Singer Victoria Monet is booked. She is busy. The summer is for the road, specifically the European leg of Bruno Mars’s Romantic Tour.
Think about that.
Opening for him. Night after night. Thousands of people screaming in your face while you dance until your lungs burn.
That kind of stamina isn’t luck. It’s 37 years of living plus years of deliberate effort. Since 2017, weight-training has been non-negotiable for her. Not because she has to be, but because she refuses not to.
“I’m a strong believer in willpower,” she says on Women’s Health ’s Strong Like. “If you want something bad enough… you make it happen.”
It sounds cliché until you realize she lives it.
The Heavy Lifting
Her coach is Omar Bolden. A former NFL player, now a student of Chinese medicine. A weird mix? Maybe. Effective? Apparently yes.
He’s patient. She’s had a lot to deal with—pregnancy, PCOS, the shifting tectonic plates of a woman’s body. He doesn’t rush.
“We all could use a little bit [primal movement] every day.”
Every session starts with the basics. Warm-up. Mobilize the shoulders, rotate the spine, open the hips. It’s the World’s Greatest Stretch. Fire hydrants. It looks like yoga but feels like preparing a engine.
Once she is loose, the core work begins. Dynamic stuff. Medicine balls thrown against the air. Wood chops that twist the torso like a wrung-out towel.
Bolden doesn’t want pretty abs. He wants armor. A core that supports a person performing acrobatics on a moving stage.
The Glutes Are Non-Negotiable
Victoria has requests, though. She laughs when she says it.
“Can we do legs and glutes?”
She wants them thick. Powerful. Not genetic flukes, but built.
Bolden agrees. They use double bands and barbells for hip thrusts. Then elevated squats. It is grueling, simple, undeniable work.
“We often think… the only way to achieve maximum results is genetics… That’s just not true.”
It is right there in the iron. You have to earn the shape.
The Quiet After the Storm
Lifting weights is half the equation. The other half is stillness.
She recently started Tai Chi with April Littlejohn. It is not a warm-up. It is a reset.
Littlejohn says it clears the mind, especially in the morning. It brings meaning and peace. It ties the chaos of the workout regime into something sane. Without it? Victoria might go crazy. With it, she stays dedicated.
She is gritty on stage. Graceful on the mat.
Watch her do both in Strong Like if you believe willpower is just a word. It isn’t.
But does she have time for sleep?
