An East Indian, Vegetarian Girl Who Likes to Lift
Written by Invictus member Jasveen Dhaliwal
I was never an athlete in my university days. I was the nerd who wanted to become a doctor and make her parents proud.
Who would have thought I would become a jock.
I don’t come from an athletic family. My parents never encouraged any type of physical activity because it would take away from my studies. I was always a chunky kid with self-esteem issues because of the way I looked. When I went away for university at 23, I tried going to the school gym and do a circuit or spend time on a cardio machine, but I never stuck with it. I would try going regularly again and again, but, I would always quit after a couple of months. I was so bored doing the same workout by myself with no one telling me if I was doing it right.
A little over three years ago, when I was 28 years old, one of my co-workers asked me if I wanted to do a “Spartan Race”.  I had no idea what that was and she told me it was a 15 km obstacle race. I don’t even think I could have walked 15 kms at that time. She recommended I do this thing called “CrossFit”. Â
I looking into it and I was pretty intimidated, so I joined a CrossFit “boot camp”. I changed my diet slightly and I stuck with it for six months. I enjoyed the variety of workouts, I had people to workout with and push me to do better, and I lost 25 lbs in six months. By that time, I was ready to join a real CrossFit gym. Up to that point, I had never picked up a barbell in my life so that first year was very challenging and frustrating, but I loved every moment of it. I wanted to know everything about CrossFit and that’s when I came across Invictus. The programming was interesting and on Sunday Fundays at my first gym, I would do an Invictus workout. I loved it and wanted to do more, but I was restricted at the gym I was a part of.
On the other side, I was working on becoming a travel nurse, but as a Canadian, it took me a while to get my first job in the US, but it finally happened two years ago! I got to live and workout in Manhattan for six months, Hawaii for six months and then, I finally got the chance to move to California. The only reason I wanted to move to San Diego was to train at Invictus! My dream came true six and a half months ago. I wanted to be a part of all of the classes my body could handle. I would come early to class and work on gymnastic skills and stay after to stretch and work on my core. Some guy named Bryce would encourage me, give me tips and kept telling me he believed I could be better. I also joined the strength class.
Before coming to Invictus, I had no idea what the difference between powerlifting and weightlifting was. I had never been to a box that had a powerlifting class and I never thought I would love it as much as I do now. Thank you to Calvin for the awesome programming and to Hunter for the great coaching! I came to Invictus with a 245lbs deadlift, 160 lb back squat, 105 lb bench press and, after six months, my deadlift is now 305 lbs, my back squat is 208 lbs, and my bench press 145lbs.
I had never really done Olympic weightlifting classes until I came to Invictus. The other gyms I had been to only had Oly classes on Saturdays and I worked every weekend, so that never really worked out for me.  I had never been to a gym that had Oly classes five days a week. Training here, I was able to PR my power clean from 120 lbs to 143 lbs, jerk 115 lbs to 130 lbs and Snatch 93 lbs from 75 lbs.  I know those aren’t big numbers, but who would have thought an East Indian, vegetarian girl with no athletic background could lift that? Not me!
On a side note – at my first CrossFit gym, we always did the Burgener warm-up during class. Living in San Diego, I was able to drop in at Mike Burgener’s home and receive coaching from the legend himself. He really is an amazing coach and he knows exactly what to say to fix your lifts.
And how can I not mention the Endurance Club and Nuno. I don’t like running and running does not like me. I never really push myself to run faster and I had no idea about the importance of pacing or timing. It only took six months, but Nuno kept pushing me to run faster and believed I could do it when I didn’t have faith in myself. If I had more time, I would have loved to be a part of the Rowing Club as well, but I wasn’t able to fit it into my schedule (Sorry, Shane!).
At Invictus I realized the importance of coaching, not just for correcting your movements, but a really good coach will push you to do better, go faster, and believes you are stronger than you think you are. Every coach at Invictus did that for me. I was always scared of putting weight on the bar, because I didn’t think I could lift it. They proved me wrong.
People ask me now if I want to compete and I tell them “Not a chance.”  I’m 100% sure I’m not going to make it to Games or even Regionals and I’m ok with that. I’m competing against myself and I don’t have anything to prove to anyone. I just really enjoy doing things I couldn’t do when I was younger and having the strength to try new things like Flying Trapeze, Chinese Pole and Gymnastics. CrossFit has also been an amazing community for me. Being a travel nurse the last two years, the only thing consistent in my life has been CrossFit. Moving to a new city every six months and not knowing anyone is difficult at the beginning, but after joining the local gym, I don’t feel so alone anymore. So thank you to the members of Invictus for welcoming me with open arms. I’m truly going to miss you all!
I’ve leaving Invictus stronger athlete than I ever thought I could be and I’m so lucky to have been a part of this family!
We miss you, Jasveen!