Meet the people making it happen:
Cassi Niemann (she/her)
Co-Director
Cassi Niemann is a barbell strength coach in Albuquerque, New Mexico, and a co-owner of Iron Soul Gym, where she founded The Barbell Club. She works with everyday humans through online coaching and in-person training, specializing in building sustainable strength habits, improving movement efficiency, and supporting people through key life transitions including pregnancy, postpartum, perimenopause, and post-menopause. She believes the best training happens in community, where people can show up together, break down barriers, and celebrate differences. Strength, for Cassi, is a tool for long-term health, autonomy, and confidence at every stage of life.
Sam Padilla (she/her)
Co-Director
Sam Padilla is a strength coach born and raised in Albuquerque, NM. She is the founder of REACH Strength, an inclusive and trauma-informed coaching practice where she works with folks remotely and in-person. She is a powerlifting, Olympic weightlifting, and general strength coach who loves working with people at any stage of their journey with the barbell. Her specialties in her work include working with the chronically ill, neurodivergent, and the post-op/injury populations. As a queer, brown, chronically ill woman, she focuses on making fitness as accessible and sustainable as possible. Her philosophy is strength is for EVERYONE.
Paige Menking (she/her)
Board Member & Fundraising
Paige Menking had made powerlifting her new year's resolution for so many years before she finally started training at Iron Soul in 2021… and now she constantly wonders why she waited so long! Paige is a public health consultant and instructional designer based in Albuquerque, where she’s lived since 2018 with her partner and their pets, and her work takes her all over the U.S. supporting community-based public health workers. When she’s not at the gym picking up and putting down heavy things, she loves to bake, garden, and watch British murder mysteries.
Allison Kenny (she/her)
Board Member & Fundraising
Allison Kenny (she/her) is a queer, fat, chronically ill powerlifter and theater maker in Albuquerque, NM. With big gratitude to the Fulcrum Fund + Urban Enhancement Trust Fund Grant, Allison will spend 2026-27 interviewing queer + trans powerlifters and writing a play based on our experiences of lifting heavy while loving big. She is the proud co-founder of High Desert Playback, an award-winning LGBTQIA+ theater company that she leads with her wife, Lynn Johnson and beloved, Danielle Simone. She's the mother of a teenage daughter and the most handsome chihuahua's, Coco + Bear.
