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‘If people have an issue
with my physique, then
that’s their hang-up’
Samantha Briggs reveals to
Pippa Field how a six-month
sabbatical from the fire
service for a CrossFit career
paid off. Now she wants to
inspire the next generation
E
ven being the “fittest”
female in Britain and a
former world champion
does not, it appears,
exclude you from
criticism.
“You get people who comment
on your muscles. They say you
look too big and you shouldn’t look
like that as a female,” explains
Samantha Briggs, days after
finishing inside the world’s top 20
at the 2019 CrossFit Games in
Madison, in the United States.
The annual event, which started
in 2007 with 70 athletes and a
prize fund of $500 (£413) and has
now grown into a worldwide
televised spectacle backed by the
biggest sponsors and individual
winners’ cheques reaching
$300,000 (£248,000), tests
athletes’ strength, endurance,
speed, agility, gymnastics, power
and overall fitness, over four days
to crown the “Fittest Man and
Woman on Earth”.
It is just one arm of what was
originally a fringe
fitness method – the
high-intensity
training programme
of CrossFit – which
has grown into a
worldwide brand.
Briggs, herself,
shrugs off any body
criticism, adding: “I’m
5ft 7in and I weigh
68 kilograms [10st
10lb], I’m not
huge.”
But even if she
was taller or
heavier, Briggs would
not mind. She is rightly proud of
her muscular physique.
“If people have an issue
with it, then it’s their
hang-up,” she says.
As one of the world’s
leading full-time CrossFit
athletes – and champion
in 2013 – it is her strength
that earns her a living.
And in a society that
continues to produce a steady
flow of negative commentary
on fat-shaming, skinny-shaming
or sexualising of women, Briggs
believes it is about celebrating
what the human body can do.
“If we can inspire the
younger generation to live
a healthier lifestyle and be a
role model for them being active,
as opposed to some of your realitytelevision stars, where their focus
is on being as thin as possible,
which is not necessarily being as
healthy as possible, then it’s a
good direction.”
It was in 2009 that Briggs
discovered CrossFit as an
accompaniment to her amateur
triathlon pursuits. A year later, she
was competing at her first Games,
finishing 19th and then fourth 12
months later.
She originally combined
CrossFit with working for the West
Yorkshire Fire and Rescue Service,
but when injury put her out for a
year in 2012, she decided to take
a six-month work sabbatical to
concentrate on getting fit for
the 2013 Games.
The gamble paid off. And with
prize money, sponsorship and
other opportunities forthcoming,
not to mention wanting to stay at
the top of her game, Briggs
resigned from the fire service.
In five of her seven Games
appearances, the 37-year-old,
known as “The Engine”, has placed
inside the top 10 and this year,
after finishing 18th off the back
of elbow surgery last year, was
awarded the 2019 Spirit of the
Games Award in recognition of
her contribution to the sport in
general.
“When I first started, the more
athletic look wasn’t quite the
norm. But people are a lot more
positive towards it now. Having the
Olympics here in 2012 definitely
shifted the focus, more people
started looking into sport,
especially for women,” adds
Briggs, who runs training camps
for people of all abilities.
“A lot of people start CrossFit to
try to get fitter and to look a
certain way. But you see a big shift.
“Rather than them saying I want
to be a size 10, it becomes I want to
lift ‘X’ kilos, or run ‘such’ a time.
The focus becomes on what the
body can do, as opposed to what
you look like.
“The side-effects of trying to
lift this weight, or run this fast, is
you do end up losing weight and
looking more athletic. But you
start to appreciate your body
more for what it can do.”
And those negative
comments?
“Sometimes you’ll get
internet warriors. But
for every negative
person, there’s at
least five or 10
positive
comments.”Over time, I came to realise how
much mental strength it gave me,
too, from a consistent sense of
achievement to the reliability of
a routine.
Weightlifting segued into
powerlifting, after my trainer and
friend Jack suggested it as a way of
focusing my training. He was right;
it did. He then asked me to join his
team, Barfight. I was not a fan of
performing in a team after my
school days, but powerlifting is the
best of both worlds – individual
effort alongside the support and
love of a team.
In a powerlifting competition,
you have three attempts of three
lifts – squat, bench and dead lift.
The goal is to lift the heaviest you
can manage.
Your top lifts are added up and
then compared against whoever
has been lifting in your weight
category.
To compete at the Euros, I had
taken part in a qualifying
competition two months before,
which I had passed with flying
colours, exceeding my own
expectations.
It confirmed the ethos I had
lived my life by: put the effort in
and you will always succeed.
So, when I failed in Ireland, I got
emotional because I could not
understand what had gone wrong.
I had put in the effort, but it still
had not been enough.
Leading up to the Euros, I was
dealing with a lot. My second book
had just come out so, physically
and mentally, I was drained.
Wrapped up in all of this was the
anniversary of Rob’s death, a time
that always comes with a
temporary depression.
I had secretly hoped that
hitting my goals at the Euros
would somehow alleviate the
sadness I felt, and prove that mybody could power on through
immense emotional turmoil. And
when it could not, it did not just
feel like a failed lift, it felt like the
grief of Rob’s death was a weight I
would never, ever be able to shift.
As a woman, failure can seem
like it is not an option. The stakes
are too high. We are taking on the
gender pay gap, the gender
physical activity gap, the gender
gap in boardrooms – for women, it
seems, there is less room to fail
than there is for men.
As a woman of colour, that
statement is doubly true.
But what if overcoming the fear
of failure in sport can redress some
of the balance in other areas of our
lives? By chance, I came across a
video by the actor Will Smith, who
said: “You’ve got to live where
you’re almost certain you’re going
to fail. That’s the reason for
practice – practice is controlled
failure.” It really resonated.
For me, sport is that place to
confront my fears. A safe space to
practise. Sport taught me to no
longer fear what goes wrong.
I got over my initial meltdown
around my Euros performance. I
shifted the focus to what I was
going to do better next time. I
worked out what lifts I needed to
focus on, and what adjustments to
make in terms of food and sleep, so
that my recovery could be quicker.
And the process of assessing,
action and improvement lent a
noticeable sense of confidence and
resilience to other areas of my life.
A failed lift was not the end of
the world, it was simply the end of
that particular competition.
The way I see it, my biggest
success is not just about what I do
on competition day. Far from it. It
is about how I bring my heart and
soul to the platform every single
day before that.Weight off her
mind: Poorna Bell
says taking up
powerlifting has
been beneficial
for her mental
health and
redressed the
balance in her lifeBody politics:
Samantha Briggs
has shrugged off
criticism from
‘internet warriors’dealing with a lot. My second book
had just come out so, physically
and mentally, I was drained.
Wrapped up in all of this was the
anniversary of Rob’s death, a time
that always comes with a
temporary depression.
I had secretly hoped that
hitting my goals at the Euros
would somehow alleviatethe
sadness I felt, and prove that mynoticeable sense of confidence an
resilience to other areas of my life
A failed lift was not the end of
the world, it was simply the endo
that particular competition.
The way I see it, my biggest
success is not just about what I d
on competition day. Far from it.I
is about how I bring my heart and
soul to the platform every single
day before that.h.
rm of what was
ge
themme
ichd.
f,
ody
g: “I’m
gh
ste
would
rightly proud of
ysique.
e an issue
their
ys.
world’s
CrossFit
ampion
strength
iving.
ty that
duce a steady
commentary
skinny-shaming
fwomen, Briggs
ut celebrating
body can do.
pire the
tion to live
yle and be a
hem being active,
me of your realitynorm. But people are a lot more
positive towards it now. Having th
Olympics here in 2012 definitely
shifted the focus, more people
started looking into sport,
especially for women,” adds
Briggs, who runs training camps
for people of all abilities.
“A lot of people start CrossFit to
try to get fitter and to look a
certain way. But you see a big shift
“Rather than them saying I wan
to be a size 10, it becomes I want to
lift ‘X’ kilos,or run ‘such’ a time.
The focus becomes on what the
body can do, as opposed to what
you look like.
“The side-effects of trying to
lift this weight, or run this fast, is
you do end up losing weight and
looking more athletic. But you
start to appreciate your body
more for what it can do.”
And those negative
comments?
“Sometimes you’ll get
internet warriors. But
for every negative
person, there’s at
least five or 10
positive
comments.”Body politics:
Samantha Briggs
has shrugged off
criticism from
‘internet warriors’Briggs’
favourite
CrossFit
workout
Three rounds of
programme
‘Nasty Girls V.2’Pistols x 50
Alternating
single-leg
squats as low
to the floor
as possibleRing muscle-
ups x 7
Combination of
pull-up
followed by a
dip on the ringsHang power
cleans, 55kg x
10 Lifting a
weighted bar to
the shoulders
above a parallel
squatfear of failure
The Daily Telegraph Friday 16 August 2019 *** 5
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