In yet another feat achieved by India's body-building contingent, Mumbai's Iqbal Sayed has successfully won the silver medal at the Mr Olympia amateur event held in Hong Kong. The 2015 Mr Mumbai runner up defeated as many as 20 countries in the Classic Bodybuilding category to finish second. A civil engineer with Reliance Infrastructure and Mumbai Metro, the 27-year old's secures international glory for India in his very first competition.
Speaking exclusively to Sportskeeda he said, “I'm very happy that I've been able to do justice to the training that I put in for the past 6 months. Since, I have a day job, it mean that I had to dedicate all my time into this game.I suffered with Typhoid 10 days prior to the tournament, I was literally in tears as the doctor told me I won't be able to participate. However, I had to participate as I put in so much effort. I'm really grateful to everyone around me who helped me win.”
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Iqbal is trained under Rakesh Udiyar, the same coach who was behind Aamir Khan's recent Dangal transformation. Having completed an engineering and MBA degree, Iqbal entered professional body-building only one year back. However, this particular journey saw him garner immediate local success being crowned Junior Maharashtra Shree and Mr Ghatkopar. This particular victory comes out of nowhere as he was ranked as one of the bottom seeds.
He added, “I had shoulder injury early this year, hence for almost 3 months I barely did any training. But, I must thank Rakesh Sir, who is a legend in the industry, who helped me reach this particular stage. My family who helped me through my mood swings and my difficult stage.
Suffered Typhoid just five days before the event
Every single day, every single meal was measured and prepared by them. My Mumbai Metro Project team who have been a continuous support to me in climbing this stairs, specially my immediate manager who is CEO Metro business for Reliance Infrastructure Ltd – Mr Abhay Kumar Mishra; an All India Rank 1 IES Officer who has been a mentor to me to remain determined with my goals and managing all the things gracefully. My Chief Human Resource Officer – Colonel Shubhodoy Mukherjee; retd Col from Military Services for all the time management I needed for this prep. My Best friend – Sagar Shetty who has been a continuous motivational mentor and a strong support to me since my college days.”
“I never entered this competition to win anything, I entered to get exposure at this level, but somehow I impressed the judges and here I am,” he added.
A project manager with the Mumbai Metro, Iqbal pays for his bodybuilding through his salary. He added, “You must have hear off the saying, once a body builder always a body builder, so that's quite apt for me. Once I started I didn't know how to stop, it becomes like an obsession. However, I hope this particular victory helps me garner more support because, bodybuilding is one of the most expensive sports. But my eventual goal now is to join the fitness industry as I have good base in the form of my previous job.”
He added, “Right now, if you see I'm doing everything on my own, but I can't complain either because I didn't win anything. However, I keep thinking, if I can do so much with just 3 hours of practice a day, imagine if I did it full time, followed a proper diet, had 8 hours of sleep. So, I'm definitely targetting participating in more events in the future.”
This paritcular victory also makes him the second best classic bodybuilder in Asia.
