Ten­nille Al­leyne

Tama­ra Re­beiro is a pro­fes­sion­al T&T body builder who has com­pet­ed lo­cal­ly, re­gion­al­ly and in­ter­na­tion­al­ly over the years.She was al­so nom­i­nat­ed by the TTBBF as the fe­male nom­i­nee for Body­build­ing for the FCB Sports Per­son­al­i­ty of the Year Awards for 2007 and 2008, where she was vot­ed in­to the top ten sports per­son­al­i­ties for these years.

When Re­beiro is not an­ni­hi­lat­ing her com­peti­tors on stage, she is work­ing as the stu­dent ser­vices man­ag­er at the Trinidad and To­ba­go Hos­pi­tal­i­ty and Tourism In­sti­tute.She holds a BBA from the Uni­ver­si­ty of New Brunswick and at­tend­ed Na­pari­ma Girls' High School.

Her list of ti­tles in­clude Na­tion­al Se­nior Body Build­ing and Fit­ness Cham­pi­onships (Trinidad) Body Fit­ness Open Class (first place); Cen­tral Amer­i­can and Caribbean Body­build­ing and Fit­ness Cham­pi­onships (Ba­hamas) Body Fit­ness - 163 cm Class (first place); Cen­tral Amer­i­can and Caribbean Body­build­ing and Fit­ness Cham­pi­onships (San Sal­vador, El Sal­vador) Body Fit­ness - 163 cm Class (first place); and this year's CAC cham­pi­onships Over­all Win­ner, through which she was able to earn her pro card.

The T&T Guardian caught up with Tama­ra Re­beiro and here is what she had to say on her ex­pe­ri­ences as a body builder.

TTG: What got you in­ter­est­ed in body build­ing in the first place?

TR: I de­vel­oped an in­ter­est in health, fit­ness, and body­build­ing from a young age due to my par­ents, who were both phys­i­cal­ly ac­tive and in­to weightlift­ing.

TTG: Did you weight lift grow­ing up?

TR: I played var­i­ous sports in school, but nev­er re­al­ly set­tled on one to spe­cialise in. I start­ed lift­ing weights when I start­ed work­ing, and got hooked.

TTG: When did you de­cide that you want­ed to ac­tu­al­ly com­pete as a body­builder?

TR: I start­ed com­pet­ing at the en­cour­age­ment of the man who is now my train­er, Per­ry Jerome. I was very hes­i­tant at first, but at the urg­ing of my hus­band, I de­cid­ed to try it. Af­ter my first com­pe­ti­tion, I was hooked.

TTG: Any chal­lenges­so far?

TR: My great­est chal­lenge now is to source fund­ing to com­pete on the pro­fes­sion­al cir­cuit. It is al­ready very cost­ly to com­pete as an am­a­teur, so to com­pete at the pro lev­el is even more so.

TTG: What does your hus­band think about your sport­ing ca­reer?

TR: My hus­band is my num­ber one fan, and I thank him for all his love and sup­port. It is not easy be­ing the sig­nif­i­cant oth­er of a body­build­ing com­peti­tor, but he per­forms the role with such pa­tience and en­thu­si­asm!

TTG: What has been your proud­est achieve­ment?

TR: Win­ning my pro card at the re­cent CAC Cham­pi­onships and earn­ing the right to com­pete as a IF­BB Pro­fes­sion­al.

TTG: As a woman in a so-called "men's sport," what has been the re­sponse from your peers in the body build­ing fra­ter­ni­ty?

TR: Most of my peers have been very sup­port­ive, male and fe­male-I think we are all unit­ed by the love of the sport and share the dis­ap­point­ment at the lack of sup­port it re­ceives.

TTG: What are your thoughts on the treat­ment of body­build­ing lo­cal­ly?

TR: There is a gen­er­al lack of re­spect for the sport in this coun­try. It is not a "main­stream" sport like crick­et, foot­ball, net­ball etc, and there­fore it has been ex­treme­ly dif­fi­cult for the Trinidad and To­ba­go Body Builders Fed­er­a­tion (TTBBF) to se­cure suf­fi­cient fund­ing to be able to ex­pose our lo­cal ath­letes to re­gion­al and in­ter­na­tion­al com­pe­ti­tions to help them to rise to the high­est lev­els of the sport world­wide.

TTG: Are you ever con­cerned about hav­ing a physique that is less fem­i­nine?

TR: No, I have nev­er felt as though I have lost my fem­i­nin­i­ty-as a mat­ter of fact, there isn't a time I feel more fem­i­nine than when I step on the com­pe­ti­tion stage.

TTG: Would you ever do body build­ing full time?

TR: If fi­nances al­lowed, def­i­nite­ly!!

TTG: Are you on a spe­cial di­et as a body builder?

TR: The list of things I can eat is much short­er than the list of those that I can't! While the di­et dif­fers slight­ly in the off sea­son, as op­posed to com­pe­ti­tion prep, the ba­sic prin­ci­ple re­mains-eat clean! That means stay­ing away from processed foods as far as pos­si­ble and of course the usu­al sus­pects like fried, fat­ty fast foods, sug­ary can­dy, pas­tries, rich sauces, gravies and sal­ad dress­ings etc.

TTG: What's your train­ing reg­i­men like?

TR: I work out five days a week and rest on the week­ends-each work­out con­sists of both weight train­ing and car­dio.

TTG: What's your most elu­sive goal pro­fes­sion­al­ly and/or per­son­al­ly?

TR: I haven't yet reached the lev­el of spir­i­tu­al­i­ty that I would like, but I'm work­ing on it.

TTG: Where have you trav­elled to com­pete?

TR: Thanks to the TTBBF, I have been priv­i­leged to trav­el to many in­ter­est­ing places-Ba­hamas, Bermu­da, Spain, Italy, Grena­da, Venezuela and El Sal­vador.

TTG: What is the great­est ad­vice you re­ceived?

TR: That you shouldn't be afraid to con­tin­u­ous­ly aim for ex­cel­lence and suc­cess, re­gard­less of the hate­ful­ness and en­vy you will meet along the way.

TTG: When you com­pete in front of the judges , what is your frame of mind like?

TR: I just try not to be in my head too much, try to look re­laxed, poised and con­fi­dent. I fo­cus on pre­sent­ing my­self in a way that the judges can't help but take no­tice.

TTG: What do you hope to achieve in the next five years?

TR: I hope to be able to chan­nel my pas­sion for the sport in­to a suc­cess­ful ca­reer in the health and fit­ness area -I would ac­tu­al­ly love to be­come a nu­tri­tion­ist, with em­pha­sis on Sport Nu­tri­tion.

TTG: As Min­is­ter of Sport, what would be a change you can make to the sport in T&T?

TR: If you mean sport in gen­er­al, I would try to en­cour­age greater cor­po­rate sup­port, and clos­er col­lab­o­ra­tion be­tween na­tion­al sport­ing as­so­ci­a­tions. Al­so, bet­ter com­mu­ni­ca­tion be­tween the Min­istry and the NSOs.