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With social media and online influencing, I think it's a lot more common to be interested in building a "bodybuilder's" or otherwise heavily muscular physique without ever intending to get on stage. Hell, even when social media was still in its early days, you had women like Lisa Moordigian who did I think one or two contests before deciding that fetish work would be much more lucrative and without the physical and mental stress of prep for a competition. I don't think "not going on stage" is something that is limited to East Asian bodybuilders.
Also, I'm not sure what your perception of "has plenty of followers but never interacts with them," or "combine traditional appearance with hyper-modern display" is towards them when you also see the same from Western influencers as well. And while you do see image manipulation from notable East Asian bodybuilders, you also see that a lot from other competitors, men and women, as well.
Of course you find similar traits in fbbs from all around the world, but within the Asian community its intensively on the rise. Just take some of the most popular athletes at the moment:
Olivia Bian: 170.00o followers, never replies or likes anything on her page. Rock star appearance on the airport:
Chun-Ri: 130.00 insta followers: posts a lot but not a single comment or message to her fans.
Facetuning is used a lot on SM these days, but nowehere as shameless as among the asian models. The heads and bodies often dont seem to fit.
One appeared in glamour outfit at a fashion show (think it was in Singapur, lost the link)
traditional outfit in a prfossional manner:
Thats glamour muscle, red carpet vibes. One level above whats happeneing somewhere else. At the same time, those women are under represented in the big events. So far, for Olympia: Xinyu Chen is qulaified for Figure, and Yan Hong for WPD, thats about it.
The question remains: is bodybuilding in China/Korea primarily seen as means of self protrayel, rather than competitive sport.
With social media and online influencing, I think it's a lot more common to be interested in building a "bodybuilder's" or otherwise heavily muscular physique without ever intending to get on stage.
I bring this up often on here. A growing number of women want the look but don't want to compete and deal with the prep and the low rewards.
Olivia Bian: 170.00o followers, never replies or likes anything on her page.
I am assuming you are talking about Instagram. She has roughly the same amount of followers on Rednote/Xiaohongshu. And there she does react regularly on comments from users. So I think with the Chinese it's more a case of being active on their own social media. Most Chinese aren't even present on IG at all.
I am assuming you are talking about Instagram. She has roughly the same amount of followers on Rednote/Xiaohongshu. And there she does react regularly on comments from users. So I think with the Chinese it's more a case of being active on their own social media. Most Chinese aren't even present on IG at all.
Now thats an interesting point I have not considered yet.
Excellent observation.
PS: do you live in China ?
PS: do you live in China ?
I don't live in China, but I do have a Rednote/xhs account, and I have Douyin without account (because no Chinese phone number), so I can follow most things (Douyin has some limitations without account, but is accessible). Douyin (Chinese version of TikTok) and Rednote/xhs are my main sources for all the posts I make on this site.
And very importantly: I speak Chinese (not natively). Although the Chinese firewall is real, I think the language barrier is still the biggest obstacle to know what is going on there.
I make use of Baidu (Chinese Google) to find info/articles (all Chinese). I am also on BiliBili (video website) and sometimes Weibo (but, trouble with access)
I bring this up often on here. A growing number of women want the look but don't want to compete and deal with the prep and the low rewards.
It's completely sensible. Unless someone has a strong competitive desire to fulfill or they're just absolutely dominant like Andrea Shaw, there's absolutely no reason to compete. The prep is even worse than the steroids on your body and the reward is, at best, a pittance.
I don't live in China, but I do have a Rednote/xhs account, and I have Douyin without account (because no Chinese phone number), so I can follow most things (Douyin has some limitations without account, but is accessible). Douyin (Chinese version of TikTok) and Rednote/xhs are my main sources for all the posts I make on this site.
And very importantly: I speak Chinese (not natively). Although the Chinese firewall is real, I think the language barrier is still the biggest obstacle to know what is going on there.
I make use of Baidu (Chinese Google) to find info/articles (all Chinese). I am also on BiliBili (video website) and sometimes Weibo (but, trouble with access)
Not being chinese but speaking chinese: respect.
What I also noticed is that the asian big names have plenty of female folllowers. There are clips where you can see them touching, smiling, seeking for selfies with the FBBs. Alomst like Swifties.
Would you say, from your experience at the chinese platforms, that the asian athlete/fan community is more outgoing and confident about what they are doing - i.e. not shy to act out their liking, even in public areas?
is there anything like a local Asian bodybuilding organization outside of the IFBB world ?
Would you say, from your experience at the chinese platforms, that the asian athlete/fan community is more outgoing and confident about what they are doing - i.e. not shy to act out their liking, even in public areas?
I would say, there are still a lot of negative reactions on social media, which can get pretty bad. Most fresh in my memory is when Yàn Hóng publiced a post (this one) where she didn't use face filters, and got a sh*tstorm of reactions over her. Female bodybuilders still really have to fight against the traditional societal norms.
But there's also a group of fans who like it, and they use memes like these how they like female muscle. It might sound strange but I sometimes feel it's almost like they treat them as Anime characters which you can be a fan of.
Recently I have seen a bit of a trend of long-haired muscular guys, inspired to look like an anime-character. Interestingly enough this also leads to (sometimes very funny) reactions of users who are unsure about the gender of the guy (see this post).
I therefore see connections between bodybuilding, anime and cosplay. Maybe that's why there's such a crowd when Olivia Biàn Ruìyīng turns up at a gym, which you linked above. But I have to say that surprised me as well.
I still think people will not be open about their liking outside of the bubble with likeminded people, let alone in the public space, but this is largely an assumption from my side as well, since I am not in China myself. Someone who has lived there fairly recently, or comes there regularly can say a lot more about this.
is there anything like a local Asian bodybuilding organization outside of the IFBB world ?
As I understand it, there's the CBBA which is a national organisation, and there's the NPC Worldwide China (part of NPC Worldwide).
The competitions which are organized by organiations as Huanji, DMS, Training Monster are often under the NPC Worldwide China, and these are the route to IFBB and going to the Olympia.
The CBBA is a different structure with their own local, regional and national competitions.
My man, thats some information you provide here. I wish i would speak chiense to follow up more directly on this trend.
CBBA seems to be affiliated with IFBB (not the IFBB Pro). Leaving the larger girls almost no choice but joining NPC/IFBB Pro. It will be interesting to see, how this turns out in the future. NPC/IFBB Pro are not as regional organized like the IFBB, everything is pretty much centralized in the US. With the growing number of athletes and popularity, wouldnt be surprised if the Chinese will start something on their own.
From the Korean perspective: bodybuilding is always going to be much more developed as a social media phenomenon than as a "serious sport," but it is still a serious sport nonetheless. The reason is their combination of competitiveness, high beauty standards (which can in niche cases extend to muscular physiques), and highly cultivated social media-driven presentations of self. Check out the Netflix show "Physical 100" to see an example of the intersection of these qualities (Da-jeong An and Ji-hyun Kim both appear in the show, along with some other muscular competitors).
The online presence of Korean female physique athletes is probably well known to most users of this site. But I assure you that bodybuilding (or rather, physique/figure/bikini) is absolutely a serious sport among those who are into it. There are at least two factors, however, which drive the disparity between the high level of online presentation and the relatively lower level of international stage competitiveness: 1) Koreans are very serious about their social media and do a lot to cultivate their online images, and 2) Korean women aren't particularly competitive internationally owing to disparities of scale (that is, they tend to be short and small and have to do a hell of a lot of work to get anywhere near an international-level physique). If you want to see an example of what I mean, check out footage of the 2014 WFF Universe where Ji-hyun Kim takes the stage with Daria Diossi and Ildiko Gaspar.
Owing to the above factors, you'll see Korean women on the competitive stage and in significant numbers - it's just that we're talking about Korean stages, not international ones. Korea has a number of organizations which host shows: the Korean Physical Culture Association, NABBA, IFBB/Asia Grand Prix, Monsterzym, KBA. From time to time some notable competitors like Yeon-woo Jhi and Da-jeong An will rise from these local shows and break out into international competition. These are exceptional cases.
Such athletes drive the popularity of the sport because Koreans like to see other Koreans doing well internationally (even if they don't win, looking good on stage is captivating). I suspect other Asian situations may be similar, where the women are competitive and appear on stage locally, but we just don't hear about these competitions.
Source: I have lived and worked in Korea for the last 10 years and am a member of a local gym there.
Korean, Vietnamese and Chinese Female Bodybuilders are quite a different breed these days, they dont fit the usual western standards:
Have a great body, but are also not shy to use AI at all cost
Have plenty of followers, but never interact with them
Show themselves in the public like superstars, but can rarely be seen on the big stages
Combine traditional appearance with hyper-modern display
Is womens bodybuilding there more of a social phenomenon than a serious sport? Any thoughts welcome, feedback from the source appreciated.