Kristin Hornacek’s haven is inside the gym.
There the Gaylord native can put in her earbuds, get lost in her music and do what she loves most: lift weights and perfect her body.
Well, it’s at least a quiet sanctuary for Hornacek for now.
She recently returned from the OCB Eastern USA Bodybuilding, Figure and Bikini Championships held Oct. 10 in Rochester, New York. She placed first in four different classes, earning her International Federation of Physique Athletes Pro Card.
She’ll now compete as a professional going forward. That might mean her silent refuge in the gym could one day turn into fans interrupting her for tips from the pro or to even snap selfies with the neighborhood championship bodybuilder.
“It can look tedious to some, but the gym is my solace,” said Hornacek, 31. “That’s where I feel the most at peace, and it’s when I feel the stresses of the day melt away. I like that it’s routine and calming.”
Of course, like most great things, Hornacek’s transformation didn’t happen overnight. It started in 2011 when she and her husband, Dan Hornacek, 29, decided to change their lifestyles and shape up.
The two started a 12-week trainer program with bodybuilding.com. After completing the program, it propelled Kristin to continue her training and eventually enter bodybuilding shows.
The first competition she did was the Grand Traverse Bodybuilding Show in spring 2014. With Dan also competing, she became the women’s overall champion while he took second in the men’s tall class.
Those results inspired Kristin to compete in the Western Michigan Championships held Nov. 8, 2014, in Kentwood. She faced 200 competitors and took second and third in a pair of classes. While those results would impress most lifters, it only made her more determined.
“Second and third place wasn’t good enough for me,” she said.
So Kristin then visited renowned bodybuilder trainer Mark Dee, who owns Center City Gym in Petoskey.
“He is the guru of bodybuilding and an amazing resource because he knows so much,” Kristin said. “I wanted him to help me understand why I took second and third place. I asked him what I needed to do to go back and win it next time.
“He went through my pictures and pointed out weak areas that I should work on. I trained and worked with him for the next eight months, and he helped me.”
Through Dee, Kristin learned that bodybuilding isn’t just a hobby — it’s a complete lifestyle change. Bodybuilders eat, sleep and breathe their lifestyle. For her to make the progress she wanted, that meant she had to change her diet and map out each meal and focus her training on lifting and doing cardio six days per week. The two worked together for eight months, prepping Kristin for the OCB Eastern USA competition in New York.
“The reason we trained so long was that he taught me it was a lifestyle and a never-ending thing,” Kristin said. “It’s an everyday lifestyle change, and it’s not a diet. You have to change your entire lifestyle to support your goals. That’s why I started lifting six days a week and seeing him in Petoskey twice a week.”
“Mark told me about the Eastern USA show in New York, and he told me to make that show my goal. So for eight months I traveled to Petoskey to work on posing and lifting. We worked with my diet really closely and did different two-week experiments with what carbs reacted with my body. We perfected and fine tuned everything so that when it came to the show, we’d know what I was doing. It was a long prep for eight months, but it really paid off. I couldn’t have done it without him.”
It certainly did pay off as did the help she received from Dan Forcier, owner of Powerhouse Gym in Gaylord, and friends Jim and Wendy VonDoloski.
“I can’t stress enough how much they’ve influenced me,” she said. “Jim put doing shows into my ears awhile ago, and they traveled to New York with me to support me.”
Now that Kristin has her Pro Card, she is unsure which show she’ll compete in next. But she does know she wants to put in the extra effort before making her debut as a professional bodybuilding.
“I have to train a little bit more,” she said. “Now that I’m at the pro level, I have to improve on my weak spots and areas I have to bring up to par to be competitive at the pro level.
“It’s building a little more and perfecting other areas, and then I’ll look at the pro shows I want to enter. That’s probably a solid year away, and it’ll take a lot of training.
“Girls at the pro level are very well developed and are there for a reason. I have to put my training in and make sure I’m at that competitive level.”
While a year of training could sound like a large task for some, it’s just another 312 opportunities for her to get lost in her sanctuary — lifting with her earbuds in, melting away her stresses.
Courtesy of: Gaylord Herald Times