Female Bodybuilder in Kenya Pumps Iron, Tears Down Stereotypes 

This article was originally published on akomanet.com

By NOORULAIN KHAWAJA     Nov. 21, 2016

Nairobi — Lawyer by day, bodybuilder by night. Farah Esmail was first introduced to bodybuilding in 2011 on an airplane en route to Florida. She noticed a woman taking out food from the overhead bin. Esmail found that to be odd so she struck up a conversation with her, only to learn that she was a bodybuilding competitor.

"She had a special food bag. I had never seen someone carrying their own food on a plane," said Esmail. "She was 42 and she looked like she was 25 because she was in amazing shape."

Esmail was regularly in Florida for short vacations, but this time around, when she arrived she learned that she would be attending a bodybuilding competition in Boca Raton to support a friend's girlfriend.

At the competition, Esmail was intrigued by what she saw on stage.

"I was in complete awe looking at these women," said Esmail. "In awe because of their body shape, muscles, strength and confidence they exuded on stage."

Fitness has always been a part of Esmail's life. She played sports as a student at Hillcrest and continued through law school in Canada playing squash to decompress from studying. When living and working in the United States, Esmail took up marathon running. A favored athletic feat for her was climbing Mt. Kilimanjaro with her father and uncles, but there was one thing always on the back of her mind: bodybuilding.

It was not until she moved back to Kenya that she decided to pursue it seriously. The year was 2014, and she had been back in the country for two years and just left her job. It was at this point that Esmail started to reevaluate her life and self-reflection brought her to the realization that she still had things she wanted to achieve. Items on her bucket list: climbing Mt. Kenya, taking a trip to India, performing in a bodybuilding competition.

Her journey to bodybuilding began in a place familiar to her, the gym. She knew she had to step it up—more intensive weight training and changing her diet—to win a competition in the bikini category.

"I used weights and had a trainer in my early 20s, but I didn't know what I was doing," said Esmail. "I'd always been athletic, but I ate horribly."

Lack of resources in Kenya meant that she had to turn to the internet, using social networks like Facebook and watching YouTube videos to get educated on the sport and how to pose. She would remain self-taught until the end of 2015.

According to the Kenya Bodybuilding Federation (KBBF), bodybuilding was popular here in the 1970s and 1980s, but it diminished in the mid-2000s because the sport became entangled in corruption and political scandals. Different groups were vying for control of the sport and funds were disappearing, leading disgruntled athletes to give up training.

In 2014, the same year that Esmail was entering the sport, Chris Omedo became chairman of KBBF and turned the sport around.

"When I first came into the position, bodybuilding was a dead sport," said Omedo. "Now the sport has come back in a big way."

Under Omedo's leadership, there was an increase in the number of funders and followers of the sport, in part, because of local media coverage. One big change that he implemented was introducing a female division in competitions. For Esmail, the timing couldn't be better.

Esmail’s first competition was Musclemania Africa in 2014. She came first in the fitness model category, but second in the bikini fitness category.

"I was hooked, thinking that I need to do better," said Esmail, recalling her first competition as a "complete disaster."

She redeemed herself in 2015, winning in the bikini category for competitions such as Ms. Kenya and Ms. Nairobi. But, 2016 has been her biggest year.

In May, she competed in the inaugural Arnold Classic in South Africa, a highly regarded and competitive stage, placing seventh in the masters (over the age of 35) bikini fitness category. In October, she went to the United Arab Emirates to compete in the Dubai Muscle Show and won the masters bikini fitness category, her first international win. The following week, she came back to Nairobi to defend her Ms. Kenya title.

She credits her success this year to the hiring of her UK-based coach, Michelle Brannan of ShowGirl Fitness, who helped her get better at posing and stage presentation. Not all bodybuilders in Kenya can afford to hire an overseas coach because occasional trips to meet with the coach can be costly. Esmail considers herself blessed because her full-time job as a lawyer sustains her bodybuilding career.

"I have a passion for legal practice, which pays for my other passion," said Esmail. "Not a lot of Kenyan athletes can afford to go outside because it's expensive."

In addition to paying for her coach and trips to the UK, she also pays for flights, accommodation, and entrance fees that come with attending international competitions. The sport can be expensive for Kenyan athletes, who want to continue representing their country on an international stage, because of a lack of funding from the government.

Bodybuilding demands discipline and dedication as well. It takes at a minimum 12 weeks to train for a competition where the bodybuilder ends up on stage for five minutes. A normal day for Esmail is cardio in the morning, work during the day and weight training in the evening. She maintains a diet of low carbohydrates, eventually no carbohydrates just before the competition, and being that she is particular about what she eats, she weighs her food and takes it into work in Tupperware containers. Esmail eats a total of six meals a day, one of which is a protein shake post-workout.

“Local Kenyan diet is good. Sukuma wiki and sweet potatoes are great local staples. The quality of chicken and beef here is good, regularly organic,” said Esmail. “I think you can get access to good macronutrients, but supplementation is expensive.”

Esmail is an ambassador for and is currently sponsored by Ultimate Sports Nutrition (USN), a supplements company from South Africa. Being affiliated with USN is of benefit because the cost of her supplements are subsidized, with some supplements even being free. USN has been a sponsor for bodybuilding events in Kenya and for women in the sport, with its first ambassadors being female bodybuilders.

Beauty standards for women in bikini fitness requires that they have the overall package. Preparation before a competition means getting a spray tan, finding a good bikini, buying posing shoes and jewelry, and having hair and makeup done on the day.

When KBBF first included women in competitions there were only two female athletes on stage, one of them being Esmail. That number is growing. At this year's Ms. Kenya competition, 12 women competed on stage in the bikini fitness category.

The increase in female participation in a predominately male sport is a good sign, given local culture and traditions.

"There was this perception before, that was implicated by our traditions, that ladies are not supposed to take up sports like bikini and figure because they would be half nude on stage," said Omedo. "That is changing. It's not just about bodybuilding, cat walking, pageantry, it's about your lifestyle and staying healthy."

Esmail understands that sentiment and how being on stage might raise eyebrows, even among the Indian community, but having a supportive family helps.

For Esmail, it's not just about winning more competitions. Her goal is two-fold: bringing health and fitness to the forefront of the Ismaili community, which she does by organizing fitness events, and encouraging more women to get into bodybuilding.

While she acknowledges that she works in a conservative profession, she isn't worried about the possibility of damaging her brand.

"Not only am I mentally tough, but I am physically tough," said Esmail. "I didn't want one of my passions to interfere with the other. I think they can coexist.”

Farah Esmail, exercising both her mind and her body.