MARGAO: During the first couple of weeks of January, Solania Lopez de Freitas, fondly called ‘Sol’ around Benaulim, is a very busy woman – she is flooded with clients enthused by freshly-made New Year resolutions. Sol wears many hats – professional accountant, football player, off-roading enthusiast and single mum among
others – but the 48-year-old is also one of the very few female fitness coaches in the State, perhaps the only one in South Goa offering circuit and strength training programmes tailor-made to her clients’ needs and abilities. Sol says she forayed into coaching quite by accident, during the Covid-19 lockdown, and it is now a huge part of her life.
“I grew up on a farm in a small town near Brasilia- surprisingly for a country that’s so big on football, my town did not have a girl’s football team, so I was always playing football with my elder brothers, male cousins and friends,” reminisces Sol, who eventually moved out of her native country, to the UK, where she learnt kickboxing and was quite the gym fiend. When she relocated to Goa in 2014 and enrolled her two boys in a football club, it took her back to the good old days of her outdoorsy childhood and she was thrilled when the club announced a parents’ football tournament.
“Then I found out that it was only for fathers, there were no matches for the mothers! When I asked around, I found there were football teams for students and young girls, but none for mothers and I decided to remedy that, since there were so many enthusiastic Goan mums who wanted to play the beautiful game,” she says, recalling that she started a football team with six mothers and it soon grew to 20 members who used to meet and play football competitively, coached by Sol.
When the pandemic hit and all the gyms were closed, Sol, who was just recovering from a serious knee injury, was at her wit’s end on how to regain her strength.
“My neighbours who were moving out of India generously left me their fitness equipment and I managed to set up a mini-gym at home, and started working out again. I posted a couple of videos on social media, and several women reached out and said they were inspired to exercise, as they now had a lot of free time. Slowly, the lovely South Goa community convinced me to begin fitness training online via video conferencing, and when the lockdown was lifted, to take on clients and train them personally,” she says.
She adds that women often are more comfortable working out with her, as most intensive fitness regimes adopted by male fitness trainers do not take into consideration womens’ menstrual cycles, and the changes in energy levels throughout the cycle.
“In some phases of the cycle, a woman may have lower energy and feel lethargic, or not feel inclined to lift heavy weights, and may need a different intensity or range of exercises. Many of my clients have told me that they have given up going to the gym as their trainers did not understand and adapt their workouts,” she says.
Sol now has around 20 clients at any given time, and also trains people online and can often be spotted exercising on Benaulim beach, wrapping up high-intensity work-outs with a dip in the sea. And she all this while being a hands-on mum and working remotely for a shipping company.
“I love my work in fitness, but to be honest, it doesn’t really pay the bills. I do it because it makes me happy, and helps me inspire and influence people to adopt an active lifestyle, as it can literally save lives. It’s not just about weight-loss or short-term goals, exercise should be a way of life, to stay strong and independent. Working out with my clients everyday is like therapy, it helps with stress and anxiety and for women over 50, it helps immensely with heart health, mobility and flexibility. We need to be fit enough to complete simple day-to-day tasks without depending on others, as we grow older, don’t we?” she asks with a smile.
Sol does not believe in diets or depriving yourself of sweet treats or nights out, and enjoys a very active social life. “Eating dessert or having a drink when you are craving it will not make you fat. Moderation is key, and eating clean, un-processed food makes a massive difference. Diets are not sustainable,” she quips.
“You have to enjoy life, but there are no short cuts or miracle-working supplements, you need to put in the work to lose the flab and build muscle. Weight-loss is secondary- working out will keep you healthy, happy and strong,” Sol signs off.
