Bailey will be the first to tell you that her accomplishments in competitions and her career mean nothing compared to how proud she is to have overcome her own body image issues, which she struggled with for a long time. Since then, she has become the first Ms. Physique Olympia and the first IFBB physique pro, owns her own gym and clothing line, and she has been featured in several magazines. She now runs a fitness website to inspire people on their fitness journeys.
Masino’s bodybuilding career lasted from 1994-2007. Her biggest win was in 2003 when she claimed first place in the Night of Champions competition in both the Lightweight and Overall categories. She also had a career as a model and was also voted the “Sexiest Bodybuilder Alive” by Iron Man magazine.
Durbesson is not a bodybuilder for competitions, but instead, she trains because it is what she loves to do as a personal trainer who also has an Instagram following of over one million. She is French and moved to the United States to be with her then-boyfriend, and now still lives in the States to continue her career as an athlete.
Ence is a bodybuilder, fitness model, and CrossFit athlete and trainer. She has competed in several CrossFit competitions and has even come out with some first, second, and third place titles. She follows a strict fitness and nutrition regimen, and because of that, has a physique even most men could only dream of having.
McLish is a retired bodybuilder and has also appeared in a couple of movies and has authored a couple of books. From her story, it looks like she didn’t always think about becoming a bodybuilder, although fitness was important to her. She was encouraged by her fitness club business partner to join bodybuilding competitions, and in her only four-year career, she never placed lower than third in the competitions and even won the first competition she ever entered.
McLish actually inspired Portugues to become a bodybuilder. When Portugues was in college, she saw McLish’s many victories and wanted to start a muscle training regimen herself. While she did not quite amass the same fame as McLish, she still consistently placed in the top 10 at the Ms. Olympia competition.
Grishina is a retired gymnast and current bodybuilding fitness competitor. Her career began in the early 2000s and is still competing even in 2020. She has won several first and second place titles in her professional career, and looks great! In her forties, she doesn’t look a day over 25.
Chyna, also known by her birth name Joan Marie Laurer, was a professional wrestler, model, bodybuilder and author. She made her debut in 1995, and her career lasted until she retired in 2011. Chyna was renowned for being “the most dominant female competitor of all time,” according to the WWE, and her legacy will last a long time. Sadly, in 2016 she passed away from an accidental drug overdose at the age of 46.
While Lavenne may have been on the bodybuilding stage before, she now would rather be known for her acting and modeling. She still maintains her very muscular and athletic physique, as you can see on her Instagram with 25,000 followers, but she would rather build up her IMDB page than her competition wins.
Lisa Marie Varon, also known by her ring names of Victoria or Tara, is a retired professional wrestler, fitness competitor and bodybuilder. She began her career in wrestling and bodybuilding in 2000 and officially retired in 2019. Varon has held several Champion wrestling titles and was pushed by none other than Chyna to pursue her career as a wrestler.
Cordie is a natural bodybuilder, which means she stays away from using performance-enhancing drugs. She first got into bodybuilding when she was young. Cordie loved to ski, but when she was 17, she blew out her knee so badly that she could never ski again. Through her physical therapy in rehabilitation for her injury, Cordie fell in love with muscle training, which led her to later enter into bodybuilding competitions.
Andressa is a Brazilian fitness competitor and model. She is known for winning and placing high in several of the most popular competitions in Brazil and for her modeling for different fitness brands and magazines. She is recognized mostly now through her Instagram page where she has a following of six million people.
Marianna Komlos’s bodybuilding and wrestling careers only lasted about a year each, but she gained a lot of recognition for her beauty and strength. She even won a couple of champion titles. Komlos tragically passed away from breast cancer at the age of 35 in 2004.
Reis is a bodybuilder and model from Brazil. She is also a businesswoman and owns her own restaurants in the United States. She has competed and placed highly in several competitions throughout her career in Brazil and in the United States. She was even chosen as a Playboy Playmate. Reis is now married, a mother to young children, and has chosen to focus more on being a nutrition coach, as shown on her Instagram page with over half a million followers.
Vuorela is a bodybuilder that is best known for being one of the hottest female bodybuilders out there. She has nearly 80,000 followers on Instagram and biceps that could maybe even make the Rock jealous. She is also a mother of two children, Hugo and Wilma.
Armstrong is a fitting last name for a bodybuilder and wrestler, and it isn’t even her stage name! Armstrong was a professional bodybuilder from 2004 to 2009 and was the Playboy Playmate of the Month in September of 1986. In September of 1994, she came out as HIV-positive in that month’s issue of The Advocate. Since then, she has done her best to bring awareness to AIDS through multiple campaigns.
Sara Piana is an Icelandic bodybuilder, mostly known for her marriage to Rich Piana and the drama of their relationship rather than winning competitions herself. The two were married in 2015 at the Mr. Olympia competition. Drama surrounding Rich accusing Sara of only marrying him for a green card, and Sara accusing Rich of lying led to her growing fame. Unfortunately Rich died in 2017, and Sara posted that she was saddened by his death.
Marsh is another natural bodybuilder, as well as a media personality, columnist and model. She has appeared in a number of reality TV shows, including her own Totally Jodie Marsh. Although she is more known for her media presence, she has competed as a bodybuilder and won the INBF Bodybuilding Championships in Los Angeles in June 2012.
Von Werder is an interesting combination of stripper, bodybuilder and evangelist. She has won the title of Miss Nude Universe and has competed professionally as a bodybuilder. Her evangelism comes from her beliefs in a matriarchal religion which takes common feminism to a whole different level. She has even published books on the topic.
Laszewski had a long bodybuilding career from 1994 to 2015. She has placed highly at the majority of her competitions and has even won two championships as the overall winner. Even though she has not placed as high as she would like in several other of her competitions, she is still considered the third-best in IFBB Pro Women’s Bodybuilding ranking.
Like several other women on this list, Enos struggled with body image and eating disorders before bodybuilding helped her find the confidence she needed to overcome those issues. She now boasts over half a million followers on Instagram and an insane physique that she achieved naturally through hard work in fitness and dieting.
Mukami wasn’t always a perfectly fit bodybuilder. She is very open on her website and Instagram about her struggles with weight and her consideration of getting liposuction back in 2011, that was until she finally found her perfect personal trainer that helped her get her dream body without the need of liposuction. This inspired her to enter bodybuilding and fitness competitions, and in 2014, she launched her fitness and inspiration website and now has almost 70,000 followers on Instagram.
Nabieva is an Azerbaijani bodybuilder with three million followers on Instagram. She lifts weights and builds her body for her bikini competitions, but she is currently not training for any specific competitions. She does not like the strict diet and exercise regimen required to win those competitions, but she is clearly still training as evident by the revealing pictures she shares on Instagram.
Rish grew up with a focus on health and fitness from her parents. She eventually became a registered nurse, which only encouraged her healthy habits more. Rish did gymnastics and danced when she was young, but slowly began lifting and gaining muscle. In 2008, she competed in two fitness, figure and bodybuilding competitions.
Nicole Bass began her career as a bodybuilder in 1985 and continued until 1997. She won several bodybuilding championships throughout her career. Once she retired from bodybuilding, she became a professional wrestler until she retired in 2000. Not only was she a bodybuilder and wrestler, she was also an actress and had some guest appearances on several soap operas. Bass sadly died in 2017 at the age of 52 from a heart attack.
Wolfe grew up doing intense gymnastics practices and competitions from the moment she could walk to when she was forced to quit because of a back injury. Since her childhood was focused on fitness and competitions, she wanted to continue that interest and start training for fitness and bodybuilding competitions.
