Lisa Lyon had won the first World Women's Bodybuilding Championship in Los Angeles in 1979. she guest posed at several other 1979 competitions, including the 1979 Mr. Olympia. On April 9, 1980, she staged her own bodybuilding show, titled Lisa Lyon's United States Bodybuilding Championships, which Rachel McLish won.

Lyon immediately became a one-woman media-relations activist on behalf of the sport. She appeared in all the bodybuilding publications of the time and was featured in many magazines outside the world of fitness and muscle. She made the rounds on the television talk shows and wrote a book on weight training for women titled Lisa Lyon’s Body Magic, which was published in 1981.