May 2 was simultaneously not Capri Crosby’s day and also as good of a day as it gets.
The North Thurston High School sophomore competed in the Washington State High School Powerlifting Association state championship meet at Olympia High School, looking to improve from her second-place finish as a freshman in 2025.
Competitors choose their starting weights for squat, bench and deadlift and have three tries to complete one rep for each section. The powerlifter in the weight class with the most weight lifted is the champion.
Crosby, in the 132-pound weight class at this year’s state meet, had no problem finishing the squat section of the competition, successfully lifting 215 pounds, then 235 and finally 250.
But once she got to the bench portion, it all went wrong.
Crosby lifted 115 pounds for her starting weight, but she failed to lift 130 pounds and couldn’t make it out of that section with a second successful rep. She already wasn’t feeling well that day, but whatever illness had been lingering showed up in full force in between her bench reps and deadlift reps, as she vomited on multiple occasions.
A flash of fear ran in Crosby’s mind. She had to begin her deadlift reps at 250 pounds, which was higher than most of her competitors’ finishing weight, and a state championship was still well within reach. In fact, if Crosby successfully deadlifted 250 pounds, the state title would be hers. The second and third reps wouldn’t have mattered.
Through all of the adversity she was battling, one message slammed through her brain:
“There’s no way that this weight isn’t coming off the ground.”
After all, powerlifting became her lifestyle. Crosby was the president and team captain of the powerlifting team at North Thurston, and she had invested time into building her diet and workout regimen toward becoming a great powerlifter, as well as to live a healthy lifestyle. After three 90-minute powerlifting practices after school, she still works out in her home gym and cooks healthy meals for her and her family.
She had worked too hard to let anything stop her.
Crosby stepped up to the platform, and she picked up the 250 pounds successfully, laughing and smiling before putting the weight back down. She was a state champion, and there was nothing else required from her at that point.
But Crosby wanted more.
Despite feeling sick, she then lifted 275 pounds, more than twice her body weight, and then matched her personal record at 290 pounds for her final rep. Crosby became the first female powerlifting state champion at North Thurston High School with a total weight of 655 pounds.
“It’s really cool. You have to put in a lot of hard work, not a couple days of hard work but months or even years of hard work to get there,” Crosby said. “It feels like it all comes together when you’re a state champ. It was not one of my best days. Some rough things happened, but you have to be willing to push through and give it all you’ve got.”
Crosby was the only powerlifter from North Thurston to qualify for the state meet, and she hopes her historic performance, especially through adversity, inspires others to join her on the team and on the state podium next year.
“It felt like I was making a mark. We’ve had male state champs before, but we’ve never had a female,” Crosby said. “It felt nice to stand up there and be from a school that had never stood up there before. It was fun to see some of my teammates inspired by that and say, ‘We have to compete next year.’ I think people would realize that they actually have a chance if they believe in themselves.”
Crosby’s journey to a state championship was crafted rather rapidly. She had minimal weightlifting experience with her father Daniel Crosby before she was exposed to North Thurston’s powerlifting team at a club fair her freshman year. Capri Crosby was encouraged by her friends to join them in signing up for the team, but she was the only one who went through with it, she said.
Crosby’s attitude toward powerlifting shifted from an activity she partook in for fun into a lifestyle when she qualified for the state meet last season. She also participated in a number of other sports and activities, including dance, wrestling, soccer, cross country and track.
But after she suffered a concussion while tumbling in dance this past fall, Crosby wasn’t allowed to dance or participate in contact sports. All that was left was powerlifting, which became her outlet.
“I went all into powerlifting because I found it was something I could do despite the fact that I lost all the other sports that I loved,” she said. “It switched from a tragic moment to where all of a sudden I had this drive to go all in with powerlifting. It helps you learn how to calm yourself and not worry about the rest of things in life.”
Entering this year’s state meet, Crosby was grappling with the pressure of being the top-ranked powerlifter in her weight class. She said she had never experienced being on top before, and the illness certainly didn’t help with her anxiety.
But no one was more nervous during the meet than her father, who said his normally low resting heart rate spiked to 90 beats per minute watching his daughter compete for a state title amid all she was battling with.
“She’s had days where she’s been genuinely sick and couldn’t even get a low weight up. I was worried,” Daniel Crosby said. “I was more stressed than I should’ve been watching her lifting all the weights and going through the motions.”
Capri Crosby celebrated by going to her cousin’s birthday party and announcing her state title, and she told her coworkers at Jersey Mike’s of the good news the following day.
She set the bar high for her first two years of powerlifting, with a third-place medal and a state championship under her belt already. Crosby has her sights set on qualifying for the national powerlifting meet, as well as more state titles.
“I just have to keep raising the bar for myself and be willing to push myself and also take care of myself,” she said.
Crosby will be a Running Start student starting in her junior year and aims to earn an associates degree in business. One of her dreams after high school is to open her own gym, specifically supporting powerlifters.
Crosby was one of 11 local powerlifting state champions at the meet and was one of four girls to place first, joining Olympia’s Mahea Pittman (114-pound class), Tumwater’s Lily Blake (148-pound class) and Olympia’s Paytin Mulcare (220-pound class).
Seven local boys won state powerlifting titles: Olympia’s Yestin Ruiz (114 pounds), Yelm’s Asher Roberts (123 pounds), Olympia’s Josh Elkum (132 pounds), Olympia’s Drew Jacoby (148 pounds), Rochester’s Maddox Rodgers (181 pounds), Timberline’s Asher Young (198 pounds), and Yelm’s Samuel DeJiacomo (242 pounds).
