VIII. Gay Games Cologne 2010

Even if the weather wasn’t really sunny during the first days of the competition, temperatures suddenly rose to unprecedented levels yesterday evening. At least for those spectators of the Gay Games who assembled at the auditorium of the DSHS Köln at 6 p.m. sharp. The rise in temperatures was not due to the masses who filled the auditorium up to the last seat, but to the participants on stage. In very skimpy outfits and with their muscles oiled the bodybuilders were holding their competition on this Monday evening, and the public was in awe! The three Gay Games Ambassadors Leigh-Ann Neidoo, David Kopay and Chris Morgan insisted on being there to cheer the athletes.
 

Starting the competition were the men over 70 years, who delivered their performances with wit and charme and took the spectators’ hearts by storm. There were five different age categories among the men,  but Valerie Worre was the only women to compete. She felt visibly at ease with being the centre of attention and showed that she was not only muscle-bound but also very flexible in the hips. But hers was not the only performance which stood out amongst the towering muscles that everybody expected to see: From agile athletes doing the splits to bodybuilders walking the moon walk or performing robotic moves, the imagination knew no limits.
 

Amongst those competitors who showed not only admirable skills on stage but also lots of fun was Rene Silvin, gold medal winner in the age categorie “above 60” from the USA. To the tunes of “I feel pretty” from the musical West Side Story he was flexing his muscles and finally dropped his pants – but had another one underneath, of course. The public went wild, and the athlete was rewarded the gold medal. “I certainly didn’t expect that”, 62 year old bodybuilder Rene Silvin stated later, “This is my first gold medal in body building and my first time at the Gay Games.”

Things didn’t look that bright in the past for this sportsman: 30 years ago he was diagnosed with AIDS, and 15 years ago he had to fight cancer. “After the cancer, I spent some time in a wheelchair and had to relearn walking from scratch. I went to the gym and thought, why leave it at that? When I’m already here, I just can continue to work out.“

Today, 15 years later, he’s celebrated as a champion at the VII. Gay Games Cologne 2010 and is happy to be part o fit. This is not his only achievement in sports: In 1967 he was already Swiss Champion in Rowing. But not content with resting on his laurels, he started looking for new challenges 40 years later and came across the Gay Games: “I never heard of Gay Games before”, the gold medalist told us, “I was just looking for bodybuilding contests for men over 60 years old. Unfortunately, there aren’t a lot of them, and that’s how I found out about the Gay Games.”
 

Time will tell what the future has in store for Rene Silvin’s career in sports. But he already has a mission for the years to come: “I was one of the first to be diagnosed with AIDS 30 years ago. Today I want to talk to people with AIDS to give them courage and strength.” His gold medal at the Cologne Gay Games is certainly an important part of that.

More photos can be found at http://www.qubesport.net/photos