I was never particularly interested in lifting heavy weights. My main form of exercise in my teenage years was dance so I was always drawn to things like pilates, yoga and barre instead. However, my friend qualified as a personal trainer at the beginning of 2020 and convinced me to do a session with her, where she gradually started introducing me to the world of weight lifting. A few sessions in, I was hooked and nearly two years later, I managed to deadlift a 100kg loaded barbell – a number that would have been unfathomable to me 24 months ago and still feels pretty crazy now.

Deadlifts are one of the most fundamental lifting moves and they were something I was introduced to pretty quickly when I started lifting weights and I’ve been practising them almost weekly since joining a CrossFit box in April of this year. Dani Ren’e Gaskell, the owner of CrossFit Streatham where I train, explains: “Deadlifts tend to be the exercise where you’re able to lift the most amount of weight and they use several large muscle groups within the body.”