RINCON -- Local businesswoman Elizabeth Keith walked away from a recent U.S. Powerlifting Association competition with some new records and taking championship honors back with her to Effingham County.

For Keith, who owns and operates the 108 Ale House restaurant in Rincon, it’s all in a day’s work. She currently holds the number one spot in the country for the  USPA Women’s Raw -90kg class and the Iversll Best Lifter at the USPA Goddess of Steel Powerlifting meet in Hendersonville, NC, in addition to other honors. She took the Georgia All Time All Classes Total record, broke the Open Squat, Bench Only, Open Deadlift, and Deadlift Only records in her class.

She said she got involved in the sport because she was overweight and started working out, losing 100 lbs. One night at the restaurant she met J.P. Marshall.

“We started talking about working out and he was like, well have you ever thought about powerlifting and I was like, no, and he was like, you should try it,” she said. 

So, Keith said she did and she has been serious about powerlifting for the past 2 1/2 years.

Keith said she has been competing for a year as of January and said it had been a strange year with competitions being cancelled due to the COVID pandemic. She said her last competion in Hendersonville was the first one she was able to make since October, 2020. Her partner, J.P. Marsh, said she is currently ranked number one in the country in the USPA for 2021 in her weight class. Additionally, she ranks fourth in the world.

Working out several times a week, she takes command in the private gym she uses to hone her skills and works to add that next level of competition that she’s chasing. 

“I love it, it’s a passion of mine,” Keith said.

It’s a lot of fun, she said, because it’s you against yourself out there on the platform. 

“Setting goals and reaching them keeps you disciplined.” 

She said she never would have gotten this far without J.P.’s help. 

She commented that a lot of women think you can’t do this sport and still be feminine but she’s here to tell them that is wrong. 

“You can still be feminine, you can still be a girly-girl but you could still dominate on the platform,” she said. “There’s a lot of women out there doing it and it’s a lot of fun.” 

Keith said a lot of women reach out to her about getting in a gym, but not so much about powerlifting. She said in the beginning she couldn’t imagine being able to squat 446 lbs., but she knows now you just have to keep working at it.

Coming off this last competition her squat record was 446 lbs.; her bench-only record was 248 lbs.; her open dead-lift and dead lift only records were 463 lbs.; and the total that took the Georgia all-time overall powerlifting was 1,157 lbs.