WE'RE IN THIS TOGETHER

It hasn't been an easy road but now this bodybuilding couple are making waves in the industry

- NOKUTHULA ZWANE-EJIKE

IT’S a demanding sport that requires hours of intense training in the gym as well as saying no to delicious food for weeks on end.

But all the hard work they put in is worth it for bodybuilding couple Alyssa Ramdass and Kiran Singh. Not only did bodybuilding bring them together, it’s also given them a massive sense of achievement and fulfilment.

They’ve both earned Protea colours, the highest achievement for a South African athlete, and have also won top honours at competitions locally and abroad.

Kiran (38), a firefighter at Msunduzi fire station in Pietermaritzburg, almost gave up bodybuilding after a bike accident in 2012 resulted in the loss of his left leg above the knee. But after adapting to life with a prosthetic leg he started training again to get stronger and found the intense exercise was also beneficial to his mental health.

Last year the couple flew South Africa’s flag high at the International Fitness and Bodybuilding Federation (IFBB) World Championships in Spain, with Kiran coming fourth in the men’s wheelchair category and Alyssa placing 14th in the women’s physique category.

Although he usually competes in the able-bodied category, their team manager decided Kiran should enter in the wheelchair category when they went to the world championships.

Watching her husband compete on the world stage for the first time and do so well was both emotional and motivating for Alyssa (30). “He’s my biggest inspiration in bodybuilding,” she says. Alyssa, a dentist with a practice in Mount Edgecombe, north of Durban, is the youngest and only Indian woman in KwaZulu-Natal to compete in the women’s physique category both in South Africa and the world championships.