A lot of people told Kim Donnelly she was wasting her time entering the 2008 NPC Max Muscle West Regional body building event, held in November at the Chandler Center for the Arts.

Donnelly, a 17-year-old senior at Basha High School, had only started lifting weights about a year ago and had never entered any body building competitions. Fortunately for her, Donnelly didn’t listen to this negativity.

She finished first in the teen class and, more importantly, was second overall in the C class.  In the overall competition, Donnelly competed against women in the 20s and 30s.

“When I started working out, I had no intention of competing,” she says. “I just wanted to work out. But I met some people at the gym who said I should try it. I had no idea what to expect.”

One thing she didn’t expect was the negativity from schoolmates about her plans. She had started her exercise program initially as a way to distance herself from some of the drama associated with school. It turns out not listening to these other kids was the right thing to do.

“People kept telling me that I shouldn’t do this,” she says. “They said I had no chance. But once I won, now there are some people wanted to get into it now too.”

Kim Donnelly is the daughter of Jim and Gina Donnelly, who own the Old World Pizza Kitchen in Gilbert. Working at the restaurant and going to school would seem to be a busy schedule, but Donnelly still wakes up at 5 a.m. every day and drives to Gold’s Gym on Baseline and Gilbert Road to work out.

“She is just so dedicated,” Gina Donnelly says. “It’s really impressive to me that she’s been able to accomplish what she has.”

Kim has received a lot of support from her parents in this endeavor, although they had some big concerns during the eight weeks leading up to the competition. The training schedule accelerates in this time, and food and water intake drops substantially.

“You really have to dehydrate yourself and take off a lot of weight,” Kim says. “I lived on tilapias and broccoli leading up to the show. It was brutal, definitely not a healthy diet. I eat very healthy right now.”

Leading up to the competition, Kim enlisted trainer Bernie Mooney to help her train. Not only did she have to get her body in the right form (down to about 10 percent body fat), she also had to learn the proper poses to show off her physique and find the right outfits.

“It’s like a full-time job,” Kim says.

Kim has taken a break from competition since the event in November, but not from working out. She wants to enter another show in California in the summer and would like to eventually join the professional body building ranks.

She will graduate from Basha High School in the spring and plans to attend Chandler Gilbert Community College in the fall. She eventually wants to attend Arizona State University and study sports physical therapy.

Written by Kirk Kern

This entry was posted on Monday, January 12th, 2009 at 3:45 pm and is filed under Featured Story. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.