Women in Sport With Katie Catherall

In her latest Women in Sport column, Quest Media Network's Katie Catherall speaks to Donna Ravey, owner of the The GymBox61 in Denton, about her passion to improve people's lives through health and fitness.

Making both our mental and physical health a priority has become much more apparent over the last 12 months with the absence of other luxuries in our lives. 

However, personal trainer Donna Ravey has picked up on the lack of time some women put aside for their own health. She says ‘taking time to train the body and mind is a form of self-care and should be enjoyable’. 

She finds that having a challenge and ‘choosing to love’ the skin that you are in is when people begin to flourish and she strives to install this mindset into everyone she works with. 

Beginning her fitness journey whilst living in Australia, Donna experienced a large amount of home sickness and felt herself beginning to feel insecure in her body. In order to combat this, she found a love for helping her fellow backpacker friends to engage in physical activity, with the hopes of relieving both her own and her friends’ stress and anxieties. 

This allowed her to build her confidence whilst being in a new environment and also fuelled her with a sense of power that she would then bring back home with her. 

Upon her return to England, Donna decided to follow her deep-rooted passion and qualify as a personal trainer. Working in a commercial gym to begin with, she noticed a ‘huge lack of confidence’ in the women using the weight areas and after speaking with them she found a large amount of women wanting to lift weights but had no knowledge or idea of where to start. 

Taking this on board, she decided to create a group which enabled her to work with a variety of amazing women from different backgrounds who all had a similar goal they wanted to achieve- to feel strong and find a love for progressing in the gym without worrying about the number on the scale. 

‘I absolutely loved seeing the achievements of them getting that first barbell squat, getting that perfect form on their deadlift and seeing my beautiful ladies create friendships and confidence’ Donna says and she also noticed some of the men ‘impressed’ to see her ladies ‘smashing the bench press’. 

It became evident to these ladies that there is a place for every single person in the weights area and once those initial fears were washed away, Donna’s ladies were ‘unstoppable’. 

Last year Donna opened her own gym in Denton, The GymBox61 and has been joined by so many of her wonderful clients at her previous workplace. 

‘We have established a community that goes way beyond just a gym session. We have completed marathons together, had family game days at the gym and plenty of themed nights out!’ she says. 

Donna ‘finally’ feels that she has achieved her dream where people are able to come to the gym not only to train but to take some time away for themselves. ‘That hour away from work stresses and busy family life to just connect with friends and have the environment of encouragement to be the best version of yourself is amazing’. 

Donna coaches her clients to believe in spending time to totally work on themselves, telling them that time away is like ‘an important meeting with yourself’. 

Many of her clients have nothing but positive words to say towards the service Donna offers and the friendly atmosphere she has created for everyone to be apart of. 

With comments such as ‘nothing beats the personal levels of this gym’ and ‘your sessions have transformed my life for the better’ from her incredible clients Hayley Birchall and Jenni Gilligham, the positive impacts that Donna has on other’s lives is immeasurable and shows again just how vital health and fitness is for everyone.

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