Emily Campbell: From a council property to British weightlifting queen

Growing up on a council estate in Nottingham, she relied on free fruit and veg from the local market and worked in a special needs school to fund her training journey.

But weightlifter Emily Campbell is now a two-time Olympic medallist after ending  Team GB‘s Paris 2024 campaign with a bronze after winning silver at Tokyo 2020.

Now, the advocate for body positivity is setting her sights on Strictly Come Dancing – and you wouldn’t bet against her appearing on the BBC show soon given the hard work and determination she has put in to make it to the pinnacle of her sport.

Campbell, who went to Paris with a celebrity hair-stylist and was the only member of the British weightlifting squad to make the Games, won bronze yesterday.

Her medal in the women’s +81kg category meant the 19st 9lb weightlifter became the first Briton in the sport to win two Olympic medals in over half a century.

Campbell was born in 1994 to her decorator father Trevor and mother Lynda, and grew up on the Snape Wood estate in Bulwell, Nottinghamshire, with her younger sister Kelsie, an international swimmer for Jamaica.

Speaking to the Daily Mail in March, she said: ‘It was nice to be in a real city surrounded by real things. It gave me determination and motivation to work hard and make the best life that I could for myself.

‘But I had amazing parents who gave me opportunity after opportunity – and I was very good at trying to seize them.’

Talking about her heritage, she previously told British Weight Lifting: ‘My background is Jamaican and the way we celebrate is good food and good music.

‘When I was a kid on a Sunday you would be woken up to the sweet smell of curried mutton, rice and peas and mellow vibes of reggae music.

‘My hair is also something that is incredibly important as it’s part of my identity and the fact we can do so many different styles that really shows our culture.’

Campbell had initially hoped to become a shot putter and began weightlifting to improve her strength while studying sports science at Leeds Beckett University in 2016.

She did not receive funding when she began trying to qualify for Tokyo and instead had to raise £10,000 just to make it to the qualifying competitions.

Campbell told the Mail: ‘I lived at home and the bank of mum and dad was a huge help. I also reached out to the local community and a lot of them helped me.

‘I got a lot of support from the local Bulwell Market who gave me free fruit and veg and would fix my boots.’

She worked full-time in a school for children with behavioural needs, then on reception at a sport and injury clinic at the University of Nottingham.

Campbell said she ‘just did anything I could’ to pay for training and competitions and eventually received a small grant from British Weight Lifting to help her Olympic bid.

But she said this was called ‘black girl money’ by a jealous team-mate, adding: ‘Unfortunately, one of my team-mates felt she deserved the money instead of me. A nasty comment was made but that’s just life.’

Campbell’s first big moment was winning the English Senior Championship in January 2017 in Milton Keynes.

The following year she secured bronze at the 2018 Commonwealth Games in Australia, and then again in the 2019 European Championships.

At the 2021 European Championships, she became the first British weightlifter since Marie Forteath in 1988 to win golds across all three disciplines at the tournament.

At Tokyo 2020, which took place in 2021 due to the pandemic, she became the first British woman to get a medal in weightlifting at the Olympics by winning silver in the women’s 87kg+ session which saw both British and Commonwealth records broken.

She also won gold at the European Championships in 2022 and 2023, and also at the Commonwealth Games in Birmingham in 2022, before heading to Paris.

There, she yesterday became the first British weightlifter since Louis Martin in 1964 to win multiple medals at the Olympics.

In recent years Campbell has featured in an advertising campaigns for a range of brands, from Nike to Aldi, Venus razors to hair colouring brand Schwarzkopf, and Dreams beds to Optimum Nutrition.

The weightlifter, who has to consume around 3,300 calories a day, has long been frustrated that plus-size sports clothes are not more readily available for women.

But she recently became the first weightlifter to be sponsored by Nike, saying: ‘They said they are happy for me to be in the conversation about what plus-size girls would like to wear. It is nice to know your voice is being heard in such a massive corporation.

‘You never know, you might just see an Emily Campbell range with Nike.’

Speaking about how commercial deals began to come in after her Tokyo silver medal, she said: ‘That changed my life from the outset.

‘I went from a girl who was never recognised, and nobody even knew what I did, to walking down the street and people knowing exactly who I am.

‘I have done some pretty cool things since Tokyo. Things that I wouldn’t have ever imagined. I did Blue Peter. I did a Google ad. I got invited to the GQ Awards where Vivienne Westwood, Keanu Reeves and Stormzy were all sat in the room.

‘I am more than grateful for everything that I have been involved in. But I am still the same Emily Campbell that grew up in Bulwell.’

As well as her own clothing range, Campbell – who now is a National Lottery-funded athlete – has ambitions to open a weightlifting gym.

But she previously the Mail that she has also faced many barriers in life because of her weight.

She said: ‘Brands have been put off me because I am a bigger size. There are certain images brands want to portray and if you don’t fit into that box then it doesn’t work for them. You do get your trolls that write comments.

‘There is a lot of stigma in weightlifting. The boys are allowed to be big and they are really impressive and everybody thinks it’s amazing. But with the girls, it’s, ‘They are fat and out of shape and look like they ate too many burgers’.

‘I am a super heavyweight girl, but I am this size for performance. I am 19st 9lb, but I was 14st 13lb when I started the sport and I wasn’t moving enough mass to compete against the best girls in the world.

‘I want to leave a legacy and I want to show people that you can be proud of whoever you are, even if you don’t look like what society says you should look like.

‘There are not many athletes who have been plus-size and a person of colour. Everything is about representation. You can’t be what you can’t see.’

Campbell has also spoken about racist comments she has suffered, saying: ‘Yeah, lots of them have been sly and indirect. Unfortunately, we still live in a society where some people’s views don’t align with everyone else’s.

‘That’s why I try to work really hard to inspire young people of colour to achieve what they want to achieve.’

Meanwhile speaking about Strictly back in March, she said: ‘I would love to be on Strictly Come Dancing. I like that it’s something you have got to train hard for, something that is going to humble the hell out of you.

‘But it’s a bit of glitz and glam – and I love glitz and glam. Getting dressed up in nice dresses. That would be amazing.’

Yesterday, Campbell completed the Team GB medal haul with a cartwheel after clinching bronze.

She celebrated on stage after setting a new combined personal best of 288kg over snatch and clean-and-jerk disciplines to finish behind defending champion Li Wenwen of China and 21-year-old Park Hye-jeong of South Korea.

An audacious bid to muscle in on silver with a last lift of 174kg fell short but there was no disguising Campbell’s delight after finishing with a cumulative total five kilograms better than the one that sealed her silver medal in Tokyo.

‘It was the best cartwheel you’ve ever seen in your life,’ joked Campbell, whose medal was Team GB’s 65th and last of the Paris Games.

‘My coach had been telling me at every international for a long time that he wanted to see this cartwheel, and I thought, now’s your opportunity.’

Bedecked in red, white and blue braids, and sporting an Olympic rings logo stitched in by a celebrity hairstylist she flew in especially for the occasion, Campbell looked the part.

She placed third after securing a personal best of 119kg in the snatch, but it was already clear that Chinese defending champion Li and South Korea’s rising star Park were in a class of their own.

Li, who was injured prior to last year’s World Championships, was a long way short of her best but still snared the gold with relative ease, lifting a combined 10kg more than Park, who herself was 11kg in front of Campbell.

The 24-year-old gold medallist clearly had plenty left in the tank and celebrated her guaranteed gold medal by rejecting her final lift and instead lifting her coach on the stage to the delight of the capacity crowd at the South Paris Arena.

Despite the slight downgrade on her shock Tokyo silver, Campbell admitted that having friends and family cheering her on in Paris made her second Olympic medal particularly special.

‘The field was tough today and the level compared to Tokyo was so much higher, and I knew I had to bring out the big guns,’ she added.

‘It’s been a really tough road to these Games, and my family have been there every step of the way supporting me, and it’s great that they get to celebrate out here. They are absolutely nuts and they are going to be on a high for the rest of the day.

‘When I started weightlifting the plan was to make the Olympics in Paris and try to go for a medal. Tokyo was a bonus along the way, but today I have achieved the goal that I set out to do.’

Having blazed a trail for the sport in the UK, Campbell is intent on mentoring future British weightlifters at her base in Nottingham University – but added: ‘If Strictly want me, I wouldn’t say no.’