Brains and brawn
Celeste Van Kirk/Observer-Reporter
David Ryan Bunting, an assistant coach for the Washington High School boys basketball team, is shown during a game at Peters Township High School Dec. 28.
David Ryan Bunting holds a pose before winning the OCB Steel City Natural Men’s Bodybuilding & Physique Competition in November.
In his 32 years, David Ryan Bunting has fulfilled multiple roles while calling numerous places home.
The student, teacher, professor, volunteer and coach has lived in Louisiana, Arkansas, Tennessee and New Jersey.
Now settled in Washington, Bunting can add another position to his qualifications: physique competition winner.
On Nov. 4, Bunting, an instructor in the education department at Washington & Jefferson College, won two divisions of the 2017 OCB Steel City Natural Men’s Physique Competition.
“It was surreal,” said Bunting. “I didn’t believe I won until the next day.”
It was his first competition, and, in addition to his family, Bunting’s friends and coworkers from his adopted community, including W&J staff, were there to cheer him on.
“They wore ‘Team Bunting’ shirts,” he said. “Joyce (Ellis, LeMoyne Community Center executive director) brought a van of people. They were yelling and cheering. I loved it.”
Bunting, who also works as an assistant coach for the Washington High School boys varsity basketball team and volunteers for the LeMoyne Center, has little free time, so preparing for the competition, which included up to three hours of exercise daily, was a challenge.
But Bunting prefers a busy schedule.
David Ryan Bunting is pictured with LeMoyne Community Center Executive Director Joyce Ellis.
“I have that competitive fire. I don’t like to start something I can’t finish,” Bunting said.
The struggle, he said, was sticking to a strict diet.
“I’ve always worked out, but I would eat whatever I wanted,” he said. “I went from eating anything I wanted to eating nothing I wanted.”
After the win, Bunting was happy to indulge in Thanksgiving and Christmas meals. It’s an indulgence his coach fully supports.
“It’s very important to take a break. It’s necessary, not just physically, but mentally. It’s not healthy to hold that strict diet all year-round,” Longo said. ” Everyone wants to stay in peak shape. You’re in ultimate shape when walk on stage. I have to teach them all you can’t hold that peak. It’s a good thing after the contest to introduce other foods and take a break.”
Now, Bunting is back to a training routine and restricted diet – taking in about 300 grams of protein a day – in preparation for two shows in April: OCB Natural Pittsburgh and OBC Best of the ‘Burgh Pro/Am.
The schedule is becoming more natural for him now, but before November’s competition, Bunting was unfamiliar with the world of physique training.
Bodybuilder Cliff Goodrow, a friend and former teacher, urged him to get into it.
“I had a chance encounter with him at a show he was judging, and he told me I should compete. I didn’t know anything about posing or dieting,” Bunting said. “I told him that.”
About a year later, Goodrow connected Bunting with local trainer Stasi Longo of Sonshine Fitness, McMurray. Longo was a competitive bodybuilder and has been a judge and trainer for decades. With her guidance, Bunting was hooked.
“I was very impressed with him as an individual and athlete. I knew that he had great potential to do well in this sport,” said Longo. “He was 100 percent on board with everything I had to say. Being an athlete himself, he understood my coaching strategies, respected them. Being a coach himself, he understood what it takes to do well.”
Unlike bodybuilders, physique competitors wear longer board shorts when competing and are judged on muscularity, body conditioning, symmetry and stage presence.
Bunting won both of the divisions in which he competed: the open competition and novice competition.
While posing looks easy, it’s actually the most difficult aspect of competition, he said. Being able to maintain a pose is the key to a win.
“It takes so much energy to hit a pose and hold it,” said Bunting.
Physical fitness has always been important to the New Orleans native, but Bunting also is accustomed to more cerebral pursuits.
A 2007 graduate of W&J, Bunting earned a master’s degree in education and completed a one-year teaching fellowship at his alma mater. In 2009, he decided to stay in Washington and took a job teaching fifth grade at Washington Park Elementary.
David Ryan Bunting, left, is shown with members of the W&J education department during a trip to Ireland.
“Every teacher has a niche,” he said. “Fifth grade is mine.”
In 2016, another opportunity came up at W&J, this time for a master teaching grant through the Heinz Foundation. When a professor retired, a permanent position opened up, and Bunting decided to stay.
The physical training, he said, has enhanced his career.
“I feel sharper at work,” he said. “Training is such a focus, everything else can’t help but get elevated.”
The elevation occurs naturally, said Longo.
“When I used to compete, the closer I got to the contest, the more hyperfocused I was across the board in my life,” she said. “You’re so sharp from eating so clean and being so focused, you start to do everything across the board in your life better.”
Longo, who said she admires Bunting as both an athlete and mentor, said the two share a passion for healthy living.
“Ryan is drug-free. I’m a drug-free advocate in this sport, and that makes a difference,” she said. “Ryan and I have the same goals and value system. We’re doing this the healthy way and the way that is going to help us live longer. This sport is all about getting into the best shape of your life.”
At Ellis’ urging, Bunting talked to kids at the LeMoyne Center about transforming his body for competition. He compared achieving goals to playing a video game and completing one level at a time.
“We had a nice conversation about the most difficult thing they had to accomplish. They talked about trying to make honor roll or making the basketball team,” he said. “I told them to start at level one. In a month, I said, look back on your progress and how much you’ve achieved. Compare yourself to where you were a month ago.”
Bunting can now compete at a professional level, but plans to stay in the amateur circuit for at least a few more competitions. For now, he’s enjoying preparing his students to become teachers and feels like he has found a family at W&J.
“I love the people I work with. It’s a good environment. And I love teaching. You don’t know the impact you have until years later,” he said. “I miss my fifth-graders a lot. But, ultimately, I’d like to run my own school. I don’t know how or when or where. But whatever I can do to help me prepare for that, that’s what I’ll do.”