A natural bodybuilder from Co Armagh is hoping to represent Ireland at the world's most renowned professional men's bodybuilding contest later this year..
David Stewart, 47 and from Lurgan is also sharing his story about how he began his journey to becoming a bodybuilder in a bid to inspire others to pursue their dreams as he says "age is just a number".
The competitions he enters are all for natural bodybuilders only - with a rule of strictly no steroids.
Read more: 'Inspirational' NI personal trainer beats cancer to win bodybuilding title
David told Belfast Live: "I’ve been training on and off since I was 16 years old. I started because I was a skinny kid and as I got older I was bullied and picked on. I wanted to do something about it and change my appearance, so my father, David, who also competed in bodybuilding, brought me down to a gym one day.
"He handed me a set of dumbbells and as soon as I lifted those weights for the first time, it just felt great and natural. I knew it was for me and I fell in love with the whole training process and how you can manipulate your body to turn into muscle.
"I took myself away from everybody for about seven months and when I came back out, people could see how much I'd changed and put weight on. That's where the passion came from to compete but I didn't know you could do it naturally. I always wanted to compete but never thought I was good enough until one day I said I wanted to be the best of the best.
"So I looked into shows where it was all natural athletes and in the first few and finished second and third. After that I started to win all around me and changed my physique completely to the way the judge would want it. I do all my training at Fitness Factory gym in Lurgan and have been with them for ten years."
David added: "Since then I've held quite a few titles at the Northern Ireland Fitness Model Association (NIFMA) shows then I started competing at the British National Bodybuilding Federation (BNBF) shows.
"I just competed in the BNBF Northern Ireland show recently in the masters category and repeated my title against other natural bodybuilders.
"Now I have qualified for the British finals being held in Coventry in September, where all the best natural bodybuilders will compete to see who will be the best in Britain and can go onto the World Finals in Australia.
"I also have the opportunity to go and compete in Dublin to try to get picked to be on Team Ireland to go and compete in the worlds in Germany and then onto Las Vegas to compete in the pinnacle of the bodybuilding sport, the natural Mr Olympia. To compete there for Ireland would be just unbelievable and a dream come true."
He added: “For shows you need to start preparing 22 weeks before with a strict on what you eat, when you eat and what types of food you eat and calories per day as it helps to hold onto muscle.
"At the same time, you want to bring your body fat down to get in great condition and for your muscles to be sitting out.
“Leading up to shows I put my body through a lot of stress where I will be training two to three times a day, six days a week, working on a different body part each day.”
David praised his family and friends for their support, especially his partner Mandy and kids Megan, Ben and Cody, who also hopes to follow his dad into the industry.
And he has this message for others considering making a similar move: "Don't be like myself, shy or scared to approach people in gyms, especially young ones as you see so many of them injuring themselves, if they've tried to lift heavy weights or things like that.
"Start of light and work your way up through it and have a chat with someone about competing. You can have a go at it and start off in an amateur show and take it from there.
"But you can achieve anything if you put your mind to it, it doesn't matter what age you are."
You can follow David's journey on his Instagram page.
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