If you met Tammy Lauer at church, or at one of her daughter’s swimming meets, you would probably never guess she’s one of the top powerlifters in the country.
The 50-year-old, unassuming mother of three is a family woman first. But in her free time she likes to pump major iron, and competes at USA Powerlifting competitions.
She’s so strong that she holds several state records, and this past Saturday she set two American records.
Lauer first dabbled in powerlifting more than 20 years ago, when she and her first husband got into the sport through bodybuilding. He took her to see her first competition back in 1988.
“I looked at the women on stage and said, ‘I can do that,’” she said. “I went through a year of bodybuilding and qualified to go pro, but in bodybuilding, it’s really subjective. In addition to having muscles, the judges are looking at your tan, your choreography, your music, and your appeal.”
After a year of bodybuilding, instead of going pro she decided to try something a little more black-and-white. It was powerlifting.
Powerlifting is a strength sport that consists of three attempts at maximal weight on three lifts: squat, bench press and deadlift.
“In powerlifting, you can’t blame anybody if you don’t make the lift,” Lauer said. “You are comparing yourself against yourself, trying to set a personal record.”
After a couple more years of competitive powerlifting, in 1992, life changed for Lauer. That’s the year she got pregnant with her first child, and her husband was diagnosed with cancer.
She was seven months pregnant when he got sick, and he died 11 months later. He was 32 years old.
“Those two events kind of stopped it all,” she said about her powerlifting. “I had my infant, I got remarried, and I had two more kids.”
Lauer stepped back from lifting to raise her family, but after two decades away from the gym, she finally decided in 2013 that she was ready to go back.
“I waited until my kids were 14, 16 and 20 before I said, ‘I think I can go to the gym and the kids are going to be OK,’” she said.
It was also about this time that Lauer met her training partner, Zyvonne Langan.
“We knew each other from church,” Langan said. “One morning I was going to work out, and Tammy was there. We started talking and I found out about her background in bodybuilding and lifting.”
The two started working out together and encourage each other. Lauer credits Langan with motivating her to get in the gym.
“I lack the discipline to go in alone, but when Zyvonne says, ‘I’ll be there at 5:30 in the morning,’ I’ll be there,” Lauer said.
“I’m her encourager and training buddy,” Langan said.
Lauer may have gotten back in the gym in 2013, but it would be another two years before she returned to powerlifting.
She still holds two state records set in 1991 for a female in the 123-pound weight class. One is her squat record of 300 pounds, and the other is her total weight record of 780 pounds. Total weight is the combined weight for all three different lifts.
“I looked at those records, and I was impressed that my records from 1991 had not been beaten,” she said. “That was the first encouragement. The second was, I turned 50 about a year ago. I started looking at the 50-year-old records, and I said, ‘I can do that.’”
She was particularly eyeing the bench press record.
So, with a goal in mind, Lauer began seriously training this past February, and in May she had her first competition in more than 20 years.
After that first competition, she signed up for another in June, then another in August.
In August, she benched a weight that would have been an American record, but there weren’t three national referees present, which is required to set a record.
After the August competition, Lauer took a few months off to support her daughter in high school swimming, but all the while she was planning on going for the record again.
Once swimming was finished, she was ready and got her chance this past weekend during the USAPL Senior Powerlifting Championship at the American Strength Training Center in Maplewood.
The three referees she needed were present, and that Saturday she benched 151 pounds to set single-lift and three-lift American records in the 138-pound division.
It’s the first time in her career that she’s held an American record.
Now that she’s broken the bench press record, she’s looking at others. She believes she’s only scraped the surface of what she’s capable of in powerlifting, and so does her training partner.
“She broke those records and had some personal bests that day, too, and it kind of opened up the doors,” Langan said. “She has a lot more she can do.”
“The truth is, I’m just a casual lifter so far. I haven’t tried as hard as I can,” Lauer said. “I think I believe in myself, and I’m ready to go back out and try to set the Minnesota record in deadlift, and better all my others.”
So next time you meet a nice, middle-aged woman at church, don’t assume she isn’t also a record-holding powerlifter in her spare time.
Courtesy of: Hutchinson Leader