![\"A](\"https:\/\/hyphenonline.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/01C-doaa-shayea.jpg\")
The athlete hopes her performance in the Glasgow games will challenge assumptions about who belongs in elite sport and what strength looks like<\/h2>\n\n
\n\n\n\n![\"Jaheim](\"https:\/\/hyphenonline.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/Jaheim-Karim-1024x1024.png\")
<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\nIn January, Doaa Shayea<\/a> was at home in Plymouth, sitting in her family\u2019s living room when an email notification popped up on her phone. It came from Tom Whittaker, the performance director for England\u2019s para powerlifting team.\u00a0<\/p>\n\u201cCongratulations,\u201d it read. She had been selected to represent Team England in para powerlifting at the Glasgow 2026 Commonwealth Games<\/a>, which run from 23 July to 2 August. For a moment, Shayea had to stop and read it again. The message was short, formal, life-changing. \u201cI got emotional for sure,\u201d she says. \u201cI told Mum. It was such a special moment.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\nThis month, the 28-year-old will make her debut in one of the biggest competitions of her career after less than three years in the sport.<\/p>\n
Shayea moved to Britain from Yemen aged five, and has just finished her second year studying sociology at the University of Plymouth. Shayea cleared her summer schedule as much as possible to prepare for the games. \u201cMy time really consists of training,\u201d she says. \u201cThat\u2019s all I ever do\u2026 and studying. But now university is done, I can completely just focus on training and being the best that I can be.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
She was born with spina bifida<\/a>, a condition that can affect the nerves controlling movement and sensation in the lower body, and uses a wheelchair. She says her disability has shaped \u201ceverything\u201d \u2014 from how she sees the world to how she understands her place in it. \u201cWhen you are born with any sort of difference, you kind of want to prove the world wrong, and prove to yourself and others that you\u2019re capable.\u201d<\/p>\nSport became one way of testing that instinct. For Shayea, the drive was not simply to compete, but to push against what she saw as the narrow expectations placed on disabled people. \u201cThe driver for me has been being in a wheelchair and the negative stereotypes and attitudes towards people with disabilities and what they can and cannot do,\u201d she says. \u201cMy aim has always been to far surpass that.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Growing up in Plymouth, Shayea\u2019s route into disability sport began at a school sports day, where she was talent-spotted for wheelchair tennis. The sport was accessible locally, but only with support \u2014 she relied on a teaching assistant to take her to training sessions. Around the age of 12, she was scouted for wheelchair racing and began training at her local athletics track.<\/p>\n
Her relationship with racing ended after 12 years in what Shayea describes as a painful selection experience while trying to qualify for her GB debut in the sport.<\/p>\n
\u201cFrom that moment on, I knew I\u2019m just not going to be picked, for whatever reason it is,\u201d she says. \u201cI felt like racing, in my experience at the time, involved things outside of performance that shouldn\u2019t really come into sport. After that call, I didn\u2019t go back to that sport.\u201d<\/p>\n
By 2022, another opening appeared. Her gym was looking for an adaptive athlete to attend a CrossFit event in London. Shayea competed and won the women\u2019s division. A coach spotted her there and introduced her to para powerlifting, but Shayea was not immediately convinced.<\/p>\n![\"A](\"https:\/\/hyphenonline.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/02-doaa-shayea.jpg\")
Shayea wins the women\u2019s 67kg category para powerlifting silver medal at the European Championships, March 2026. Photograph courtesy of Doaa Shayea\/WPPO\/Vakho Tsatsalashvili<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\nPowerlifting<\/a> meant entering a gym-based, male-dominated strength sport, a very different world from the track life she was familiar with. \u201cI got into the sport with a lot of doubts but wanted to give it a go either way,\u201d she reflects.\u00a0<\/p>\nWithin three months, Shayea was selected to represent Great Britain at the European Championships, where she finished fourth. Less than a year later, she competed at the World Championships in Dubai. \u201cIt just took off,\u201d she says.\u00a0<\/p>\n
In March Shayea competed again in the European Championships, this time in Georgia, and won silver<\/a> in the women\u2019s up to 67kg category.<\/p>\nAround the same time Shayea began powerlifting, she also started wearing the hijab. The two changes are connected in how she understands this stage of her career: one making her physically stronger, the other making her more visibly Muslim.<\/p>\n
Although she was born Muslim, faith became something she came to understand more deeply for herself. \u201cYou can be born a Muslim, which I am,\u201d she says, \u201cbut you don\u2019t fully truly find Islam until you find it in your heart.\u201d That visibility has followed her into her Commonwealth debut.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Since her selection was announced, Shayea says she has faced online abuse about her faith and identity. For an athlete preparing to represent England, the reaction has been difficult to ignore. \u201cNo matter what I do, or what I say, the pure fact that I\u2019m a woman in a hijab, that doesn\u2019t fit the narrative,\u201d she says.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\n
<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n<\/div>\n
In January, Doaa Shayea<\/a> was at home in Plymouth, sitting in her family\u2019s living room when an email notification popped up on her phone. It came from Tom Whittaker, the performance director for England\u2019s para powerlifting team.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cCongratulations,\u201d it read. She had been selected to represent Team England in para powerlifting at the Glasgow 2026 Commonwealth Games<\/a>, which run from 23 July to 2 August. For a moment, Shayea had to stop and read it again. The message was short, formal, life-changing. \u201cI got emotional for sure,\u201d she says. \u201cI told Mum. It was such a special moment.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n This month, the 28-year-old will make her debut in one of the biggest competitions of her career after less than three years in the sport.<\/p>\n Shayea moved to Britain from Yemen aged five, and has just finished her second year studying sociology at the University of Plymouth. Shayea cleared her summer schedule as much as possible to prepare for the games. \u201cMy time really consists of training,\u201d she says. \u201cThat\u2019s all I ever do\u2026 and studying. But now university is done, I can completely just focus on training and being the best that I can be.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n She was born with spina bifida<\/a>, a condition that can affect the nerves controlling movement and sensation in the lower body, and uses a wheelchair. She says her disability has shaped \u201ceverything\u201d \u2014 from how she sees the world to how she understands her place in it. \u201cWhen you are born with any sort of difference, you kind of want to prove the world wrong, and prove to yourself and others that you\u2019re capable.\u201d<\/p>\n Sport became one way of testing that instinct. For Shayea, the drive was not simply to compete, but to push against what she saw as the narrow expectations placed on disabled people. \u201cThe driver for me has been being in a wheelchair and the negative stereotypes and attitudes towards people with disabilities and what they can and cannot do,\u201d she says. \u201cMy aim has always been to far surpass that.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Growing up in Plymouth, Shayea\u2019s route into disability sport began at a school sports day, where she was talent-spotted for wheelchair tennis. The sport was accessible locally, but only with support \u2014 she relied on a teaching assistant to take her to training sessions. Around the age of 12, she was scouted for wheelchair racing and began training at her local athletics track.<\/p>\n Her relationship with racing ended after 12 years in what Shayea describes as a painful selection experience while trying to qualify for her GB debut in the sport.<\/p>\n \u201cFrom that moment on, I knew I\u2019m just not going to be picked, for whatever reason it is,\u201d she says. \u201cI felt like racing, in my experience at the time, involved things outside of performance that shouldn\u2019t really come into sport. After that call, I didn\u2019t go back to that sport.\u201d<\/p>\n By 2022, another opening appeared. Her gym was looking for an adaptive athlete to attend a CrossFit event in London. Shayea competed and won the women\u2019s division. A coach spotted her there and introduced her to para powerlifting, but Shayea was not immediately convinced.<\/p>\n Powerlifting<\/a> meant entering a gym-based, male-dominated strength sport, a very different world from the track life she was familiar with. \u201cI got into the sport with a lot of doubts but wanted to give it a go either way,\u201d she reflects.\u00a0<\/p>\n Within three months, Shayea was selected to represent Great Britain at the European Championships, where she finished fourth. Less than a year later, she competed at the World Championships in Dubai. \u201cIt just took off,\u201d she says.\u00a0<\/p>\n In March Shayea competed again in the European Championships, this time in Georgia, and won silver<\/a> in the women\u2019s up to 67kg category.<\/p>\n Around the same time Shayea began powerlifting, she also started wearing the hijab. The two changes are connected in how she understands this stage of her career: one making her physically stronger, the other making her more visibly Muslim.<\/p>\n Although she was born Muslim, faith became something she came to understand more deeply for herself. \u201cYou can be born a Muslim, which I am,\u201d she says, \u201cbut you don\u2019t fully truly find Islam until you find it in your heart.\u201d That visibility has followed her into her Commonwealth debut.\u00a0<\/p>\n Since her selection was announced, Shayea says she has faced online abuse about her faith and identity. For an athlete preparing to represent England, the reaction has been difficult to ignore. \u201cNo matter what I do, or what I say, the pure fact that I\u2019m a woman in a hijab, that doesn\u2019t fit the narrative,\u201d she says.\u00a0<\/p>\n