71 year-old powerlifter from Somerset breaking records just a year into the sport

A 71 year-old woman says she feels she has a 'superpower now' after taking up competitive powerlifting in the last year.

Peeps Nicol, who lives near Weston-super-Mare, started the sport after her husband died and says it’s even helping her to manage her multiple sclerosis. She’s now entering competitions and setting records for her weight and age category.

Peeps was living in Spain with her husband of 30 years Brian - but when he passed away in 2020 she eventually moved to Somerset for a new start.

After joining a gym, her personal trainer encouraged her to try powerlifting.

She said: "I’m quite pleased with my deadlift now. I should be just about able to lift my bodyweight now. I’m 63kg, 9st 10lbs or so - I still think in old money!"

Peeps says her family are proud of her for taking up the sport and hopes more people will be encouraged to try it. She said: "Women of my age - we don’t think about things like powerlifting, it’s not what we do. Most people that I know - they’re keen to do a bit of aqua aerobics or yoga or something like that, which don’t particularly appeal to me. But what I’ve found in powerlifting is something I really like to do. I didn’t ever have that in my life - some kind of sport that I like to do."

Peeps takes part in competitions at JC Strength Academy, co-owned by Jo Barwell-Clarke (pictured) her her husband Jon

Peeps has taken part in competitions already at JC Strength Academy in Weston-super-Mare. She is set to compete in another one in autumn.

Co-owner of the academy Jon Clarke said: "I just think she’s amazing. The fact that she got into this at such a late stage but just jumped in straight away with two feet, straight into the deep end, immediately wanted to get on the platform for a competition. These are things that she didn’t have any plans on five years ago. She’s just found it, loved it and then pushed forwards with it and is a great example of what the sport’s all about."

Peeps says her husbands was concerned about how she would manage after he died, but she believes he would be proud of her. She said: "He was worried about how I’d get on but I promised him, before he died, that I’d be alright. Somehow or another, I’d be alright. I just knew I would be but I didn’t know in what way and I feel I really do have this superpower now, that I’m growing into something big and strong and it feels so good."