Jussi Hamalainen's original site - drawings of famous bodybuilders.

How did you start your drawing career?
- I have always liked drawing. Someone has once even said that I have born with a pencil in my hand, because in general, drawing is very easy to me. It has always come naturally with me, without any stress or frustration. First memories I have of me drawing were when I was sitting on the living room floor at the age of six with great amount of pencils and brushes in front of me, and a paper filled with lines and circles. From then on, drawing has acted more serious part on my life. At the age of eleven I joined to drawing school along with few of my friends. It was the drawing school where I got the grounds on how-to-draw, and also I came familiar with different kinds of drawing equipment. We studied on how to draw live models, sceneries and various kinds of portraits. On that school I spent four years of my life studying the fine art of drawing.

How did the gym and training come in the picture?
- At the age of 15 I came up with another greatly beloved and welcomed aspect to my life, training at the gym. That, as well as drawing, has not vanished from my life during the years, and I doubt it ever will. I noticed at once that I enjoyed the sport very much. Naturally I made mistakes at the beginning, as will every rookie when they take up this sport - I trained at first seven days a week, two and a half hours in one session. That, on the other hand, reflects my enthusiasm what I had to the sport. As time passed, along with great deal of other mistakes and hours which were spent on reading the training book and magazines, I reduced my training to three to four days a week while the same time reducing the time I spent in the gym at one session. All these changes have of course brought results, and also made my training more reasonable. I doubt anyone would have the interest in training seven days a week, two and a half hours in one session, for a dozen years… I have also added more sporting activities along with my training in the gym (ice hockey, running, swimming, football…) during the years to improve my aerobic condition, and also because my other profession requires excellent physical condition. I graduated as a firefighter / paramedic in the spring 2000, and since then it has been my second profession which I enjoy doing great deal.

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