This story is part of “Latinx in Fitness,” a series of articles showcasing the unique experiences of Latinx trainers, athletes, and gym owners within the fitness community. Read the rest of the stories here.
King G, known on Instagram as “The Fit King,” never set out to become Instagram famous.
In fact, he was hesitant to develop a strong social media presence due to concerns that he would come across as overly sexual to his audience.His passion for education and desire to inspire others drove him to start creating content.
As a proud Panamanian-American, he was acutely aware of the lack of fitness and nutrition information in his country and other Latin American cultures. During the COVID-19 pandemic, he made an effort to learn Spanish. After years of being labeled a “no sabo,” or “a kid who doesn’t know,” a term used to describe someone from a certain cultural background who doesn’t speak fluent Spanish, he quickly created content in Spanish to make health and fitness information more accessible to native speakers.
What started as a simple video to spread positivity quickly grew into hundreds of thousands of followers, an online coaching business, a clothing line (Altos Riesgos), and of course, education.
“Whatever I do is going to be sexual in nature, but if you come (to my page) and message me and listen, that’s great,” he says.
We sat down with King to discuss his journey to influence, the importance of fighting misinformation, and his hopes for the future.
I’ve been into fitness since I was a kid. Fitness has always been a good pastime for me. I loved that it was always a competition with myself. The challenge, the discipline, the will to be better than yesterday. And all the goals are really for myself.
When it came to content creation, my friends would always tell me, “You have to post videos. You have to create content. You have the looks. You have the muscles. You have the tattoos. You have the hair. You have everything people want.” And I’ve always been skeptical of being sexualized. There’s a lot of information on my page, but a lot of it doesn’t get communicated because people are so focused on how I look.
A long time ago, I went to California and I met a lot of entrepreneurs there. I actually met someone who doesn’t tolerate slacking, Erin Ross, and she really encouraged me to start posting. When I started, it wasn’t even about fitness. It was about motivating people and helping people become better people. If you scroll back, you’ll see that I always made sure I was dressed and I didn’t wear matching outfits. I wasn’t really concerned about how I looked on camera.
“I’m here Nice! I’m not here Fake support. I really Please help me, there is already so much negativity in the world.”
I am Afro-Latino. Growing up, you were either black or not black. I think race and ethnicity, especially in America, constrain everyone. People can’t differentiate between race and ethnicity. They’re not the same thing. It’s just skin color and culture.
I’m Panamanian, and I spoke Spanish as a kid, but I felt like I was too black for the Hispanic kids, and too Hispanic for the black kids. So I never fit in. If I went to visit my family in Panama, I couldn’t speak to them if they didn’t speak English. I was always trying to learn. I was on Duolingo around 2010. At school, people would always pester me, saying, “You’re so bad, your pronunciation is awful.” Naturally, my pronunciation is going to be awful, and that doesn’t help. It makes you lose confidence. And when you lose confidence, you don’t want to practice.
Then COVID hit and there was literally nothing else to do. I really threw my time into it. I started listening to music videos, reading lyrics, watching interviews. Eventually I started making videos in Spanish and people saw them and were like, “Are you native? English was your second language?” That was a big thing for me.
I started making videos to give tips and tricks about how I learned, also to help other no-sabbo kids. You can be a no-sabbo, Italian, French, anything. Whatever language you want to learn, you can apply everything I said in the videos and use it yourself.
Israel Pitchford
If I knew Spanish, I’d be able to reach a lot more people. There are a lot of myths and misconceptions in the Latino community (about fitness). There’s a lot of misinformation because of a lack of resources, whether it’s about protein powders, creatine, general nutrition, information about exercise. I have a strong Panamanian following, and that’s another big reason why I do this work. No one knows about Panamanians. We are an unknown treasure, so I’m very proud. For most people in my life, I’m the first Panamanian they’ve ever met. My work helps to raise our profile a little bit. And now that I know both languages, it helps to bend those myths.
Growing up in the US, it was easy for me to get into fitness because there were more resources. The environment matters. And if the environment doesn’t teach you about fitness and diet, it gets pushed aside. So, as a minority, there’s a lot that we don’t know and we fall into misinformation. Here, there’s more interest in health and fitness than in places like Panama. There’s not too much emphasis on calculating macros or exercising or getting enough sleep. You’re just trying to eat to survive and get through your days. So, it’s a little bit harder to break out and be very successful (in the fitness industry) in other cultures. It’s possible. You just have to work at it.
But things are getting better. More and more information is coming out, people are starting to change and become more proactive. We are also seeing more influence from Latin culture, for example Lucy Moreno from El Salvador and Jazmin Margalef from Uruguay. We all talk a lot about our community. We find each other. But when we see someone succeeding, more people think, “Maybe I can try this too.”
I hope my content helps people. That’s really what I want. To educate people and make them laugh. I hope you laugh, learn something, and feel inspired to inspire others. I’m not here for likes. I’m not here for fake support. I just genuinely want to help, because there’s already so much negativity in the world. I used to be a negative person, doing all the bad stuff. And then I started going to the gym again and I was like, “Oh, this is what I was missing.”
Hopefully,[my content]gives someone that extra boost they need, whether it’s the gym or learning a language or whatever.
Want to read more first-person perspectives from Latinx fitness pros about overcoming obstacles, breaking barriers, and achieving success? Click the links below to read all the stories:
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