9:20am Sunday 5th September 2010
By Dave Peters
AN estate agent has ditched her job to pursue her dream of becoming an Olympic weightlifter.
Twenty-five-year-old Sunny Brar has chucked in her £25,000-a-year career selling houses to concentrate full-time on her dream of making the London 2012 Games.
She made the decision just ten months after lifting her first weight and has already gone from zero to second in England in her 63kg weight category.
She said: “It is a risk giving up a good job but I have always had this dream of competing in the Olympics ever since I was a kid and I will do whatever it takes.”
Brar admits she had initial misgivings about a sport which is normally associated with hulking muscle-bound competitors when her friend suggested it as an alternative to going to the gym.
She said: “I thought I don’t want to do that, it’s for fat people, but I went along because I am always up for new things and was bored of the gym.”
She took to it straight away winning the Midlands Championship in her first competition and she achieved personal bests in every competition since.
And because she is competing at the U63kg category she is confident she won’t lose her looks.
She said: “I may get a bit leaner but I don’t want to put on huge muscle mass. Nobody can believe I am a weightlifter – they expect people who are huge with a huge gut and massive muscles.
“I’m a bit different to that.”
Already she can lift more than her own body weight above her head, managing 80kg in the clean and jerk and 70kgs in the snatch.
She decided to quit her job after struggling to juggle her 12-hour working day with her training.
She said: “I want this so much that I didn’t have any doubts about giving my job up and I haven’t had any regrets but I may need to take up a part time job to keep some money coming in.”
She has had to leave her flat and move back in with mum in Iver as she comes to terms with no longer having a salary.
She said: “I have had to make sacrifices but it will all be worth it if I get into the Olympics. It would mean everything to me just to be a competitor there.”
Mum Sandy is fully behind here.
Her Ford Focus is now parked on the road after she gave up her garage to allow her daughter to convert it into a gym.
Brar said: “I don’t know what the neighbours must think. I’m not a grunter when I’m lifting but they must hear the weights banging.”
She has always been sporty and was ranked number two in the country for pole vault at U17 level.
She said: “I have tried my hand at loads of sports but I wish I had tried weightlifting sooner.
“If I had started earlier I could have represented England at the Commonwealth Games.”
Her coach Phil Nourse, said: “When she came down I knew straight away she was a natural.
“She would have definitely got into the Commonwealth Games if she had started earlier and now she’s aiming for the ultimate goal.”
But she faces a massive uphill battle to fulfil her Olympic dream.
Even if she achieves the Olympic qualifying standard and is the best in her weight category she could still end of up jobless and dreamless.
The British team have said they will only have two women in their entire weightlifting squad – leaving them without competitors in six weight groups.
She said: “It would be such a disappointment if I was the best in Britain and still didn’t get in but it makes me want to do it even more.
“I live, breathe and do everything for weightlifting and I really want this.”
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