Three local athletes, who are also instructors at the Bogalusa YMCA gym, are training for future bodybuilding competitons and one is training for fitness competition.

Brooke Kennedy is training for the fitness competition, while Ricky Singleton and Brandi Beaudette are training for bodybuilding. There are two main goals in mind. One has been accomplished as they are all living a healthy lifestyle. The other is to compete next summer.

The three have been in the gym for a few years working out, but they’ve only been setting goals and doing intense workouts since about February.

“People don’t realize that you come to the gym, you work hard and there is a payoff if you want to get out there as a sport to it,” Singleton said. “It’s a good lifestyle. It incorporates your diet, just a healthy mental state and just overall, a healthy wellbeing and training. You’re focused. It incorporates everything in life.”

Beaudette said it requires a lot of investment.

“Not just financially as far as eating clean. It is more expensive, but investing the time, making sure you’re here everyday with a regiment, with goals you try to attain and attainable goals, reasonable goals,” Beaudette said.

Singleton added to Beaudette’s point about the goals saying that you start with the small goals and work into bigger goals.

“If your health improves or if you have joint pain or back pain, it’s also great for that. It just helps the total body,” Singleton said.

Kennedy said the three keep track of different things when it comes to their bodies.

“We go down to the nutri shop and we get our body composition. We stay on it. You measure body composition, muscles and body fat,” Kennedy said.

Beaudette said before getting into this sport, she was living an unhealthy lifestyle, but getting into bodybuilding has completely turned it around.

“I had a lot of health problems,” she said. “Once I decided I didn’t want to live like that anymore, I don’t have any health problems anymore. I don’t have back pain and I don’t have knee pain. I had trouble gaining weight for the longest time. I have a very healthy appetite and this has really helped me put some weight on to be healthy.

“It’s given me a level head. It’s helped me keep a routine in my life and just live a good Christian lifestyle. It’s helped me open the doors to meet people. It’s given me a better prospective of what’s expected out of life. The ‘Y’ has really saved my life in every way possible.”

The three met because of bodybuilding when Singleton and Beaudette attended a class Kennedy was teaching.

Kennedy, who has been working at the YMCA for a year and a half, said she decided to get into fitness when she saw a sign for a competition.

“I saw them up there with the body building. I was like, ‘That’s what I want to do,’” Kennedy said. “I started dedicating and I’ve been dedicating ever since. Ever since I met these two — this is where we met — they started coming to my classes that I teach (at the YMCA). We just hit it off like that. We started working out together and now we’re inseparable. We work out together and we play together.”

Kennedy has been working at the YMCA for a year and a half. Singleton and Beaudette have been working there since May.

When asked the most rewarding part about training others, the three friends talked about is how great it is seeing people change to a healthier lifestyle.