From dance floors to weight racks: Alex Hipwell's journey to empowerment and strength

How did you get into dancing?

“I was born in Brisbane, on the east coast of Australia. But I actually spent the first five years of my life growing up in Papua New Guinea, because my father was captain of a New Guinea airline. We moved back when I was five, and I had a very active childhood, playing a lot of sports, from Iron Woman to swimming, to netball to dancing. At the age of 14, I decided to go with the one sport that I was really bad at, which was dancing! But that set me up for the rest of my life, to be honest, because it was my parents who were guiding me to always do what makes my heart happy. And that set the foundations for everything I have done since then.”

What was it that made you love dancing?

“I loved getting up on stage, I loved the way that I lost myself, when I was dancing, I just felt this freedom. They say dance like no one’s watching, that really has a meaning to it, because there is something so therapeutic about dancing. I had to overcome stage fright and nerves which I did with the help of a coach that my mum got me when I was 12. Now it’s like I’ve come full circle, because I am coaching others in their mindset, helping athletes channel their mind because your mind is so powerful. So when I look back, that was supposed to be my path. My parents supported me the whole way.

“I got scholarships and went to some great schools in Australia, which took me overseas and I landed in Germany of all places! Australian dancers were very sought after because we have been trained to be versatile so we got a lot of jobs. I worked as a professional dancer for 15 years. I never had any money, but I was living my dream, it was fantastic on so many levels. But I was also frequently injured and I wanted to understand why I, and lots of the other girls, were. The main focus for us as dancers was that we had to be skinny, so a lot of us didn’t have periods because we didn’t eat properly, and now, looking back I can see that if I had known then about nutrition and training, I would probably not have had those problems.

“I took the opportunity to study online in 2008 when the financial crisis hit, we were all out of work because a lot of shows got cancelled, so I did a year long course. I fell in love with fitness and nutrition. I fell in love with the anatomy, the body, what’s happening, and, and it’s just literally been the most beautiful journey since. I already had a better understanding of my body. I started going to the gym, I started training differently and doing a lot of core strength work.

“I became pregnant with my son Jack, and a year after I had him I decided to leave the stage as a dancer and as a choreographer. I got into BodyBuilding, and quickly became very successful at it, and won the German championship in the first year, and Nike picked me up and asked me to become a Master Trainer. It’s been an honour to represent them for 12 years now, through all of their innovations and changes. And in the midst of all of this change, I also discovered the functional fitness world, and CrossFit. I was seeing the female athletes’ bodies and was just so impressed with their physiques. But the thing I really found was a community in the gym. I went from the lonely solo sport of bodybuilding, to joining a group of like-minded and incredible humans. But the most important thing for me was my mindset change of fueling my body for an aesthetic appeal in bodybuilding, to now wanting to eat enough food to be able to perform in CrossFit. So I’ve gone from this aesthetic fueling, controlling mindset to thinking “I need to fuel my performance”. And that was such an eye opener for me, and I thought this is such a healthy direction, I need to go with it.

Was it difficult to watch the scale changing and your body changing?

“When my body changed from dancer to bodybuilder was probably the biggest thing for me. So I remember, weighing myself daily, I think is a better way to do it, just because you get an average over the week. But as a dancer, you have an emotional connection to a scale. So I had to stand on this scale every day, and I was crying every day, because I was putting on weight every day. So I created a vision board, and I put on all my favourite athletes, all these women that I just really admired. I wrote affirmations there, and I put it above the scale. So when I stepped on the scale, I looked at that first, and I just would go over it in my head.”

When you support women in their own kind of transformations how do you deal with their concerns about their bodies changing?

“Some women fear putting on weight. It could have been they were overweight when they were younger, it could also be that they were force fed as kids. There’s lots of small triggers involved. It’s just fear of not understanding the process of what’s going to happen. They only have their past experience of what they’ve experienced.”

So your main focus is to coach and work with women?

“Most of the time women will come to me because they want to get a bit stronger and see some sort of progress from the work that they’re putting in. But you also have to look at the rest of their lives: how much sleep are they getting? Where are they in their cycle? Are they drinking enough water? Protein? Am I eating enough to support the activity I’m doing? Why does my body change throughout my cycle? And how can I approach it with an understanding of this too shall pass. So it’s not about having a rigid training and nutrition programme, and doing it all perfect at once. It’s about going, Okay, what is realistic for me? What is measurable? How am I going to show up, but also what really matters? What do I really, really want?”

Why should women be training differently to men?

“I discovered that during my studies there was hardly any research done on women, then it was 2%, now it is 7%. Most of the scientific research for sports and nutrition is done on males, but women are not small men. I was very curious about how our hormones impact us during the four stages of our cycle. Women should be training differently to men because we are hormonal throughout our entire cycle. Men are very linear. When it comes to hormones. They may have a surge, for example of their testosterone or whatever and certain time in the day, but not to the point that it impacts recovery differently throughout four weeks or three weeks. Every woman has a unique hormone profile that needs to be very clear from the beginning. You cannot generically create a programme that is phase based. There’s just not enough data out there. We do not have enough research, but the fact that we’re talking about it, and the fact that we’re looking at things like oestrogen, you know, oestrogen is an anabolic hormone. So if we know that there’s a surge of oestrogen at a certain time in the cycle, why don’t we try and utilise it?

“I get all my women to track their cycle, and I get them to note how they are feeling. How powerful they are feeling, or not. So by understanding your unique hormone profile you can maximise your training and finally get what you want! I’m not only talking about optimising female performance in the gym, but also in life and work. When you know how your cycle affects you, you can begin to plan.”

If you could only give one mantra to your clients, what would it be?

“Yes, I can.”

You have an online programme called “Strong for Summer”, how can women sign up for it?

“I have my Lifting Women coaching platform through which I coach women all year round, but we also do an 8 week challenge to prepare for summer, I mean, we all want to feel good on the beach. I want to feel strong, and I want to feel sexy. So I decided to create a programme where the motivation is to become strong and fit. The by product is how you look. It’s a four or five day a week programme, and there is a private group where we can support each other through it. It is not a generic programme though, I still want to make sure that each woman who signs up is going to benefit from the programme, so we have a call before we begin to check in.”

Tell me about your connection to Mallorca.

“All of my retreats have come from a personal transformation of mine, I was in a lot of emotional pain, and when I had finally got through it I was standing in the kitchen and I thought, How can I empower women? How can I bring them together? I know my energy is powerful, but I don’t understand it yet, but I know when I bring women together they can do things that they previously didn’t think they could do. So I decided to rent a villa in Mallorca and organise a retreat, and that was in 2014. I wrote it on Facebook, and it sold out in eight minutes, I had 13 people sign up! And it was just incredible. It was an absolute game changer. And I had my second one I think the same year, and I decided I needed to add a bit more fitness and that’s how I came across CrossFit Mallorca and the people there. The island is very healing for me, the sunshine and the water, being Australian I am very connected to both of them. Whenever I am here I am reenergised, I feel that I am not alone. I don’t have the words to explain the magic of this island.

If you are interested in the Strong for Summer programme then connect with Alex on Instagram and DM her https://www.instagram.com/alexhipwell. Or visit
https://www.lifting-women.com/ for her contact details.