In today’s section of Competitors Profiles, we’d like to introduce you to Hunter. He competed in our third bodybuilding competition in 2016.

My name is Hunter and I’ve been transitioning for about two and a half years. I’m a welder by trade and I do bodybuilding on the side. I plan on becoming a physical trainer in the next year.

I actually started training with my trainer and then decided to do a bodybuilding competition at FitCon after we started working together. She’s done other competitions herself.

My diet and routine is a seven day a week job.

The  FitCon competition was my first bodybuilding experience. I kept seeing people post pictures of the competition on my Facebook page long before I ever started training for it.

To prepare and motivate myself, I had to keep telling myself that it was worth it and that I had the capability of being on stage just as much as the next guy, even though I hadn’t had top surgery. Emotionally it was exhausting telling myself that I looked just as good as everyone else up there.

I think that it’s great that we are creating our own competition. I hope to see a Trans women’s side of it as well and I would like to see it get as big as NPC or IFBB. I would like to see it grow and have the possibility of having qualifying rounds that people can buy or own.

Bodybuilding to me relates to my identity because it helps show who I am inside, on the outside.

I think that we’ve come a long way but we still have a very long way to go especially since a lot of Trans people are stealth and have no desire to help others.

I do see myself as an ambassador for the Trans community and the LGBT community as a whole. A friend of mine and I own a clothing business called flannel fly 66 that was built to help people. I feel like I am also an ambassador because I try to stay as visible as I can in order to show people that it is okay to be visible

Five years from now I hope to still be competing but own my own welding art business and competing in other shows such as the NPC.

Tips I would give would be to find a trainer that can help; if you don’t have money, find a friend that will help push you and help you with things.

Hopefully I’ll see you all this upcoming October!

###

Please follow us on Twitter | Instagram | Facebook | YouTube