ONE MORE OBSTACLE: LOCAL DEEJAY ENTERED IN 'ELIMINATOR' COMPETITION

Amy Zych has three last names, plenty of jobs, a husband, two children and a body by Nautilus. Her life is an obstacle course.

It is natural that next weekend in Redondo Beach, Calif., Zych will compete with other women from a

cross the United States in "The Eliminator," an obstacle course contest to be broadcast by ESPN at a later date.

At 5-6 and 126 muscular pounds, Zych has an athletic ability that leans toward climbing walls, mountain biking and snow boarding. The obstacle course competition, an indoor version of ESPN's "Survival of the Fittest," is her newest challenge after years of competing as a bodybuilder and later in aerobic fitness competitions.

Zych needs the three last names. Zych is for athletic competitions, and Fessler suits her marriage to Francis Fessler, a sports medicine major at Southeast Missouri State University. Listeners of radio station KISS-FM also know her as Amy Z, whose show airs week nights from 6 to 11.

A native of the former Lutesville who later moved to St. Louis, Zych was a competitive bodybuilder from age 14 to 18. She quit because women's bodybuilding was becoming muscle-bound. "The girl that wins the show is a little bigger," she said.

She then switched to fitness competitions based on aerobics, body building and beauty. She has won three titles: the 1994 Miss Cincinnati Fitness, the 1994 ESPN2 Fitness America Pageant and the 1997 NPC Las Vegas Classic.

But fitness competitions are evolving, too, and are attracting more women with backgrounds as dancers and gymnasts. "I'm a better athlete than I am a dancer," she says.

So after a break from competing, Zych is coming back as a participant in an obstacle course contest she describes as "very intimidating."

"They said if you have any doubts about your athletic ability, don't do it," she said.

She'll be climbing rocks, 10-foot-high sand dunes and all sorts of other obstacles in the man-made course. That requires a different kind of training than she'd done for fitness competitions.

"This time I had to train for athleticism, speed and agility," she said. Gerry Salter, a physical therapist at the St. Francis Universal Health and Fitness Center, designed a workout for her that requires working with her own body weight instead of free weights.

Because her routine is so strenuous, Zych only works out 30 minutes a day to train for "The Eliminator." She times herself at each station to become accustomed to the lactic acid buildup that occurs during an obstacle course competition.

In the 1997 Galaxy Championship, an obstacle course competition in Cancun, Mexico, Zych finished fifth among 104 women.

Why compete? "Because I've been doing it since I was a kid," she said. "Maybe it's in my genes. It's something I have to do."

Forcing herself to go to the gym isn't a problem.

"Willpower is seeing the changes," she said. "Knowing you're going to be on stage, on camera in front of millions of people gets you in shape."

Zych is taking some time off from studying mass communications and theater at the university. Besides her job at KISS-FM, she also teaches a class at the gym and models for muscle and fitness magazines. Her physique has landed her on numerous TV shows, including "Entertainment Tonight" and "Extra."

Moderation is Zych's secret to staying in top shape. She eats what she wants and especially likes pumpkin pie with whipped cream.

The more muscle you have the easier it is to burn body fat, she says.

Though it has taken her six years to add 10 pounds of muscle to her body, she says many women are afraid of weights because they're afraid they're going to look like a bodybuilder.

"That doesn't happen," she said. "If anything, they're going to get more shapely."