Women are constantly told that they need to look a certain way and eat a certain way. We seem to be stuck in an environment where a significant amount of emphasis is put on how our bodies look. However, amidst this toxic perspective, there are women in our community who are embracing a new narrative: a narrative that celebrates their bodies for everything they are capable of. These three incredible athletes can inspire us all to let go of societal expectations, focusing instead on our ability to be strong and healthy women.
Kendall Martin: Javelin Thrower
Kendall Martin, a fourth-year at UCSB, throws javelin on the track team. This talented woman has balanced the student-athlete life all four years of college and has developed a very cool mindset about food and body image along the way.
In high school, Martin went through her fair share of struggles with her relationship with food. “I was an athlete, but I barely ate any food. I didn’t think about food as fuel. I thought about it as something that would make me gain weight,” she recalled. “I thought I had to be as skinny as possible.”
However, this narrative began to change as Martin transitioned into being a college athlete and became accepted into a community of so many other strong and healthy individuals. “Coming into college— starting to lift and starting to focus on food as fuel— I wanted to be as strong as possible. Today, I am really proud of what my body looks like because it’s a product of working hard and eating well. Now, I want to be the biggest in the room in terms of confidence and being fit and knowing I am a strong human being.”
Cali Brannon: Marathon Runner
Fourth-year, Cali Brannon, began diligently training for a marathon earlier this year. She completed her first one in February in an incredible three hours and nineteen minutes qualifying her for the Boston marathon. Fueling her body properly was essential to her success throughout the training process. Thus, Brannon began to recognize food as a source of fuel. “Some people look at overeating as a bad thing,” she told me, “But I look at food in the sense that the more I eat, the more energy I will have.”
When I asked Brannon how being an athlete has played into her body image and relationship to food, she responded, “When you’re training and have something you love, it’s not about how you look. For female endurance athletes, there’s a lot of pressure to be at your minimum body weight. But when I’m training really hard, I have this understanding that I’ll be a little heavier than usual— but it’s necessary to have that energy.”
Brannon also brought up that throughout her marathon, she noticed that the fastest women were not always the skinniest. “Everyone looked so different, and they were all marathon runners,” she told me. As women, many of us feel this pressure to look a certain way. However, we are not meant to all look the same. Brannon’s perspective on food and being fit applies to all of us. We all need fuel and we all deserve to eat, regardless of our body type or how many miles we can run.
Amanda McCandles: Triathlete
Speaking of strong women, Amanda McCandles is an absolute beast on the UCSB Triathlon team. A member of the team for two years, McCandles just got back from the national collegiate competition in Georgia where she completed an Olympic distance triathlon— that’s a mile swim, a 24.8-mile bike ride, and a 6.2-mile run.
When I asked McCandles how working out affects her body image, she explained to me that the two topics are completely unrelated to her. She simply works out to be happy, to feel physically and mentally strong. “I think that as a result of working out, something that’s nice is that your body looks good,” Amanda explained. “But I’m really accepting that I’m strong no matter how I look and I’m happy about the things my body can do. I wouldn’t want it any other way.”
Whether you are an extreme athlete or not, it’s time we start changing the narrative, start breaking past societal expectations and start celebrating our individual strengths as the incredible women we are.