27-year-old Iqbal Sayed from Mumbai, not only represented India at the Mr. Olympia amateur event held in Hong Kong, but also made the whole country proud by winning the silver medal. Sayed is a civil engineer with Reliance Infrastructure and Mumbai Metro and this is said to be his very first tournament. Sayed, the 2015 Mr. Mumbai runner up, beat nearly 20 participants from other countries in the Classic Bodybuilding category and finished second.  

“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 means that I had to dedicate all my time into this game” Sayed told Sportskeeda. “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,” Sayed further added, while showing gratitude towards all the people around him who helped him win. 

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What’s surprising is the fact that Sayed received training from none other than Rakesh Udiyar, the coach behind Aamir Khan’s Dangal transformation that has been making headlines recently. From being a civil engineer with an engineering and MBA degree to a professional body-builder, Sayed’s journey is an inspiration for people. He started body-building a year back and went on to be crowned as Junior Maharashtra Shree and Mr. Ghatkopar. 

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This victory was definitely not an easy one as Sayed was suffering from Typhoid right before the event. However, he fought against all odds and not only participated in the contest but won the silver medal. In fact, after this victory, he is now the second best classic bodybuilder in Asia. Aiming to find a place for him in the fitness industry, Sayed feels that if he can achieve so much with only 3 hours of practice a day, then if he takes it up full time, he can do much better. 

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Sayed thanked his Mumbai Metro Project team, his immediate manager at Reliance Infrastructure, and HR officer for helping him train and co-operate. He further thanked his best friend for being a continuous motivational mentor and his support. “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,” Sayed said. There could not have been a better and humbler response than this.

Source: Sportskeeda