After three months on the M&B Teen and Men’s Transformation Program, Dave Hawk Jr. earns a first-place trophy!

“The crowd began to chant,” says David Hawk Jr., of his performance at the NPC Teen Nationals on July 22. “And it seemed like with every pose, the chants got louder. These people loved what they saw, and they knew my routine wasn’t thrown together in a day. I had practiced it for weeks, and when I heard the crowd, I knew I had won them over. There is not a better high than this.”

››Teen Dreams Come True
If you expected big things from David Jr. given the legacy he has to uphold, you’ll be pleased. His dad, Dave Hawk, is a former NPC USA champion and current IFBB pro. It was Hawk Sr. who was determined to help his son make the most of his potential. But Dave Sr. didn’t stop there. He decided to enlist a group of teenagers and a few adult men in what became the wildly successful Muscle & Body Teen and Men’s Transformation Program. Nicknamed “Teen Dreams,” the three-month program featured 10 guys, including Dave Jr., who trained under the expert guidance of the elder Hawk. The results even blew Dave Sr. away. Not only did the group get in the best shape of their lives, but Dave Jr. triumphed onstage at the NPC Teen, Collegiate and Masters National Championships, earning first place in the middleweight class in the teen division, while nearly winning the overall! Others in the program also took home trophies in bodybuilding competitions.
     For a guy who considers his father to be his best friend and who’s used to benefiting from all Dave Sr.’s time and training expertise, sharing his dad with nine other guys, many of whom were new to weightlifting, wasn’t always easy for Junior.
     “From Week 4 of the program until three weeks out from the show, I was getting only a day or maybe two per week with him,” says David Jr. “I felt bad for my dad and was a little peeved at a couple of the guys. I felt they didn’t appreciate the time and effort he gave them. Some of us would give our right arm to have his constant attention, but he had to motivate a few others and push them to get into the gym so they didn’t slack.”
     Slacking was not a worry for Junior, however. “My dad knew I was going to push myself and make my dream a reality. He was confident in me.”
     Indeed, because he and Josh Belfiore (see sidebar) were preparing for the July contest, they had to work harder than the rest of the guys. “Our diets were very closely monitored — every gram of protein, carbs and fat was counted,” he says. “Our training was a bit more intense, with higher volume, more isolated exercises, little rest — if any — between sets, while doing double the cardio.”
     And while no one’s more supportive of Dave Jr.’s bodybuilding goals than his parents (“Over the past four months, my dad has been doing all of my home chores, like yard work and taking out the garbage,” Dave says gratefully. “And I’ve depended on my mom 100% to cook, clean and keep up after me.”), there’s no familial compassion in the gym. “When it was three weeks out, my dad and I got together and structured our plan of training and dialing everything in,” he remembers. “I thought I had been training hard, but when my dad stepped back into the picture, we kicked it up another 100%. He really kicked my butt.”

›› Of Testosterone And Tempers
In addition to dispensing training commands and providing a kick in the pants to anyone who needed it, Dave Sr. was also called upon to keep the peace. Dave Jr. had known some of the guys from before the program, and for the most part, they had what he describes as “a great time talking between sets, exercises and even during cardio.” They often stayed together after training to eat “good diet food” at the Hawks’ or at a restaurant. But when 10 amped-up, weight-heaving, grunt-emitting guys with similar goals are forced to share a weight room, there’s bound to be an occasional ripple.
     “Ninety-nine percent of the time, we all strongly pushed each other to do better,” says Dave Jr. “But at times there was dead silence in the weight room, as tensions flared and weights were dropped. When your diet gets tough, your workdays are long, and when you have to put in two solid hours of training, you can become a bit hostile. That’s when my dad would step in and give us all a few good choice words and remind us of what we were there to do and how he had dealt with similar pressures.”
     Dave Jr. had his own ripples, which came in the form of competition with Josh Belfiore. Although older than the Junior, Josh had a similar goal: to compete in the NPC show.
     “Even though we were training for different events, a little pressure built up between us,” Dave Jr. recalls. “We began to compete and compare ourselves to each other way too much — even at Muscle & Body photo shoots. Instead of concentrating on the real competitors we hadn’t seen yet, we were battling it out every time we were posing or lifting.”
     The solution was to train separately for a while. And in the end, Dave Jr. has nothing but kind words for his fierce competitor: “Josh and I became very good friends through this great experience. We learned and laughed and became better people as well. He and I truly supported each other, and at the show we helped each other out, because the pressure was off and we both enjoyed our events.”

›› The Big Day
On Saturday, July 22, the day of the NPC Teen Nationals, Dave Jr. weighed 183 pounds. He had just come through a grueling couple of days during which he had to increase his cardio and even cut out all food to make it into competition as a middleweight. That hurdle over, he retouched his tan, oiled up and did a few light sets in the pump-up room backstage while waiting for his class to be called. “I was maybe a little nervous in the beginning,” he says, “but after I got in the pump-up room and got ready, I just focused and felt good mentally and physically.”
     After going through the preliminaries during prejudging and the evening, it was time for his favorite part: the routine. The crowd loved it. So did the judges. Dave Jr. had taken first in his weight class.
     But the night wasn’t over. After the winners in each class had been announced, it was time to declare the overall winner. Here’s how Dave Jr. remembers what happened next: “As we all stood onstage in a line, the judges had us go through our mandatory posing, and then we were told to pose down. Every time I went over to the welterweight or the heavyweight, who I thought were my competition, they walked away. They seemed to want to avoid me. As I posed, the crowd began to chant ‘Hawk.’ I knew I had friends and family there, but this chanting was much louder than just them. When the posedown was complete, the crowd went silent and the host began to talk. He said, ‘The new Teen National Overall Champion is heavyweight James Seymour.’ The whole crowd booed, and my family was dead silent in shock and disbelief. I have to say I was taken aback, too.”
     David ended up placing second overall, and came away from the experience with a philosophical viewpoint: “It doesn’t matter where you place so long as you know you did your very best to get there. I feel fantastic and I looked my best, did my best and achieved so many personal goals over these past few months. I’m very happy to say I placed second overall in the Teen Nationals. Many people have said they thought I should have won, and that’s great to hear. It keeps me motivated to get back on track to do it again and do even better.”
     That’s precisely his goal. After taking a few weeks off, he’s back hitting the weights hard to prepare for the 2007 Mr. Pittsburgh and the NPC Junior Nationals.
     Never count him out. After all, it’s in his blood.