Name: Chris Jones
D.O.B: 11th
June 1975
Age: 36
Lives: Brentwood
Height: 5’7”
Off-season weight:
13st 7lbs – 14st
Contest weight: 12st 7lbs
Years Training: 20
Marital Status: Married
Career
highlights: 2011 UKBFF under 80kg
Champion
2007 NPA British Middleweight and Overall
Champion
Will represent the UK for the UKBFF
in the 2012 Amateur
Classic in the USA
Ambitions: To gain professional status and
compete at the world level
I have been training now for twenty years, a journey that
began shortly after leaving school and was heavily influenced by my father, who
always encouraged me throughout my childhood in sporting endeavours, such as
swimming, judo, gymnastics and general fitness. My father’s family had always
been involved in various sports, such as gymnastics, rugby, water polo and
boxing and his father was chosen to compete internationally in gymnastics, so I
suppose that I inherited that genetic prowess to a large extent.
My earliest
memories of seeing muscles, so to speak, was when my father brought home a
video of Arnold Schwarzenegger as Conan the Barbarian when I was about ten
years old and seeing Lou Ferrigno playing the role of “The Incredible Hulk” in
the original TV series when I was a boy. From a young age, I knew that I wanted
to be different and have that muscular look of raw power. When I kept asking my
dad if I could start lifting weights yet throughout my teenage years, he just
kept telling me that I was still a bit too young and to wait until I had grown
a bit more. Eventually, my father gave in and allowed me to have a single old
rusty dumbbell from the garage in my
bedroom that I lifted and hoisted every way I could think of after school every
night. Combining these crude exercises with sit-ups, push ups and leg raises
started to make changes to my body that I could clearly see, and I loved these
changes.
It wasn’t
until after I left school that I joined a proper local commercial gym where I
formally became involved in the apparently insane and bizarre sport of
bodybuilding. In short, the more I trained and the better food I ate, the more
muscle I grew and, consequently, I was able to dramatically change my
appearance within a couple of years. By the age of 18 years old, I had put on
approximately two stone of solid muscle. By age 22, I had put on approximately
four stone of muscle.
My first
experience of bodybuilding competition came when I was 19 years old and I
entered the junior class of the 1994 EFBB Mr. London Classic. I placed third
out of four competitors, and I really didn’t know very much about contest
preparation. After that competition, I really got the bug and I knew that I
would definitely compete again. I competed only very sporadically, but enjoyed
success at every competition thereafter, winning the novice classes at the
NABBA 1999 South East and Kent Open Championships, and winning the middleweight
and overall at the NPA 2007 British finals. My greatest success to date,
however, has been winning the 2011 UKBFF British Finals under 80Kg class and
consequently being selected by the federation to represent the UK in the Arnold
Classic world amateur contest in the USA in March 2012.
The
opportunity to be involved in the bodybuilding and fitness industry as a
profession arrived in January 2006, after much planning and forethought, when I
bought my first gym, the Broadway Gym, in Leigh-on-Sea, Essex. When I first
started working at the Broadway Gym, it was a very run-down and outdated gym
facility with antiquated gym equipment, desperately in need of modernisation
and careful attention, but it had a unique atmosphere that made you want to
train, which still endures today. Gradually over the last six years, I have
periodically updated, renovated and modernised the Broadway Gym and transformed
it into a very friendly, welcoming and prosperous small business.
Furthermore,
I have always tried to share with the wider community the benefits that
bodybuilding, weight training and exercise can offer, since I have enjoyed
improved health, greater strength, self-esteem and self-confidence myself
through being able to sculpt my body to the way I want. In 2006, I established
a fitness and strength conditioning programme with Trinity Boys under 18
Football Club in Southend, where the boys would have a weekly circuit training
session with me in order to improve their strength and performance on the
pitch. The programme was a great success and several of the boys continued to
train at the Broadway Gym, even when the football season finished. In addition,
I have also run a scheme with a local Pupil Referral Unit in Hadleigh with boys
who have been excluded from mainstream education as part of their weekly
timetable for off-site activities. The programme has endured for the last five
years for various year groups coming up through the school and has been a
resounding success and extremely popular with these disaffected youngsters. The
benefits of weight training have transgressed the typical barriers to learning
that these boys had typically held and provided them with a greater sense of
self-worth, achievement and self-discipline. Again, some of the boys have
actually come to the gym outside of school time of their own accord and the
feedback from the teachers has been extremely positive.
In
September 2011, the Landlord finally obtained planning permission to re-develop
the site of the Broadway Gym into luxury flats and so I was forced to seek
alternative premises. An amazing opportunity arose to buy an existing gym
called Titans Health and Fitness in Rayleigh and so, from 1st
October 2011, I embarked upon my second gym project.
Titans is a
very modern gym, located within a small estate of industrial units behind the
co-operative supermarket in Rayleigh and is within very easy access of the High
Street and neighbouring Hockley and Eastwood. Titans Gym has a very friendly
atmosphere with a cross-section of different people with diverse goals of
strength and fitness. The staff at Titans are able to offer personal training,
prescription of exercise and nutritional programmes, tailored to individual
needs and a wide range of bodybuilding and fitness supplements at competitive
prices. The gym facilities include a full range of free weights, barbells and
dumbbells, Life Fitness and Power Fabrications machines, full cardio area, male
and female changing rooms and a high-powered stand-up sunbed. I am confident
that Titans will be as successful, if not more so, than the Broadway Gym has
been over the last six years.
My Keys to Success
In this life, there are no “secrets” or “magic formulas” to
be successful. Of course, luck plays a very small part in the big picture, but
I believe that we have to make our own luck in this world. Undoubtedly, to be
successful, you have to commit yourself 100% to what you want to achieve,
believe whole-heartedly in yourself, recognise your self-worth without being
arrogant, and never let others throw you off course or pull you down. The sport
of bodybuilding has taught me so much about my own strength of character and
contributed heavily to my development as a person, since the extreme discipline
and commitment required in competitive bodybuilding can be applied to other
areas of life. Although this discipline and desire to succeed must come from
within oneself, one of the most important factors for carrying you through the
challenges of life is to have someone to share these experiences with and a
family that supports you in your endeavours.
