Topic: News: Ivan & Gwen Sistos-Rojas, A Weightlifting Couple

[Chris Ⓐ LeRoux]

The Couple that Lifts Together, Stays Together
By Michael Blinn

Ivan Rojas watches as Hillary Brown slowly lowers her body into a squat. The 13 year old keeps her back perfectly straight, her eyes focus on the garage wall across from her. "We’re lucky our neighbor is perfect for weightlifting," Rojas says with a laugh.

He and his wife would know, too. At 40, Rojas, a Bolivian native, has won several international championships, and twice been to the Olympics. His wife, 23-year-old, New Jersey native Gwen Sistos-Rojas, is fresh from a gold medal in her weight class at the National Collegiate Championships last weekend.

The two don’t look much like weightlifters, let alone champions of the sport, at first glance. Their upper bodies are muscular, but not like the toned-and-oversized muscle magazine covers. Then there are their legs.

Everything on their legs sticks out, though. Quadriceps, hamstrings, calves, even their shins look muscular and defined.

Yet, the two wake up every morning at five for their first workout of the day. Then, they drive in opposite directions from their Eliot, Maine, home: Gwen to Lynn, Mass., for her aerospace engineering job at General Electric, and Ivan to Brunswick, Maine, as a banker at Bank of America. At the end of the day, they have another workout to look forward to before going to bed at 10.

It is 8:30 at night, and the light is fading fast. But inside the tiny garage, the lights glint off the numerous pictures, medals, and trophies. In the middle of the garage, there is a metal rack, and two well-worn bars with colorful weight plates, all Olympic standard, on the ends. Everything looks daunting and heavy.

Gwen leans over, and grabs the bar. Her legs flex expertly and in an instant, the bar, 65 kilograms (132 pounds) is up and over her head.

Brown and Catherine Faulkner, both 13, study Gwen’s movement’s with the bar, loaded with weights. With an early start on lifting, Ivan hopes the benefits will come to the girls.

Lifting, he says, burns fat, improves metabolism, speed, flexibility, focus, self-confidence, knowledge about personal health, and then some.

"I don’t know any other lifters with joint problems," Ivan says.

Despite the benefits, Gwen often finds herself in explanation of the sport she loves.

"I’ve met a lot of people who have no idea what the snatch and clean and jerk are," she says.

They’re doing their part to teach the world through a few neighborhood kids at a time. They never charge anyone who comes to join their workout, and their single regret is that their tiny garage isn’t bigger to house a larger crew.

"If we could have a bigger place with more kids, we’d love that," Ivan says.

Weightlifting can help anyone, often athletes who look for an edge in their game. Ivan has trained pro golfers to football players in the NFL.

"Anything with explosive movement," Ivan explains.

A normal workout plan starts with little weight (as evidenced by Brown and Faulkner, who work with a broomstick) and more repetitions to get precise form. As the workouts progress, more weight is added and there are fewer reps. When competitions near, they concentrate more on competition-specific lifts.

Gwen works on her leg strength daily, squatting 200-plus pounds twice a day. Workouts include plyometrics to enhance speed.

The kids though, stay on the workouts with the stick. That includes the Rojas’s 2-year-old daughter, Gwendolyn, who is at times more apt to ride the stick like a horse.

"She’s the youngest weightlifter ever," Gwen says with a laugh.

With practice, Gwendolyn can follow in her mother’s footsteps. Yearly, the couple spends two weeks away at Olympic training camps. Gwen has been to Spain, Bulgaria, China, and all over the United States for competitions.

With all of the international exposure, there is no room for shame at the competitions either.

"I have to go up there in this," Gwen points to her spandex one piece. "Everyone knows how much I weigh, how old I am - you’re transparent."

Being in those positions has helped Gwen in other areas of her life. Her confidence comes from her sport, and so does her discipline. Every day at work, she uses her short-term goal setting strategies, born from her weightlifting.

All of the benefits, she says, are cumulative. Everything builds up over time. Being able to stick with it is where it all comes together, especially for the Rojases.

"I’m 41 years old," Ivan says with a smile. "And I’m still moving these weights."