Powerlifter Karina Espinosa
Karina is a bundle of positive energy. She competed along with her teammates Sway and Lis back in July at the USPA Drug Tested National Championships.
Anyone in the Metro Atlanta strength community probably recognizes Karina from lifting and volunteering at local meets. Her husband/personal sherpa/photographer John and her very very very strong son Josh are usually there with her. She loves her family, her dogs and Grrrl Clothing.
Karina & I work together since 2017 after I hosted the Atlanta Women’s Open. Since then she set a lot of PRs as well as several USPA state records. She frequently rises before the sun to train with John at World Gym in Peachtree City, GA.
Training and preparation
LS: What is your lifting and competition background?
KE: I started powerlifting January 2016 and actually did my very first meet the day before my 42nd birthday on March 31, 2016 in Savannah with my son. To date, I have competed in 5 USAPL meets, and 3 USPA meets. I joined Team Lis Smash after the 2017 Women’s open in May 2017.
LS: When did you decide to do this recent competition and what was training like leading up to it?
KE: I did my first USPA meet in December 2018, and then actually signed up for my second the next day afterwards in March 2019. My fabulous coach let me know a few days after that December meet that I had actually had qualifying numbers for Nationals. I signed up shortly afterwards. I focused on training for the March meet so I could get my numbers a little higher and training went extremely well, especially squats. After the March meet, I started meet prep for Nationals about a week afterwards.
This time it was a bit of a struggle. Fatigue was more of an issue and I gained some weight that I just could not drop like before. Right after my 45th birthday, my body just went haywire.
USPA Drug Tested Nationals
LS: Any travel/injury/weight cut surprises or mishaps leading up to meet day?
KE: I had 7 pounds that I gained to drop and adding cardio (which I really detest), cleaning my eating (I have a killer sweet tooth), drinking a ton of water, and the most I was able to drop was 3 pounds. It was very frustrating and disheartening because I felt like I was doing everything right. I also suffer from migraines, and it seemed that they were just increasing in intensity and frequency. Traveling to Vegas was also a challenge because I never really realized how much traveling could affect you. The time change and jet lag is no joke!
LS: How did the meet go?
I was not able to make weight so ended up going up a weight group. Unfortunately, I did not find out until the very end of the meet that I didn’t actually have qualifying numbers in that weight group. All I knew when I did not make weight was that I may not even get to lift. Talk about wanting to just go off and cry in a corner.
I did get to lift and it was rough going. I was called on depth on my opener and redid it for my second, which was good. I was red lighted on my 3rd attempt as well but it was a weight that I had never lifted before and even though it wasn’t good for the meet, I am extremely happy about it because I got it up and it looked pretty good to me, regardless of what the judges said.
Bench was fine and I missed the 3rd lift that I missed at my last meet, and my deadlifts were nowhere near my best effort.
Goals
LS: Did you set any personal records?
KE: Although it was red-lighted, I had my best squat at this meet. 105KG (231.49 pounds). This was a 5KG (11 pound) increase from my 3rd squat in March.
LS: What were your personal goals for the event?
KE: My goal was just to improve on each of my lifts and my totals. Unfortunately, I did not meet them.
Reflection & the future
LS: If Today Karina could give some advice to Pre-Meet Karina, what would she say?
KE: Trust in yourself and your training. Enjoy the experience, even the bad, because you will grow and just become a better version of yourself.
LS: What is one of your training/competition goals for August/this fall?
My main priority right now is getting to a more comfortable weight where I don’t have to stress about weight cuts. I finally went to the doctor and got some of my health issues addressed and found out I have a low active thyroid. I am on meds, and hopefully this will help with the weight issues and some of the other things I have going on that I had no clue were impacted by the thyroid.
I am still training (a lot of hypertrophy) and by the end of August, I hope to have made a decision with my coach on if I will continue to compete or if I will just train to keep getting stronger for myself. I’m pretty sure I will continue to compete as the platform is pretty addictive and I do love it!
I am considering competing in the USPA Dirty South meet, but I will make that final decision once my meds start helping (or not) my lazy thyroid and giving myself a little time to recoup. I absolutely love powerlifting, but I also don’t want to shut out any other opportunities such as Strongwoman and Olympic type lifting events. I’ve always wanted to learn how to do a clean and jerk and snatches.
Final thoughts
KE: As an athlete, self-care is the most important thing. If I could have changed anything about the past few months was to have gone to the doctor sooner. Would it helped with me making weight, maybe or maybe not. However, it would have helped me understand why my body was behaving the way it was. It wasn’t about me not working hard enough or feeling like a failure because I couldn’t do something. I was really beating myself up for something that I had no control over. I’m now taking the time to love myself and to take care of me.
Thank you to Karina for sharing! She competes again in January 2020 at the USPA Drug Tested meet in Lake Allatoona, Georgia.
Interested in training for a powerlifting meet? YOU CAN DO IT! Whether or not you care about competing in the USPA Drug-Tested division, or if you want to lift elsewhere, or only train for fun, we have a barbell ready for you!
Contact me now to schedule a free intro.
