For years, weight rooms have been dominated by men — Girl Gains is changing the narrative to empower women’s confidence at the gym.
The club was founded in 2020 at San Diego State University and is now present on over 100 campuses across the United States, Canada and Vietnam. Their mission is to promote female weightlifting and support women in the gym.
In January 2023, former president of Girl Gains, Kayla Long, brought the club to Cal State Fullerton. For the past two years, CSUF’s Girl Gains club has hosted events, frequent gym-meetups, panel discussions with fitness coaches and created a safe learning environment for women to grow at the gym.
The current president, Mattea Chung has worked hard to grow the club on Fullerton’s campus, with attendance varying weekly. On average, they have about 15-30 active members, depending on the meeting.
Many of the women in the club formed strong connections through their shared experience of playing sports in high school. However, after starting college, they found themselves without a community to stay active with, leading them to join Girl Gains.
“It was one of the best decisions I made. Now I’m here, president of the club 2.5 years later (…) and all these people are here because I found a vision for it,” Chung said.
Haley Agbayani, a senior and biology major at CSUF, joined Girl Gains in the spring of 2024 to continue to stay active after leaving the school’s cheerleading team.
“Before Girl Gains, I was on the cheer team and I decided to part ways,” Agbayani said. “I wanted something to fill that void.”
While some women joined Girl Gains to continue their active lifestyle, some members were just getting started on their fitness journey.
No matter the fitness level, Girl Gains strives to be a safe space for women to learn and improve their weightlifting technique. Women of any background and skill level are welcome into the club. With a $25 membership, members have access to bi-weekly chapter meetings, merchandise discounts, off-campus events and their annual end-of-year banquet.
During their bi-weekly meetings, Girl Gains brought educational speakers to speak on women’s health, nutrition and other kinesiology-related topics.
CSUF’s Girl Gains chapter partners with other schools’ chapters for fitness events. Last month, they held a hiking event with USC’s Girl Gains called “Sisterhood Summit.” The club doesn’t only focus on weightlifting, they have held pilates classes, zumba classes, rock climbing, swimming and other fitness events.
Girl Gains also has bonding events like karaoke night, game night, banquet and camping trips. This semester, the event coordinator, Sarah Mazengia, planned a camping trip at Joshua Tree National Park. They spent three days on the trip.
“It was our first big overnight trip (…) It was a lot of fun, a lot of things went wrong,” Mazengia said. “But everyone survived.”
To wrap off the Girl Gains year, they hosted their second annual banquet in the Titan Student Union. Members had free food, games, awards, and a slideshow of all their photographed memories from the 24-25 school year.
Mazengia became teary-eyed as she spoke about her memories from Girl Gains, as a graduating senior.
“Banquet was really hard for me (…) I’m going to miss them a lot, because they’re all amazing, beautiful, and that is a true reflection of their soul,” Mazengia said.