The Tribune

By BRENT STUBBS

Senior Sports Reporter

bstubbs@tribunemedia.net

After falling short last year, national physique champion Lorraine LaFleur said she intends to settle for nothing less than a professional card when she competes next month when the Central American and Caribbean Bodybuilding and Fitness Championships return to the Bahamas.

“I should have won the pro card from last year,” LaFleur said. “They told me I’m too muscular. I don’t know how you can be too muscular. That’s the look I carried last year. So I was told to comply with the rules and come much softer. I don’t like it, but I’m willing to comply with the rules just to get my pro card.”

Before she can go after her pro card when the CAC Championships is staged September 24-27 at the Atlantis resort on Paradise Island, LaFleur will have to get through the Bahamas Bodybuilding and Fitness Federation’s National Bodybuilding and Fitness Championships, set for Saturday night at the Melia Hotel.

LaFleur, back in the women’s physique after the abolishment of women’s bodybuilding, will have to compete against Tanya Moxey in a rematch from last year. But she said she will be ready for whoever steps on the stage because her ultimate goal is the CAC Championships and her bid to earn her pro card as the overall winner.

Also this weekend, LaFleur will be watching with keen interest as her 16-year-old daughter Allyssa Fox will be making her debut in the junior bikini division.

“I’ve been asking her for the past two years to get involved, but she finally decided to do it this year,” LaFleur said. “She’s doing two hours of cardio a day and she’s doing her own diet and cooking her own food. She’s even cooking for me, so I’m very proud to see the progress she has made. I think she will do very well.”

While she wasn’t prepared to go full force into bodybuilding like her mother, Fox said she was impressed with the way one of the competitors looked in the bikini division last year and that peaked her interest and that is why she decided to come out and step on stage this year.

“They made me do cardio training for two hours every day and that was what started it,” she said.

Fox, however, said she was always inspired by her mother and she’s hoping that they can become the first mother-daughter combo to win the championship titles.

“I want to win my division,” said Fox, who will be entering the 11th grade at St Augustine’s College in September. “I know that my mom is going to win, so it would be nice if I can win my division and join her too on stage as a champion. I think we’ve worked hard to do it.”

And what a remarkable feat if they can both come back in September to represent the Bahamas in the CAC Championships at Atlantis.