Casey Johnston | |
|---|---|
| Born | February 6, 1987 Gloversville, New York, U.S. |
| Other names | "Swole Woman" |
| Education | Columbia University (BS) |
| Occupations |
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| Years active | 2009–present |
Instagram information | |
| Page | |
| Years active | 2016–present |
| Followers | 36,277 (July 20, 2023) |
| Website | www |
Casey Johnston (born February 6, 1987) [3] is an American writer, editor, and strength-training advocate. She has written the fitness advice column "Ask a Swole Woman" since 2016 and a newsletter about weightlifting, She's a Beast, since 2021.
Johnston grew up in the city of Gloversville in upstate New York. [4] She played field hockey and lacrosse at the Emma Willard School in Troy, New York, and went to Columbia University in New York City, where she graduated with a bachelor's degree in applied physics from the university's engineering school in 2010. [4] [5]
Johnston worked as a writer and editor for Ars Technica after beginning her career there as an intern in June 2009. [6] She was an editor for the product review website Wirecutter from 2014 to 2018. [2] In December 2014, a tweet by Johnston went viral when, after a male follower told her to "read the full article" about a story she had linked, she replied: "I wrote the article". [7] [8] While working for the website The Outline in 2018, she wrote an article criticizing the MacBook Pro's new butterfly keyboard design. [9] [10]
Johnston became interested in weightlifting after seeing Reddit posts by a beginner female weightlifter. [11] [12] She had put on some weight while in college, and begun running and dieting with a focus on her body image, behaviors which increasingly strained her over seven years. [11] [12] She began strength training in 2014, using Mark Rippetoe's book Starting Strength, and as she got stronger and felt better she soon "couldn't stop talking about" the virtues of weightlifting. [11] [12]
In July 2016, Johnston started writing a fitness advice column, "Ask a Swole Woman", for the website The Hairpin , at the request of Hairpin editor Silvia Killingsworth, one of many people to whom she had enthusiastically talked about weightlifting. [11] [12] GQ described her tone as "that of an enthusiastic amateur with an eye for bullshit". [11] After The Hairpin shut down in 2018, the column moved to the magazine Self and then Vice , which dismissed her during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2021. [11] [12] She then launched a weightlifting newsletter, She's a Beast—which "Ask a Swole Woman" became part of. [12] [13] [14] As of 2023 [update] , She's a Beast has about 25,000 free or paid subscribers, and Johnston has over 34,000 Instagram followers. [2] [11]
An ebook published by Johnston in December 2021, Liftoff: Couch to Barbell, describes a twelve-week regimen for weightlifting beginners. [11] [12] It is intended to make weightlifting more accessible for women or men who may not consider themselves typical weightlifters, and those who, in her words, feel that "their body [is] never hot enough, always in too much pain". [5] [11] Over 11,000 copies have sold digitally. [14]