There’s an odd irony in girls’s health.
It could be probably the most full division within the IFBB so far as energy, muscle, conditioning, choreography, stage presence, and athleticism go; it’s the very embodiment of the health motion—and but it has all the time lived simply barely within the shadows of its extra muscular, much less athletic cousins. In contrast to all the opposite divisions—female and male—health calls for you not solely look the half, but additionally show it in movement—excessive movement. It’s not sufficient to face there, hit some poses, and be extra spectacular than the particular person subsequent to you. No. You need to fly. And that’s precisely why Jen Hendershott belonged on the Olympia stage.
Lengthy earlier than she was Ms. Olympia. Lengthy earlier than the Arnold titles. Lengthy earlier than the routines that made judges sit up just like the entrance row of a Baptist revival. She was a cheerleader—a cheerleader who went by highschool and faculty, rose to the very high of the heap, reached the zenith of her aggressive profession at 22, and appeared round and puzzled, what’s subsequent?
The Lacking Bridge
All issues normally come to an finish, however need doesn’t know you’ve reached the tip of the street.
“I wasn’t able to retire from cheerleading,” Hendershott shares. “That’s how I discovered health.”
Hendershott had cheered at Ohio State. She had gained state championships. She was educating cheer everywhere in the world. However competitively, there was nowhere to go. Then someday Mike Davies launched her to a Health present.
“I mentioned, ‘Yeah, I can do that.’”
And the remainder is historical past.
Her rise was fast, beginning together with her first newbie present in 1997 on the Mike Francois Basic in Columbus. She obtained her professional card in 1999 on the USA Championships in Santa Monica. Then forged into the professionals, the place the lionesses feed. Let’s simply say her success wasn’t on the spot.
“My first Olympia was in 2000,” she says. “I didn’t win till 2005.”
That’s 5 years of being shut—however not shut sufficient.
“Once you’re dwelling in it, it defines you as a human. If I took sixth or eighth… I’m eighth on the planet, and I’m upset? I’m within the Tremendous Bowl and I’m mad?”
Then come the critiques.
“You want greater shoulders, greater boobs, greater this, greater that—and naturally higher situation,” she says. “Everybody seems to be wonderful. Nobody is exhibiting up fats.”
There’s no telling health women they’ve to return in more durable or higher conditioned. They’re all the time shredded.
“You retain working. You climb from eighth to fourth to 3rd. You are feeling momentum. However the competitors is fierce. None of these women are competing to lose. Nobody exhibits up hoping to put.”
However health has an added stage of hazard within the energy of their routines. They not solely need to showcase as conditioned and full a physique as every other division, however in that extremely starved and depleted state, additionally they need to carry out what quantities to an Olympic-level gymnastics routine. That factor of competitors has claimed many a knee, hamstring, ankle, wrist, elbow… let’s simply say it leaves a wake of collateral harm.
Accidents?
“None.”
“I imagine I used to be born for Health.”
As a little bit child, Jen did ballet, faucet, and jazz. She turned down skilled ballet at 13 as a result of she wished to cheer. She realized early how you can stretch, how you can ice, how you can handle her physique.
“I’m loyal to my physique,” she says. “That’s why I by no means pushed it previous what it may deal with.”
She by no means used diuretics to sharpen her situation (as a result of she knew they’d weaken her construction—dehydration radically will increase the possibility of cramps or precise harm to muscle, tendons, and connective tissue). She dieted onerous—900 to 1,200 energy a day at occasions, 40 to 60 grams of carbs—however all the time stayed clear. You possibly can think about Hendershott a daily egg whites and oatmeal sort of woman.
However even with such relentless self-discipline, why was there no {hardware}?
“What am I doing improper?” she remembers considering.
After which 2005 occurred.
She gained the Arnold. She gained the Olympia—again to again. An Ohio woman successful the Arnold in her dwelling state. Speak about being on high of the world.
“I had a dream to be Ms. O,” she says. “And to win the Arnold, being from Ohio — that meant the whole lot.”
Profitable as soon as is difficult.
Profitable once more because the reigning champion? More durable.
“Attempting to win once more because the champ was the toughest factor I’ve ever accomplished.”
However she by no means stop. She by no means walked away. Even within the wake of tragedy.
The Second No One Knew
After successful the Arnold in 2005, Hendershott acquired pregnant.
It resulted in a miscarriage—on an airplane.
“I nearly bled to demise,” she says quietly. “Not one flight attendant requested if I used to be okay. ‘Would you like some water?’ Nothing.”
When the aircraft landed, she waited till everybody had deplaned earlier than getting up and making her means out to her husband. She by no means made it public.
“It was personal. It was devastating.”
It may also have been galvanizing, as a result of 10 weeks later she gained the Olympia.
“That catapulted me into an angle I by no means had earlier than,” she says. “I wished to show to myself and to the world that I’m worthy. I’m right here. I can do that.”
In 2008 she gained the Olympia once more. In 2009 she gained the Arnold. Then she retired.
“There was nothing left for me to win.”
Time to Give Again
Joe Weider and Jim Manion created a platform—whether or not they totally realized it or not—that merged cheer, dance, and physique into one thing totally new. A pure development for ladies who had been flipping, dancing, and performing since elementary faculty.
“I actually fell into Health,” Jen says. “However I do know there are different women on the market like me who need to hold going. We simply have to point out them a means.”
And what higher means than the one Jen took? Why not convey cheer to the Olympia?
That’s precisely what the Olympia approached her to do: convey cheerleading to bodybuilding’s greatest stage. Host the first-ever cheer competitors on the Olympia. Create a feeder system into girls’s Health.
“Once they requested me, I mentioned, ‘Critically?’”
The logic is plain. Cross-promote. Convey faculty cheerleaders into the Health world. Welcome them earlier than they drift away. Allow them to see that there’s a subsequent chapter. They don’t have to hold up competing at 22.
“I advised them I’ll do that,” she says, “however I desire a couple issues. The primary is that I need to give out the award for first place.”
I don’t assume anybody goes to say no.
Again within the day, Health was harder and never fairly as interesting to some athletes. There have been 4 rounds together with two totally different swimsuit rounds, one for two-piece and one other for one-piece. No different division demanded as a lot. Since then, somebody got here to their senses, and right this moment it’s simply two rounds, with extra emphasis on routine efficiency. The division has developed, however the core stays the identical: athletic women who refuse to be accomplished performing.
Hendershott sees a complete era ready for a path ahead—and she or he’s more than pleased to point out it to them.
Life In One Shot
A intelligent title for her new e book: Life In One Shot: How I Constructed a Lifetime of Ardour, Goal, and Zero Apologies. It took 15 years to turn out to be actuality. That’s a very long time within the e book enterprise, however not with out trigger.
After Jen retired, her father grew to become unwell. She cared for him for 2 years. Then she grieved for 2 extra. Then her stepfather acquired sick. Then her stepmother battled leukemia. A decade of caretaking, loss, and grief.
“A 12 months in the past my brother dropped useless of a coronary heart assault,” she says. “That’s what lastly pushed me. Persons are all the time going to die. Life is all the time going to interrupt you.”
So she wrote. And wrote.
The e book isn’t just trophies and stage lights. It contends with doubt. Frustration. Loss. Gratitude—particularly gratitude.
“The IFBB and the Olympia gave me a spot to shine,” she says. “I might not have the life I’ve right this moment with out these individuals and people experiences.”
Greater than that, it’s a blueprint for rivals who face the quite common actuality of growing older out of their sport and discovering themselves the place they assume is the tip of the street. Nicely, it’s not; the street simply turns. The journey continues. Ardour drives it.
Life In One Shott is offered in every single place—Amazon, Walmart, Barnes & Noble.
