It’s after hours on a late May Sunday evening. Love Gym is quiet, save for the blaring pop music spilling out of the Downer Family Fitness Center. Inside, a handful of girls move freely from squat racks to free weights to exercise bikes. They’re part of the 70-member Girls Who Lift Club, open to female-identifying students, who have exclusive use of Downer for an hour every week.
Club co-head Mary Adelaide Gump ’28 racks up plates on either side of a barbell for deadlifts. Fellow co-head Ari Lee ’27 rips through a set of goblet squats. There’s no set agenda or program for the period, but the prevailing feeling is one of mutual support. “We’re all in here doing different things,” says Gump, “and when we’re here nobody is judging us and you can just try new things.”
Lee agrees, calling the club a “safe space,” and the place where her love for exercise blossomed. “One of the things that deterred me the most about going to the gym was that it was a new environment and intimidating,” she says. “Last year, I came here and all the co-heads would walk around and offer help. That’s how I learned to do things like hip thrusts and really start to feel comfortable.”
