Amy Schmid

by Hans
Photography by James Cook and GeneX

Amy Schmid has a body that screams potential. At just under 5-foot-7 and 138 pounds in contest shape, Amy, a native of Columbus, Ohio, is beautifully-shaped, with big shoulders, a tiny waist and long, lean muscle bellies. At the age of just 21, placed third in the light-heavyweights at the North Americans – an amazing achievement in itself. But it’s hard not to look at her and imagine how she might look in a few years’ time when she fills out.

It’s amazing that Amy has any kind of future in bodybuilding, however, let alone such a bright one. Just after graduating from high school three years ago, she suddenly and inexplicably began to feel weak and then lost all feeling in her arms and legs. Within a month, she was virtually paralyzed and wheelchair-bound. Amy, who had been a competitive swimmer, gymnast and softball and volleyball player in high school and was nicknamed “Diesel” because of her muscular shoulders and arms, watched in horror as her body deteriorated day by day. “I was freaking out,” she says. “I’m super athletic and then I can’t walk up the stairs.”

Finally she was diagnosed with Guillain-Barré Syndrome, a rare neurological disease, in which a tiny germ enters the immune system and attacks the myelin sheaths around the nerves. She was immediately admitted to hospital for treatment, but the neurologist told her it would probably take her six months to be able to walk again and a year or two to play sports again. But that wasn’t quick enough for Amy. “I think I’m invincible,” she laughs, “so I had to get better.” Amazingly, after just two months of physical therapy, she was released.

It was then that Amy began lifting weights. Determined to get back to normal (“my personal ‘normal’ was super strong,” she laughs), she started working in a gym and learning everything she could about training and nutrition. As she got more and more into it, she not only got her strength back, her body also started to change shape. As her already thick back filled out, she even noticed the beginning of a v-taper, making her look more like a bodybuilder than a swimmer. She loved it.

Until then Amy didn’t know much about competitive bodybuilding - despite having lived in Columbus, the home of the Arnold Classic, her whole life. But soon afterwards, she moved to San Diego, where she met national-level bodybuilder Holly Geersen. Missing competitive sports and inspired by Holly, Amy decided to do a bodybuilding show. “I thought, ‘I need to get back into something,’” she says. In December 2003 – just 16 months after she had been diagnosed with Guillain-Barré - Amy placed second in the novice class at the Excalibur.

The following year, after moving back to Ohio and enrolling at Columbus State University, Amy did Collegiate Nationals in Pittsburgh. She won the heavyweights and overall, but when she saw the size, shape and leanness of the women competing in the masters’ division at the show, she also realized she had a way to go before she could be competitive as a national-level bodybuilder. “Their conditioning was insane,” she says. “I was just a little girl compared to them. It kinda put me in my place.”

Later that year, at just 20, Amy won the heavyweights at the Ohio State. She had planned to do the Ohio State again this year, but after winning the middleweights and overall at the Motor City in Detroit in August, friends in the gym told her she was ready for a national-level show. They were right. It was only when she saw the photos after the North Americans that she realized how much progress she had made in a year. “I was so excited when I saw them,” she says. “I was like, ‘I cannot believe those are my legs!’”

Despite her spectacular success at the North Americans, Amy is keeping her feet firmly on the ground. “I like attention, but that stuff can also be a distraction,” she says. Being the consummate athlete that she is, she prefers to stay focused on training and improving. She says she wants to improve her biceps peak, thicken her abs, balance out her back (“right now my traps are too dominant and take over my back”), get more definition in her calves, and bring out her hamstrings more. Of course, at just 21 years-old, she has all the time in the world.

Right now Amy’s goal is to win her weight class at the Junior Nationals next year (either light-heavyweights or heavyweights). “I see next year as my big year,” she says. In the meantime, she is planning to do her first powerlifting show in November “just for fun” and to give her an off-season focus. “I also think it will make me a lot harder,” she says. She is also starting paramedic training in November.

Whatever her future holds, bodybuilding has already transformed Amy’s life, not just by helping her recover from Guillain-Barré Syndrome, but also by making her more confident. Back when she was in high school, she was embarrassed about her shoulders and arms and tended to, as she puts it, “hide.” Now she could not be more proud of her body and gets a kick out of all the reactions she gets - both positive and negative. “I like to freak people out!” she laughs. In fact, she says, she now loves being different. “I know not many people can do this. That gives me confidence every day.”

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