Emily Campbell is a history-maker and one of the many Olympic athletes you should aspire to. Her Wiki will tell you that she’s the most successful British weightlifter of modern times, having become a four-time European champion, and a double World and Olympic medalist.
But as she sits on the other end of the Zoom call, Campbell is as humble as ever, with her bright personality beaming through the screen. As we discuss her Olympic achievements, she shares her straight-forward bottom line. “I hope I’m the start of the end of being the first woman to do things. It’s normal for us to be able to achieve amazing things. It’s great to be a pioneer, but I hope that I won’t be the first and the last to bring Olympic medals back for our sport as a woman,” she tells PS UK.
Campbell is part of Venus‘s Move Your Body Campaign, where she joins fellow Team GB athlete Becky Downie and England and Arsenal defender Lotte Wubben-Moy in confronting the barriers preventing women and girls participating in sport. “A third of women don’t do sport because they’re uncomfortable in their own skin, and that’s heartbreaking to hear,” Campbell shares. “My sport is something I love to do every day and I want others to feel that way. As a collective, we need to work harder to make women feel more comfortable to access sport.”
Her main tip for getting into sport is simple – just give it a go. “I’m a big believer in just giving it a go, giving anything a go. Sometimes we’re scared to fail or we’re scared to not enjoy something because everybody else enjoys it. But the only way you’ll find out is by going for it.”
Through Move Your Skin and her love for weightlifting, Campbell is determined to show that struggle is universal, especially for women, but taking time to band together and acknowledge our wins is one step closer to the change that she wants to see. Campbell’s own barrier is one she openly talks about on her channels and has no plans to stop.
“I always talk openly about access to gym kit,” she begins. “It’s not as accessible as people think it is. Sizing doesn’t match up for a start, no matter how big you are. You might be a size 12 in a pair of jeans and a T-shirt, but then you put a size 12 gym kit on and it’s nowhere near big enough for you.
Image Source: Venus
“You are not a big person for wearing a 14. And the size ranges within brands are currently inaccessible and unrealistic,” she adds. “The average size in this country is a 16, so how can your gym kit stop at a size 16? We need to talk about this more and put pressure on these brands to do better.”
As she continues on her journey to make gym kits more accessible, pushing better representation is also on the cards for the Silver medal winner. She tells us: “Nearly half of women would feel more comfortable in their own skin if they had better representation in billboards, ads, magazines, adverts, etc. To me, that’s a very simple thing to fix. Brands need to start casting more realistic bodies and putting them out there for people to see.”
As a proud Black woman, Campbell has had no qualms doing her bit for representation on the biggest stage in the world. During the Paris 2024 Olympic Games, a total of 36.1 million viewers tuned into the BBC’s TV coverage of the competition in the UK, meaning a lot of people saw Campbell’s expressive hairstyle as she lifted over 87kg.
“I’ll continue to try and bring as much sparkle and sass to the weightlifting world.”
She says: “I’m a very proud black woman, and I like to shout it from the rooftops, I like to show the beauty of the complexity of our hair, our skin tone and I do it to inspire young Black children to get into sport, to see me on the TV and think, ‘That’s pretty cool. I can do that too.’ I’ll continue to try and bring as much sparkle and sass to the weightlifting world.”
Campbell’s next steps are continuing on the path of giving back to her community, whether that’s through encouraging body diversity, increasing representation, making sport accessible for anyone and everyone and maybe even starting up her own Emily Campbell Sports range, which she exclusively tells PS UK is “definitely not off the cards.”
While her plans for the LA Games in 2028 remain undecided, she’s working towards getting her own gym space and long-term goal: “I want to make weightlifting accessible for as many people as possible. I run weightlifting workshops around the country, and I’d eventually love to have my own space in a gym that everyone could come in and no matter your background or who you are. That is ultimately the dream.”
She concludes: “When the dust settles and there’s no more medals to collect, I’d love to keep giving back in that way.”
Lauren Gordon is the editorial coordinator at PS UK, where she creates lifestyle and identity content. Lauren has a degree in journalism from University of the Arts London and previously worked as a showbiz and TV reporter at The Mirror US. Lauren specialises in pop culture, hair and beauty, focusing on trends, sharing in-depth tutorials, and highlighting hidden gems in the beauty industry.
