Details Published on Friday, 26 April 2013 21:46 Written by Aaron Singerman

Right now Cedric McMillan sits in his hotel room here in Rio De Janeiro, shredded, covered in pro-tan, starving, and extremely confused. He’s confused because he knows instead of winning the inaugural Arnold Brazil, like just about everyone and their mama predicted, he’ll be somewhere stuffing his drawn-in and depleted face thinking, “Why me?”, all because he missed the Athletes Meeting today.

Missing an athletes’ meeting is no small issue to IFBB head judge Lee Thompson, and he opted to disqualify Cedric from tomorrows contest. Before he did so, he contacted the promoters, and they agreed with his decision.

From my past experience I can also predict that Cedric will most likely be fined $5,000 by the IFBB home office for missing this meeting, and hence then show.

Personally, I’m very sorry for all the Brazilian fans that were planning on seeing Cedric on the stage tomorrow, but the rules are the rules.

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NOTE FROM DAVE PALUMBO: "The question remains, does a lack of responsibility by a "professional" bodybuilder deserve to be punished to the tune of disqualification fron an international competition thousands of miles from home? If you believe that rules should be followed no matter who the person is or what the circumstances, then head judge Lee Thompson made the right call. He set a precedent that bodybuilders in the future will be forced to adhere to or else suffer the penalties imposed (with no exceptions). Personally, you might be surprised to find out that I do agree with thompson's decision (even though I secretly would love to see McMillan posing onstage tomorrow) . I think professional athletes should be held to a higher standard than the rest of us ordinary folk. However, if we hold McMillan up to this by-the-letter-of-the-law ruling, we must also strictly apply it to the rest of the IFBB athletes (including bikini, physique, fitness, and figure). Are we really ready to start disqualifying half brain-dead, carb-depleted, athletes or should we have a more tolerant policy for our professional athletes? You can't have it both ways!"