On Saturday, February 19, 2012, I attended the IFFB Flex Pro show in Santa Monica, California along with my son, Matthew. While the results were not stunningly surprising, they were surprising nonetheless. I will discuss all of my impressions in the following article.
The Venue – Santa Monica Civic Auditorium
I grew up in Santa Monica from 12 until 23 years of age. The Santa Monica Civic Auditorium was a place I saw many bands in concert. Not surprisingly, it has not changed much at all. It is a very convenient location for a bodybuilding show. It is just off the 10 freeway and there are a ton of restaurants nearby.
The ticket window was well-staffed and I was able to pick up my will-call tickets right away. The ushers were extremely helpful (almost too helpful) at finding my seats. The venue had maps of the seating chart up all over the place so finding your seat location would not have been a problem even without the ushers. I felt that the venue was excellent overall.
Vendor Exhibits
Something I look forward to when I go to shows like this are the vendor exhibits. I was extremely disappointed in this area. There were exactly 6 exhibitors present. The variety was slim because of so few vendors being present. I think that the people at Flex magazine could have worked harder at having vendors present for the first show of the IFBB season. This was really the only disappointment of the day.
Pre-Judging
The pre-judging started right on time. The bikini division went up first. There were 20 competitors in total. I don't completely get this division. By that I mean that I don't understand exactly what standards the judges are looking for. At the same time, I seem to have a knack for picking the top finishers and today was no different. The men's bodybuilding was next and they presented 17 competitors. To me, the top 5 became quite obvious as soon as they hit the stage. Again, I was quite close to picking the top 5. The pre-judging ended with the fitness competitors (12 in total).
The Finals
The finals were quite entertaining. The fitness competitors did their routines and they were extremely good at what they were doing. The male bodybuilders continued to be impressive. Everyone, with the exception of JoJo Ntifor0, came in great shape. In the end, each division shaped up as follows:
| Men's Bodybuilding Results | |
| 1 | Lionel Beyeke |
| 2 | Ben Pakulski |
| 3 | Fouad Abiad |
| 4 | Shawn Rhoden |
| 5 | Eduardo Correa |
| 6 | Grigori Atayan |
| 7 | Mark Dugdale |
| 8 | Vladimir Sizov |
| 9 | Constantine Demetriou |
| 10 | Omar Deckard |
| 11 | DeShaun Grimez |
| 12 | Stan Efferding |
| 13 | Lionel Brown |
| 14 | Oleg Emelyanov |
| 15 | Rusty Jeffers |
| 16 | JoJo Ntiforo |
| 17 | Mehmet Yildirim |
| Women's Fitness | |
| 1 | Adela Garcia |
| 2 | Oksana Grishina |
| 3 | Myriam Capes |
| 4 | Tanji Johnson |
| 5 | Bethany Cisternino |
| 6 | Jodi Boam |
| 7 | Vanda Hadarean |
| 8 | Camala Rodriguez |
| 9 | Allison Ethier |
| 10 | Sheri Vucick |
| 11 | Michelle Mayberry |
| 12 | Paula Williams-Gulman |
| Bikini | |
| 1 | Janaina Barral |
| 2 | Katrina McLellan |
| 3 | Lauren Triana |
The biggest controversy was the placing of Eduardo Correa. He came in super ripped and people actually booed when he was announced at 5th place. However, his size is what cost him a better placing.
My Conclusions
I truly enjoyed the atmosphere at the Flex Pro show. It got me super motivated watching everyone and the awesome shape they were in. It made me realize that the hard work is definitely worth it.
