6 Years ago I began my fitness journey as a 90 pound frail, lanky, near emaciated teen looking to build confidence and become comfortable in my own skin. Although my central goal has always been muscular development, I quickly fell in love with strength training as an integral part of acquiring the physique of my dreams. Physical changes don’t occur overnight, but chasing strength became a source of constant motivation for me, a goal to strive for day in and day out in the gym, a goal which I could see materialize from training session to training session.

My name is Chris Bumstead and I am an IFBB Classic Physique Pro from Ottawa, Canada. Growing up, I built the base of my physique training for football, basketball and track and field in high school. It wasn’t until I met my friend, coach and now brother-in-law, Iain Valliere, that I even thought about competing. In 2014, at the age of 19, I participated in my first bodybuilding show and fell in love with competing.In 2015, I won bodybuilding Junior Canadian Nationals and in 2016 I earned my IFBB pro card as the Bodybuilding Heavyweight Champion at the IFBB North American Championships at the age of 21. After turning pro, I switched over to the Classic Physique division and in 2017 and in 2018 I qualified and competed in the Mr. Olympia competition, where I finished second place both years. I currently still reside in Canada where I am training to obtain that first-place position for the Classic Physique Olympia.I started out purely with the love of training hard and wanting to get huge. Slowly I started to build a more complex love of fitness. Physique wise switching to the Classic division drove my passion through the roof, thinking now of symmetry aesthetics and portraying it all as a form of art through posing is such a different dynamic than just trying to be huge. And in the overall fitness and health aspect, I went from eating whatever was in sight to try and grow, to actually understanding the nutrients and how much I should be taking in to optimize recovery, growth and most importantly health. A lot of my increased views on overall health came when I was diagnosed with an autoimmune disease, IGA Nephropathy. While this may cut my career as a professional competitor short, my love for fitness and training will always be the most important aspect of my life that I will continue to uphold for as long as I possibly can. We all face our own challenges in life and I’m just grateful to have a positive output such as the gym I can always look forward to through the good and the bad.