Bodybuilder wants to build sport

Duncan bodybuilder Chris Jones, who has established himself as one of the best on Vancouver Island, would love to see the sport grow, but knows there's a lot of work ahead of him.

"I'd like to get into promoting the sport and helping people who are interested in getting into it," he said. "There are a lot of people who train, but are nervous or apprehensive about it, or don't understand the process."

Preparing for competition is a difficult process for bodybuilders, particularly the high-protein, low-carb pre-competition diet that they have to stick to prior to events.

"I think people are a bit scared of that," Jones acknowledged. "There's a lot that the general public doesn't understand about the sport. They think you have to starve yourself."

Just adding muscle mass is only part of bodybuilding, Jones noted.

"It's a big commitment," he said. "If I want to compete, it takes about 12 to 16 weeks to do the competition diet. A lot of the sport is about eating and cooking food. On top of that, you're going to the gym twice a day. It's time-consuming."

There's also the issue of steroids and other performance-enhancers, which Jones says he doesn't use.

"I compete in all-natural competition, where we are drug-tested," he related. "Anything you can buy in stores is fine: protein powder, creatine, multivitamins; nothing that comes in a syringe, though."

Jones entered a pair of high-profile competitions this year, and he paid for his training physically.

"This was the first time I've done two in one year, and they were close together," he said. "It was hard on my body."

On June 26, Jones won the Western Naturals in Nanaimo, an event he calls a "novice-level" competition.

"It was more or less guys from the Island and the odd guy from the Mainland," Jones explained. "People don't travel too far for that one."

On May 22, Jones placed seventh in his weight class at the Western Canadian Championships in Kelowna.

"It was a lot bigger, with a lot higher-calibre athletes," he said. "There were 18 guys in my weight class in Kelowna, and there were 18 guys in the whole competition in Nanaimo."

The result wasn't quite what Jones was looking for, but he took it as a learning experience.

"I wasn't disappointed, but I would have liked to be in the top five," he said. "It was my first shot at a show that big, so there was some stuff I took out of it. I wasn't 100 per cent."

Jones has been involved in bodybuilding for about five years, since he was in his late teens.

"I always used to work out for hockey," he explained. "I played rep hockey, and I wanted to get stronger for that. Once I finished playing competitively, I got into it through bodybuilding magazines and Youtube clips."

Once he gave it a shot, it didn't take long for the bug to take hold.

"I wasn't 100 per cent sure it was something I wanted to get into, but once I got started, it was something I was very keen on pursuing," he said.

Jones also won his class at Western Naturals in 2007. He thought right away about going to the next level, but that ended up taking three years. He suffered a setback when he came down with mononucleosis in 2008, which kept him out of training for around six months.

"I had to start from scratch again," he said. "It took about a year to get back to where I was. I lost about 10 pounds of muscle mass."

Jones wants to give the Kelowna competition another shot, but that won't likely happen for another couple of years. Next spring, he'll graduate from the teaching program at Vancouver Island University, and he'll have to find a job, something that could be challenging if he's training full-time.

"If I was trying to do that while training for a competition, it would be difficult," he admitted. "You don't have energy, and you're grumpy because you're hungry all the time."