PHYSICIAN SPOTLIGHT

'Skinny Kid' Unlikely Professional Athlete

Dr. Sandi Thomas-Stuart, an osteopathic physician and emergency room doctor earned her pro card in May at the National Physique Committee Jr. USA competition. After three years of near misses, Dr. Thomas-Stuart ranked the overall winner in the women’s fitness category.

BREVARD COUNTY, FLORIDA – Many people would expect a doctor’s proudest accomplishment to be a career. But to Dr. Sandi Thomas-Stuart, school came easy. It’s her off-hours pursuits that led to success she had thought unlikely.

DR. SANDI THOMAS-STUART has overcome adversity and serious injury to become a a pro athlete – and is an inspiration to anyone who has dared to dream to accomplish a significant personal goal. Above, Dr. Thomas-Stuart is pictured on the cover of the Sept/Oct edition of SPACECOASTMEDICINE.COM Magazine. Click on the photo to read Dr. Thomas-Stuart's incredible story in magazine format.

“I was the skinny kid who was picked last for kickball. For me to say I’m a professional athlete is amazing,” said Dr. Thomas-Stuart, who recently earned her pro fitness card.

Dr. Thomas-Stuart, an osteopathic physician and emergency room doctor, earned her pro card in May at the National Physique Committee (NPC) Jr. USA competition. After three years of near misses, Thomas-Stuart ranked the overall winner in the women’s fitness category.

In addition to attaining professional status, she saved herself a long, slow trip back to Brevard County. As part of the competition, Dr. Thomas-Stuart performed a Barbie-themed gymnastics routine, in which she rode onto the stage in a pink toy Corvette to a recording of the London Gay Men’s Chorus singing, “I’m a Barbie Girl.”

Dr. Thomas-Stuart and husband Scott had hauled the toy car to Charleston, S.C., for the contest. Lose, her husband had joked, and she’d be driving the toy back home to Florida.

Kidding aside, she owes much of her involvement in the sport to her husband. She’d started out in the sport competing in figure contests, which focus solely on muscular symmetry and tone.

Unlike bodybuilding, the goal is to retain a feminine appearance and not add excessive muscle mass. And unlike fitness competitions, there’s no athletic routine, such as dance or gymnastics.

In a figure competition, a bikini-clad contestant walks on stage, turns and poses for judging. The training was intense for only a 90-second payoff on stage, Dr. Thomas-Stuart conceded. And the contest amounted to no more than a genetics beauty pageant, her husband complained, suggesting she move into fitness competitions.

Fitness is more suited to her body type, Dr. Thomas-Stuart said, because the category allows for more muscle and an athletic appearance. In the figure competition, the small-waisted hourglass shape is more prized.

But an added feature of fitness competitions posed a challenge for the former kid-picked-last-for-kickball. Dr. Thomas-Stuart had always exercised, even teaching aerobics for extra money during medical school. But she’d never played a sport.

To compete at the fitness level, Dr. Thomas-Stuart needed to show designated strength moves as well as perform a two-minute routine. Contestants generally do a series of tumbling runs and dance moves that Dr. Thomas-Stuart describes as “cheerleading on crack.”

She decided to try a gymnastics class at a gym. Thirty years old at the time, she lied about her age so she could learn the sport alongside junior high and high school students.

Now 35, Dr. Thomas-Stuart works with a coach in private lessons. Training as a gymnast at her age comes with some baggage.

“I’m still scared sometimes,” she said of her fear of injury. She’d never tumbled without a spotter until the week before her first fitness competition.

CHARISMA FACTOR: “I have to actually be having fun to draw people in,” said Dr. Thomas-Stuart.

Charisma Factor

Despite that hurdle, she’s managed to master the moves and develop a charisma factor, an element of entertainment that she had to work at. “I have to actually be having fun to draw people in,” she said.

In addition to her Barbie girl routine, she has performed to James Bond theme music and once did a samurai warrior routine that included twirling Samoan knives, a sort of nod to her baton-twirling days in high school.

Dr. Sandi Thomas-Stuart

Dr. Thomas-Stuart got interested in figure and fitness training during her residency. She’d graduated from Nova Southeastern University in Fort Lauderdale and was working at Mt. Sinai Medical Center in Miami Beach.

At her gym, where she did mostly cardio workouts, she noticed a lot of fellow members who worked out daily but always looked the same. It was the competitors who got results. “I was amazed with how people could totally transform their bodies,” she said.

She started weight training on her own, and then hired a trainer. After participating in figure contests for a while, she entered her first fitness competition in June 2005 in Orlando. She surprised herself by winning the fitness and figure divisions.

Later that year, she tried a national level event – and was humbled. “I really got my butt kicked,” she said.

The experience pushed her to get more serious about her training. “For most people, that would send them reeling. For me, it just made me work harder,” she said.

Dr. Thomas-Stuart started working for Parrish in 2004, drawn to Brevard County to be near her husband’s family. Scott, a soccer coach, cooks most of her meals and makes sure all the “real life” things get done, she said.

Working in the emergency room is a perfect fit for balancing a medical career with such a time-intensive pursuit. “I don’t have an answering service, I don’t have a pager, I don’t have to run a business,” she said. “I just show up with a stethoscope.”

In addition to her rigorous workout schedule, Dr. Thomas-Stuart works with a sports nutritionist in Canada who designs her diet and modifies her calorie intake based on upcoming events and photos that she continuously emails.

Minimizing body fat is a critical aspect of the sport, requiring 16 to 18 weeks of dieting before a show.

Dr. Thomas-Stuart's (above center) pro debut took place the in last month's Fort Lauderdale Pro Fitness Cup.

Pro Fitness Debut

For Dr. Thomas-Stuart's pro debut in last month's Fort Lauderdale Pro Fitness Cup (in which she finished 12th), her training focused on heavy weights with low repetitions in a full-body workout.

The goal is always to hang on to muscle mass and raise her metabolic rate while she diets down to competition weight. At just under 5 feet, 5 inches tall, Dr. Thomas-Stuart likes to weigh 128 to 130 pounds when she competes.

She takes in 10 to 12 times her body weight in calories. As the competition neared, she reduced her caloric intake further to achieve the lean look she needed to showcase her muscle.

“Everyone gets a little crazy,” she said of the final days before a competition, when the hunger wars with nerves.

She did a “ninja round” – a 45 second burst of mandatory moves in a specific order, while dressed all in black. Next was her two-minute routine designed to showcase strength, athletic ability, flexibility and endurance.

She’s proud of her pro win last May, which was noted in Muscle & Fitness magazine. The magazine included a picture of Dr. Thomas-Stuart at the competition, which her mother brandishes at every opportunity.

“My dad jokes that anybody who hasn’t seen it is either blind, or she hasn’t met them yet,” Dr. Thomas-Stuart said.

Nailing her fitness routine during the Jr. USA competition (above), Dr. Sandi Thomas-Stuart won her pro card at the 2009 National Physique Committee’s Jr. USA Championships. Dr. Thomas-Stuart is an Emergency room physician, is 5’4 tall and competes at 128 pounds.

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