The thing I love about the weightlifting community is how supportive they are of one another. You can come in with your tiny 100 pound deadlift, set a goal for 150 pounds, and people will be cheering for you like you won a gold in the Olympics when you hit it. And that’s pretty great.

That’s how a community should be. And it’s kind of always been that way, though weightlifting bros did exist and they were vile. But the weightlifting bros have mostly been pushed aside since the 1980s and there are nearly none left now.

I know how it feels to have no one cheering for me, or on my side. That the weightlifting community does this both sincerely and as its default is pretty special.