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My trip to Montreal started off a bit bumpy. I originally had an 8am flight Wednedsay October 5^th and arrived at the airport about 20 minutes before take off – needless to say, I missed my flight! But, no problem, WestJet scheduled me on another one 2 hours later with a connection in Toronto (my original flight was direct 🙁 ). So I was loosing my head a bit…what can I say…I was on day 10 of low carbs. When I stopped in Toronto, I desperately needed to use the washroom. I quickly found one but was dumbfounded to see a lack of urinals as well as a pair of high heels beneath one of the stall doors – hmm, what was up?! Yep, you guessed it, I was in the women’s washroom for a good 20 seconds – a tad embarrassing. After finding the appropriate washroom, I ran to my flight that was well into boarding time (at least that’s what I thought). With my 3 bags of luggage, I ran to the correct gate, put my stuff down and, while gasping for air, concernedly asked if I was too late to board. The flight check-in representative laughed, and explained that boarding is not set to start for another 10 minutes – it turns out I misread the boarding time as the departure time. I made my way to waiting area and checked my phone. I received a text message from my good friend Farrah explaining me how a friend on my Facebook account used to be her grade 9 french teacher. And then it dawned on me, oh my god, this same person was my grade 8 french teacher! This sudden new development had me so intrigued – I knew I recognized this person somewhere (other than the fitness industry)! Then suddenly I heard “this is the last boarding call, last boarding call for West Jet flight 905” – oops, I better board! After making my way onto the plane it seemed I was missing something?! I left my wallet, passport, and flight itinerary at the check-in counter. Yes, things upstairs were just not working this day. To boot, my seat was in the front row of the plane and, yet, I somehow managed to make my way half down the plane aisle; it wasn’t fun having to make a line of people behind me move backwards out of the plane so I could make it to my seat.

I flew into Montreal Airport at around 6pm, hailed a cab, and was at the posh upscale St. Martin hotel before 7pm (all saints are very special – isn’t that right Chuck?? – oui oui!!)

I hit up some cardio that evening, went grocery shopping, and then settled for the night.

The following day my friend Louis arrived in town. It was my last day of weight training before the show. We headed into Montreal and trained at the ProFlex gym. It was a packed house with a huge bodybuilding memorabilia on the back wall – very cool to see!

I completed my 45 minutes of depletion training and did my 3^rd last 45 minute session of cardio. Yes, the countdown was on!

Saturday was weigh-in day – a 6 hour open weigh in for all bodybuilders – junior, masters, open men, open women, etc. There were 220 athletes (give or take a few) with 30+ competitors in my class. I weighed in at 183lbs which put me near the bottom of the light heavyweight class – not the most strategic move in some people’s eyes – I probably could have sucked down to 176lbs (to make middleweight) but to the detriment of my physique. In retrospect, I believe this would have helped me place higher since I would have been one of the bigger guys for that class. The night meeting was a little different – it seemed to go on forever in a giant banquet room with a temperature of 40°C – not surprising I guess – imagine the amount of metabolic energy in that room. Oh, and how can I forget my tanning experience, a small hotel room with about 10 guys, all of us completely nude, literally tripping over one and other, along with 2 attractive females doing the spraying – interesting to say the least.

The day of the show was interesting. Louis drove me and I arrived at the theater just before 9am. I knew I would have some time to kill but didn’t think that it would be nearly 7 hours before I would actually hit the stage! I felt confident while pumping up – I knew I had brought a very good level of conditioning. Looking around at the 30 some odd guys in my class, I could only see about 5 competitors whom I felt were dangerous along with 1 guy, Martin Allard, who was head and shoulders above everyone (BTW, Martin Allard won his procard that night!).  The lightheavy weight class was so big that we could barely all fit on stage (even in a U-like fashion). After some time, the 1^st callout was announced and, unfortunately, I was not in it. Then the 2^nd callout was announced and, again, I was not in it. Weird I thought – I wasn’t sure what to make of it. Then the 3^rd, 4^th, and 5^th callouts were made – still nothing! A little shocked I wondered what was going on. Finally a 6^th callout was announced and it included me. They went through some of our mandatories and then sent us back in line. That was it.

Back stage with Ram, Chuck, and Tyrone at the CBBF Nationals

The night show was a lot of fun. I hung out backstage with some new friends and reacquainted myself with another :0) We all seemed to have a good time and I can’t thank Carla enough for the half a cheesecake I seemingly managed to muster from her – fantastic it most certainly was!! Along with Martin Allard, 2 other competitors were crowned with IFBB professional status. Mike Johnson was one of them (who I was not familiar with) and Renaldo Gairy – a Pro just waiting to happen. Renaldo has incredible shape, structure, and balance. I believe he has the potential to go very far; I’ve always been a fan of his physique.

After the show,  my friends Athena and Chuck invited me back to their hotel room to hang out, relax, and, of course, eat! I went back to my hotel to shower, change, and then headed over to the Sheraton Hotel. We had a blast along with Tyrone, Aman, and Aman’s girlfriend. Thank you again Athena and Chuck! Good people, good food, good times!

So how do I feel? What else did I get up to in Montreal? What’s next for me? Stay tuned for part 3…