Jenna Litner is a New-York based influencer who holds a full-time corporate role at Peloton. She rose to fast fame last summer, swiftly carving a niche for her smart takes on workout style. Now with 113,000 followers, her Instagram series “Your Workout Outfit Looks Like Sh*t” has a playfully provocative headline that masks the helpful fashion, beauty and fitness advice she gives to women runners. Think: earrings you can jog in and sweat-proof make-up tips. She started strength training 11 years ago. “It’s the medium of exercise that connects me with myself; it’s my roots,” she says. 

“I have a tattoo on my body that says ‘Doubt me’. It’s become my ethos. I enjoy people doubting me. Growing up, I was very athletic but I was a late bloomer and was always undersized. People did not expect a lot from me, but I’ve channeled it into ammunition—an opportunity to prove people wrong. Feeling underestimated has turned into a superpower, because now I approach things with the mindset that I have nothing to lose. When I showed up in the weight room for the first time, I had that same feeling. 

I was 15 when I first got into weightlifting. Truthfully, it started for aesthetics. I was young and not feeling particularly confident in my body because I’d always had a very athletic, straight build which was not very feminine. Thankfully, I was fed content on social media that showed me there was a world where you could create a physical shape through building muscle. I bought into it completely. 

I wanted to build a butt, so my focus initially was on lower-body dominant work. It was successful! I built a butt. Now, hip thrusts are still one of my favorite exercises. The want to build my body helped me shift my perspective on food. I began understanding it as fuel, versus a—a daily occurrence in my life, and b—something that I should be concerned about all the time. I started tracking my macros and paying attention to what was actually important for a woman’s body. 

Being sporty my whole life has meant that I was never afraid to show up in male-dominated spaces. I was a tomboy; I have two older brothers and all I wanted to wear back then was my brothers’ baggy clothes. It’s funny to think of now because so much of my professional identity online has become about style, but I think being a tomboy back then opened me up to this world where it was okay to be different; that I didn’t have to conform to the norms that I was seeing in these spaces. That I can do it my own way. 

Jenna in one of her signature vintage graphic tees, styled with the Danimás Reveal glove. Photographed by Marsha Lebedev Bernstein for Danimás. 

The gym is my time for clarity and a chance to step away from everything. My life runs at 100 miles per hour and it’s so easy to be focused on the noise. Running helps me for mental clarity, but lifting helps me stay really focused on the task at hand. 

Take Bulgarian split squats, for example. They are my most-hated workout move but I love having them as part of my routine because I know that if I focus really hard on them, I’ll get through them and then they’ll be ticked off my list. I write a list every single day, but my list never gets completed. Except in the gym. I check everything off, and I feel really happy and accomplished for doing it. My next body part to build is my shoulders. I want capped delts. 

When I started lifting, I didn’t really know what I was doing. It was definitely very uncomfortable. I was saving content on Instagram from women I admired, like Grace Beverley and Chrissy Cela, both of whom were posting workout videos and routines back then. I actually didn’t have my own personal Instagram account until 2020. Prior to that, I had a burner account on which I followed 10 women who were weightlifting. I would be in the gym, swiping through their content and trying to replicate what they were doing. I had no sense of what types of weights I was supposed to be doing, no sense of the volume or reps. 

I was really motivated by seeing a change in my physique within a couple of months, but I noticed other improvements almost immediately. My confidence went up because I felt so empowered in that space, and my strength increased much faster than I expected. This was helpful, as I am incredibly ambitious but I don’t have a ton of patience, which is both a superpower and a toxic trait. 

Strength training has furthered this motivation for me to show up in spaces where I am not necessarily welcomed in other avenues of my life. It has helped me see that I can create this image of myself in my own brain about what I am capable of, and the challenges I am willing to accept and take on to get there—all of this has propelled me elsewhere. It has meant I felt confident flying out when I was 20 years old to do interviews for investment banking, having come from a school that typically would not be accepted at that kind of job. 

As long as I am not doubting myself, I’m good.”