By Craig T. Kojima, Star-Bulletin
Jason Iyomasa is a fine example that
determination and hard work pays off.
Building for a future
Iyomasa was a geek in the school band,
By Dave Reardon
now he's tooting his horn for the
Hawaiian Islands Bodybuilding Championships
Special to the Star-BulletinHumble bodybuilder Jason Iyomasa doesn't blow his own horn, but that's exactly what the self-described "band geek" did at Kalakaua Intermediate School 15 years ago. Actually, it was his dad's horn, a trombone that Iyomasa still has but doesn't play anymore. When he sees it, it brings back memories of when he and his friend Chris Faildo were skinny little runts trying to avoid the mokes.
"I got mugged a couple times for 50 cents," Iyomasa recalls. "Then I started keeping my lunch money in my socks. People had something against us because we were in the band."
"Yeah, we were band geeks," says Faildo with a chuckle. "That was the only way we could get on the football field. We were really small and it was a rugged school. That's how we got into weight training."
Today, after a decade-and-a-half of pumping iron and eating right, nobody is shaking down either of these guys -- except, in a sense, their own sport.
They are two of the hardest working, most disciplined bodybuilders around -- and they have the trophies and physiques to show for it. But you don't see them on magazine covers or pulling in the big appearance fees for guest posing.
Although the trend is shifting back toward drug testing at contests, natural, drug-free bodybuilders like Faildo and Iyomasa are still in the shadows in a sport where most fans think bigger is always better. And bigger is often accomplished through steroids and other dangerous drugs.
"It's an individual choice," says Iyomasa, who works as a nurse at Rehab Hospital of the Pacific. "But there's a lot of documentation of the negative short-term side effects, and they don't even know about all the long-term effects yet. Guys are dying."
Faildo was the runner-up last year in the Mr. Universe contest, the most prestigious drug-free bodybuilding contest in the world. Iyomasa aspires to join his old pal on the U.S. team.
The first step is performing well at tomorrow night's Hawaiian Islands Bodybuilding Championships at Blaisdell Concert Hall.
Faildo thinks Iyomasa has a good chance.
"Jason is known for his symmetry. Although he has a small structure (5-foot-4, 143 pounds), he creates an illusion of being much bigger and he's a very good poser," Faildo says. "He just needs to fill out a little more, but there's no doubt he's on the road to being a very good natural bodybuilder."
Harold Han is Iyomasa's workout partner and trainer at The Gym in Kakaako. He says Iyomasa's discipline and personality are two big pluses.
"It's probably his dedication more than anything else. He had a lot of weaknesses. He had to improve his legs, now his legs are a strength for him," Han says. "The other thing is that he's a real soft-spoken, nice guy. He's the kind of guy you want as a friend, who's always thinking about other people. You don't always see that in this sport."
Iyomasa trains for contests on a 16-week cycle. During that time he is on an extremely strict diet and works out four hours a day.
"Nutrition is really important. But you could have the best nutrition in the world and it wouldn't matter if you don't give it your all in the gym," Iyomasa says. "I do a lot of cardio work, like the treadmill and the bike, because it gets my metabolism going, gets me focused and gives me more endurance to lift."
Iyomasa also is inspired by his girlfriend, Laura Yamada (who helps him by preparing his special high-protein and -carbohydrate meals), and by his lifting partners Han and Clifton Torres.
Iyomasa says he doesn't really view bodybuilding as a sport where he is competing against others, but more as a test of his discipline and ability to keep getting better.
"My goal is to look better each show," Iyomasa says. "I don't really care about who else is entering, it's about making improvement show to show."
And doing it without drugs.
"I want to show you can achieve a great physique naturally," Iyomasa says. "Bodybuilding gets a bad rap, because even if you aren't using drugs sometimes people say, 'Man, he's got to be using something,' but he could be natural and just be a real hard worker."
Hawaiian Islands
Bodybuilding ChampionshipsWhen: Tomorrow
