![]() My career journey has led me from kitchens to being a receptionist, to a coordinator, to a recruiter, to where I am now a DEI Practitioner. Lo and behold I got the job and had to move across the country to Boston. I got the job and commuted for 6 months until I applied for a full-time role at the organization I was contracting at. It was another contracted role, but based in SF and that meant I would be commuting from San Jose to SF every day. During my time there I started applying to so many jobs and eventually right before my contract ended I had an interview. It didn’t really pay the bills but it was better than before. A kind gym member was able to connect me with her Manager and I got a contracted role for 3 months. After a month, I realized I wasn’t going to be able to afford my rent, and I had to figure out what to do next. After I graduated from college (SJSU in 2017), I worked in a recruiting agency that was not the right fit for me and so I resigned and started coaching full-time at a local gym. My full-time career started out in hospitality management, working in restaurants, interning at google cafe, and then officially making a transition into tech accidentally. I have been in this role for almost 2 years now and focus mostly on facilitation training, consulting on processes and systems that need to be more equitable, and overall creating an inclusive and equitable environment for marginalized communities. Taryn Pascal, (she/her) I am a DEI practitioner by day (Diversity, equity, inclusion) for a tech company. Although this has been in the works for a few years, it’s really just the beginning and I am so excited to see what’s to come and hope to be able to get more funding to help create an even better experience in the long term.Īwesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers. We often aren’t afforded the opportunity to show up as we are in everyday spaces and that is the main goal of this space. ![]() The Black platform is meant to be a space where Black women in weightlifting can rest, just be, be themselves, and lift. Our first official paid camp was held at Crossfit HCS (Ferndale, Michigan) in August 2022 and we sold out for our second annual camp being held in Durham, NC at Courage Fitness Durham in 26 hours. The Black Platform is now in year 2 of hosting an annual camp with the purpose of having a safe space for Black women to lift each other up on and off the platform. That day, The Black Platform was created. The 3-day pilot camp was a success, and so many lessons were learned but I knew from that day this new endeavor which started as a group chat, was something so much bigger. The cost was free other than travel and we held our camp at the one and only Cara Headslaughters gym. I started planning an in-person pilot camp with my friend Angela Carlberg for as many Black women as we could get together. Before I knew it, we had an Instagram group chat of 30 Black women in weightlifting and we knew from the jump we wanted to do some sort of meet-up. In that same period of time, I had the idea to create a group chat of all the Black women in CrossFit and weightlifting that I knew of and followed just to create a sense of community. After a solid year, one of the most difficult and traumatic years for two Black women, we called it quits with IRA because it just wasn’t sustainable. From there most of the content and mission were based on CrossFit workouts and ideology and I had recently made the transition to solely Olympic weightlifting so the mission was not resonating as much with me anymore. ![]() I shared my vision of creating a space for people of color in fitness and we ended up getting rid of diversity and barbells and starting a new endeavor called Iron Roots Athlete. At that time I met one of my best friends, Saykay Brown (owner of Crossfit HCS), and we immediately connected. Going into 2020, I was hopeful I could start planning for a seminar, and then of course the world shut down because of Covid-19. I came out with my first t-shirt that read, “Representation matters” and sold 13. As a biracial Black woman, I was used to being the only Black person and sometimes the only person of color in the gyms I worked out in. ![]() At the time, the only thing I had built out was a new Instagram handle, Diversity & Barbells. In 2019, I had an idea to create a CrossFit/Olympic weightlifting seminar specifically meant for people of color. How did you come up with the idea for your business? Taryn, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. ![]() We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Taryn Pascal a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below. ![]()
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