I turned 40 last fall and it has now been 18 years since I last competed in bodybuilding. Through friendships I made at that time with the amazing UFE fitness competitor Melissa Hooper Francis and her husband Bryan Francis, I’ve been invited to be a judge at the UFE Fury event in Chicago in 2012 and 2013. Naturally you would expect judges of such an event to have a fair amount of experience in the sport and, for those who don’t know me, it’s not immediately clear that I would have such experience. So, for the benefit of anyone who might be interested, I’ve decided to tell the story of my life as a competitive bodybuilder. It started earlier than you might imagine: