They say that, in order to know where we are going, it is important to know where we come from — an age-old idiom that refers to both culture and heritage.
As a fitness bunny, working out is a huge part of my culture and heritage — the household I grew up in taught me how healing exercise is, and I believe fitness has always been part of our culture as Black women. I celebrate the fit Venda women who did (and still do) manual labour and gained muscles and strong legs from the buckets of water and wood that they carried, way before the days of #Gains on Instagram. And Zulu women invented toned thighs long before Thursday leg day became a trend.
Fitness has always been us, which is why a film such as The Woman King starring Thuso Mbedu and Viola Davis is so important. The film is about a group of female warriors who fight and protect their Dahomey kingdom — true historical events from the 18th and 19th century. If you have seen the trailer or behind-the-scenes clips, you know the film is filled with Black women who are strong, ripped, fit, and toned. The force who got these stars physically there is celebrity trainer Gabriela Mclain.
“They needed to look like warriors, because they were fighting men most of the time,” Mclain tells SMag in an exclusive Zoom interview before her first client of the day in Los Angeles.
“Growing up I did track, field, and long-distance running. I loved to move — stopping wasn’t an option,” she says. “I decided to become a personal trainer and certified enough to be able to fix my injury. I love shifting people’s lives towards a healthier lifestyle, the way I did mine.”
She is the founder of GFit System, which aids in nutrition and fitness routines for injured bodies and has evolved into Gabi’s Fit Club, which empowers and pushes everyone to their limit — from celebrities to everyday moms.
Mclain has been Davis’s personal trainer for over four years and has trained her for multiple films. She was initially only signed to work with the Oscar winner for The Woman King.
“I was only meant to train her in pre-production. I started training Viola for the role, did her nutrition, strength training, and running. They then told me about Thuso and asked if I could train her as well, and as a fitness enthusiast I could not say no,” she laughs.
After she added Mbedu to her camp in Los Angeles, in a ripple effect the rest of the main cast — Lashana Lynch, Sheila Atim, and Adrienne Warren — also joined.
“I started getting them in really good shape; they got ripped and buff and then Gina [Prince-Bythewood] the director called me and asked me to squeeze her in as well. She started to understand how I function.”
Since Mclain had achieved so much with the main cast, the biggest worry was maintaining that physique for filming, so it was a no-brainer that the trainer would pack up and fly out to South Africa as the main trainer of the cast, which also included other stars such as Masali Baduza and Chioma Umeala.
“I knew what motivates them, their breakdowns and how they could go beyond their limits, which is something that takes time,” Mclain says. “What separates this movie from others is that there is no CGI, it is 100% real. The skills and muscles gained were real.”
The cast did hours of martial arts as their cardio, and moved to an hour-and-a-half of strength training with Mclain daily, where she included some of the stunts learnt in the programme.
“I am very visual, so I wanted them to imagine they were fighting someone while carrying the weights.”
Although DNA testing can set you back a few thousand and may not be an option for some, Mclain’s training technique can be done at home or in your own local gym with bands, kettlebells, dumbbells, and body weight as the main tools.
Mclain will also be releasing a programme titled Train Like a Woman King, which will include all the strength exercises and nutrition at an affordable rate on her website.
Mclain’s tips for training like a woman king
- “I always start from the legs, because they were warriors and walking, so the base is important.” Use kettlebells for legs (picking up kettlebells and dropping them), and incorporate jump squats, deadlifts, lunges, and step-ups.
- For building your core, “do a lot of sit-ups with plates, weights, and kettlebells”. Incorporate weights into every exercise.
- “Shoulders often make someone look athletic.” Incorporate punches with weights, pull-ups, pull-downs, and old-school exercises such as push-ups. Mclain also encourages compound movements that use the whole body, which prevents you from being static.
- Download apps such as TABATA where you can set up rounds and rests and which beeps to keep you accountable for endurance. “I cut resting in between to a minimum.”
- “Focus on what you can do, like building strength, rather than looking good in a bikini, that will come automatically.”
- “If you are skinny and want to build muscle focus more on strength training, but if you want to lose weight and gain muscle a combination of both is important.”
“In real life, diet is normally 80% while training is 20%, but for this it was 100% diet and 100% training. We only had three months to prepare for the film, which is a very short time to get someone in good shape, so DNA played a major role. There was no one diet that could fit all,” she says.
“Their DNA tests showed me how they break down fats, carbohydrates, protein, and all the different food groups, what they needed more of, and how much recovery each of them needed after training.”
Mclain then designed a meal plan for each member of the main cast, with Mbedu being on a slightly different diet to Davis. The personalised plans consisted of five meals (breakfast, lunch, dinner, and two snacks in between) as well as four litres of water every day. Every meal consisted of personalised protein, carbs, and veggies.
“Their breakfast, however, was similar — oats and eggs, depending on how the day was and if they needed more energy or protein,” she says.
The information from the DNA test also ensured that no one became bloated.
“We needed their stomachs flat and camera ready. There was no time to be bloated,” she laughs.
Mclain has 20 years’ experience in the fitness industry and hails from the Czech Republic. She started out at as a dancer until she had a hip injury and was forced to retire.