Athlete spotlight – Owen Gayle

 Gayle has 10 World records and 29 British records across three sports. We sat down with him to find out how he balances all his goals.

GRAVITY FITNESS: Hi Owen, great to speak to you. Please introduce yourself to Gravity readers.

OWEN GAYLE: I’m a former professional MMA fighter, more recently known for being a strength coach and strength athlete specialising in the sport of streetlighting.

I’ve been fortunate enough to accumulate 10 world records and 29 British records across streetlifting, powerlifting, and strongman. I’m a strength coach at Winning Strength and founder of the organisation Official Streetlifting which is a platform tracking records and rankings and offering competitions.

GF: What exactly is streetlifting?

OG: Streetlifting is a strength sport with four main lifts – bar muscle-up for men and bar or ring muscle-up for women, pull-up or chin-up, dip, and barbell back squat. You have three opportunities to do a 1rm attempt. The biggest lift from each is added up and that gives you your total.

GF: You were into calisthenics before streetlifting - how did you get into calisthenics?

OG: My career started with professional MMA, and I used calisthenics throughout that (the basics like pull ups, dips, press ups). In 2012, I broke my leg in a fight, this led me to getting fully into calisthenics. I never looked back.

Later on I opened a calisthenics gym in Southampton, then my career changed and I got into strength sports – powerlifting, strongman and eventually streetlifting. Streetlifting is the perfect sport for me, it still involves the calisthenics that I love and has elements of traditional strength sports. Since finding streetlifting I’ve dedicated my time to training and competing, and also helping others.

GF: What's a typical training week for you?

OG: A typical training week changes depending on my competition schedule. At the moment I’m focused on a powerlifting comp in April and I’m doing 10 sessions over five days, with two rest days.

My morning sessions are the main session, with secondary sessions in the afternoon.

I’m currently using a conjugate system to structure my powerlifting training. This means two upper and two lower with one heavy focus and one speed focus for each. The fifth session is accessory work for weak links, and energy system work.

Regardless of what I’m training for calisthenics is always there. I can use it as accessory work and to transfer over to main lifts. For example, in my second upper session of the week I might set a timer and do six pull-ups and 6 dips for 10 minutes.

Outside of that it’s about trying to increase the amount of recovery exposure I have – the athlete that can do more but still recover will get strongest.

I’m lucky that I’ve got access to things like a hyperbaric oxygen chamber, infrared saunas, dry needling, cupping etc.

GF: Take us through a day in the life so we can see how you fit it all in.

OG: I like routine. I wake up at the same time, eat breakfast then get my first session in.

After that I catch up on client replies in my training app, and do in-person client sessions.

After lunch I’m back on the computer for social media jobs and client work.

I do my second session in the afternoon, eat again, then get home for dog duties (we have two Siberian huskies) and some chill time with my fiancé.

My nutrition is samey – protein from fish or a small amount of meat, rice and potato, veg and leafy greens. I’m known for eating a lot of pizza, I just love it.

GF: How do you balance strength, skills, and recovery?

OG: The big thing for me is being organised – when life is all over the place it spills into everything. When I find the most efficient ways to get everything done then I can train optimally

For training, I narrow my focus on one goal per training block, get the job done then reassess.

Even when skills are on the back burner, I keep them ticking over because there’s always some kind of transfer.

I give my nervous system a break by not trying to kill it every single session.

For recovery, the biggest things are free. I’ve put effort into sleep hygiene (room temperature, pre-sleep routine, at least an hour with no screens). Quality sleep makes a massive difference. Use any recovery tools you have access to, especially if you’re looking to peak. Ramp up your recovery just as much as you ramp up training.

GF: What's the biggest lesson you've learned through training and competing?

OG: In every sport I’ve been involved in, strength is a marathon not a sprint.

If you want to hit your true strength potential, you have to think long term.

I’m 41 next month and still able to operate at an elite level in multiple strength sports. It hasn’t happened overnight but I’ve chipped away at it and I’m still making progress.

GF: What are your 3 non-negotiable habits?

OG:

1. Surround yourself with people who are pushing their own standards high – “you're the average of the five people you spend the most time with”.

2. Keep on learning – whether that’s training, business or anything else, there’s always something to learn.

3. Maintain routine – this has always been key for me, a routine enables me to train and work more efficiently.

GF: What are your 3 top tips for getting started in calisthenics

OG:

1. Find a good coach or mentor and soak up as much knowledge as you can – the more you can learn the better you can implement.

2. Don’t get caught up on skipping milestones – stages along the way give you the right to get to the end goal, trust the process.

3. Don’t feel you need to stay away from traditional weight training – there’s a lot you can take from it like accessory movements and remedial lifts that support calisthenics and help you progress quicker and more safely.

GF: What are most under-rated and over-rated calisthenics exercises?

OG: The good old basics are under-rated, people are keen to move on to more advanced crazy stuff. There’s a lot of ways to get more from the basics by building up to weighted versions, playing with tempo, using resistance chains and bands, different rep protocols.

The stronger your base, the more potential you have.

Over-rated is relying on bands. They’re a great tool, but the strength curve of the band is very different and it can give people a false sense of progress.

GF: What's the biggest myth in calisthenics?

OG: Biggest myth is you can’t have strong legs and still be able to perform the upper body calisthenics movements.

I’m an example that this just isn’t true - I have one of the strongest squats in the world in my weight class and I can do planche and muscle ups. Obviously if you want to be a specialist, most of your focus should go there.

But being good at both is possible, it just takes time.

GF: What are your goals for 2026?

OG: My immediate goal is a powerlifting comp in April – I want the 5th biggest total of all time across all feds. That would be 740kg (my best at the moment is 675kg).

I also want to extend my own strongman deadlift world record – it’s 305kg and we’re looking for 320 kg.

With clients I want to keep supporting them, get them on the world stage, win more national titles. And as a coach I want to keep progressing myself, my knowledge, and improving what I do.

For the organisation Official Streetlifting, the goal is to launch competitions in the UK so athletes have more of an opportunity to compete here. We want to push the sport more, get more people involved, offer different formats which might get more calisthenics athletes involved with the sport.

Find Owen and Official Streetlifting online and get involved!

Instagram Owen
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Winning Strength
Streetlifting