Hanging By A String – Backstage At Stroker's Bikini Contest - by Ozona Kidd

It's not every day that you walk into a dimly lit backstage room filled with a dozen of Tampa's most beautiful, nubile young women wearing bikini's so small that all 12 of them would have fit into a single front pocket of the oversized jeans I was wearing.

As my eyes struggled to adjust to the light, my photographer, a professional for more than 20 years who has spent thousands of hours surrounded by scantily clad hard bodies while photographing them, must have noticed the slack jawed, deer-in-the headlights look on my face.

He leaned over, struggling to suppress a cheshire-cat grin that despite his best efforts was growing on his face, and he asked me in a low discrete tone "you want a breath mint?"

"Yea right" I said with a slight chuckle trying to hide my humility having not felt that vulnerable around women since I was in puberty.

Business I thought. Back to business, and that's exactly what it was on a Friday night at the monthly Stroker's Billiards Bikini Contest.

The business at hand was perhaps more about showmanship than competition for the photographers, contestants and organizers as they prepared the performance for the packed house in front of the stage on the other side of the curtain.

Stroker's Billiards in West Tampa is one of two locations that are massive entertainment complexes filled with pool tables, dart boards, video games, live entertainment, restaurant and full bar.

The size of the place seems to shrink during the course of the evening as it fills with a neighborhood crowd most of whom are in their 20's and 30's, and the atmosphere morphs into a more intimate, late-night party.

My photographer started clicking away leaving me standing there feeling awkward, but after a few minutes the perfunctory vibe of the organizers, shouting instructions over the din of clicking cameras and chattering contestants as they slathered themselves with baby oil, primped their hair and makeup and adjusted their cleavage, caused my awkwardness to give way to curiosity.

Who are these girls and what do they do when they're not strutting around on stage in bikinis that barely cover a few square inches of their oil covered bodies?

One of the contestants, Liz Chen a psychology major at USF, was kind enough to fill me in on the whole bikini contest biz and give some insight into the experience of what it's like to strut your stuff under a hot spot light in front of a whooping audience of hollering spectators while wearing nothing but a bikini that weighs less than an ounce and a pair of 4 inch heels.

"The adrenalin rush is almost intoxicating" Liz explained with a smile that continued to widen as she thought more about it. "It's an amazing feeling… pure ego gratification when your under the lights… it's definitely addictive," she continued, and Liz would know. As a psychology student, she gave me some good insight into the various reasons that motivated the different contestants to participate."Money is a big part of it," Liz told me. "A lot of these girls are students like myself, and let's face it, when you're a full time student it's tough to make ends meet.

"Some of the contestants have children, I was amazed to discover. "You see that girl over there?" Liz was discretely pointing to a woman in a cobalt blue thong with a body that looked like it was chiseled out of marble. "She's got a kid, can you believe it? I mean she doesn't have an ounce of cellulite on her body!" she continued with a sense of bemused incredulity.

Indeed, I learned from talking to others backstage including Marketing Entrepreneur for Stroker's Vernon Lee, the diversity of the women in the contest was as varied as the styles and colors of the bathing suits they were wearing.

One contestant from Switzerland is fluent in French, German, and Italian, two are from different islands in the Caribbean, another is a legal assistant, many were dancers at one time or another and all of them have modeling experience.

Perhaps the most fascinating background was Helena who recently moved to Florida from upstate New York. A former radio talk-show host and petite blonde with a powerful athletic physique, Helena came to Florida to further her career as a professional wrestler while attending a wrestling academy in Kissimmee. She's also recently started learning Brazilian Jiu Jitsu as she prepares to test her mettle in the emerging sport of Mixed Martial Arts.

There's nothing more sobering than interviewing a beautiful blonde in a bikini who could kick your ass if she wanted to without breaking a sweat.

The contest went on for a few hours after the initial backstage preparation. There's a lot more to a bikini competition than you might think.

The show starts with all the contestants going onstage together for an initial introduction. Then each goes out individually and struts their stuff while the MC reads their profile and adds his own sexual innuendo to the contestants self described list of likes and dislikes.

In addition to the stunning beauty of the tan, rock-hard physique of the ideal female body, the smiles and charisma of each contestant build the energy of the audience into a sustained frenzy.

After a few rounds of voting, the field of contestants is narrowed. Each round follows the same format with the group that made the cut going on stage together and then again individually.

Finally, a winner was selected. Disney won this competition and she proudly took the stage to claim her victory and $400 prize.

To the packed house at Stroker's Billiards, I'm not sure the outcome of the competition mattered all that much, at least, not as much as it did to the girls who were competing for the prizes. Second, third and fourth place paid $300, $200, and $100. No, for the audience it was all about the show, and quite a show it was.

"There's nothing more painful than passing a beautiful woman walking in the opposite direction," Henry Miller wrote in the Tropic of Capricorn. While that's true, there's nothing more enjoyable than spending an evening chatting with room full of bikini clad beauties and experiencing the energy of their performance vicariously through them. All the more reason not to miss a bikini contest at Stroker's!

Special Thanks to Bill Eadie for all photos, copyright 2010 Bill Eadie Photography