To understand how far Latifah Lowery has come as a triathlete, consider where she started as a child in the little town of Green Sea, South Carolina. Growing up in a place named for the water, and only 25 miles from the Atlantic shoreline of Myrtle Beach, you might think that swimming came naturally to the youngster who excelled in basketball, softball and track. The truth is, it terrified her.
Her parents and grandparents were petrified, too. Swimming was not a pursuit they embraced but actively avoided – flowing in part from a generational lack of access to aquatics and experience in water, dating back to the segregation era.
And that is part of the backstory the 35-year-old Naples resident carries with her this month into the 42nd St. Anthony’s Triathlon, where she will compete as an elite amateur. She is set now on turning pro, coached by Boulder, Colorado-based Julie Dibens, a 2004 Olympic triathlete for Great Britain and past Ironman World Champion.
“When I was little, we’d go to the beach and my mom or grandmother would be yelling to me to be careful whenever I was close to the shoreline,” Lowery said. “What we usually did at the beach was walk the edges. And at the pool, we had to stand and were never allowed to cross to where it got at all deep.”
So how did she go from a child and adult who feared swimming to someone making waves as an amateur to watch in a sport with few top-tier African American athletes? In one sense, the answer might seem like a contradiction: She found the water alluring and enjoyed sitting on the beach and pondering its vast power. But what helped Lowery conquer her fear was something else deeply embedded in her psyche: a sense of adventure and a strong competitive spirit.
Those traits entwined her path forward, as she earned a business administration degree in college, undertook entrepreneurial jobs in technical and creative fields, and eventually moved with her boyfriend to start a new life in Florida. And Lowery’s life forever changed in 2017 after flying to Hawaii to cheer on a good friend and then-pro triathlete, Sian Welch, in the Ironman World Championships.
“When I watched the race, my first reaction was, ‘These people are all crazy, jumping in the ocean! What are they doing?’ ” Lowery says. “But my second reaction was, ‘They look really fit.’ I’ve always been someone with little body fat. And even though I was not fit, I thought, ‘I look like them. Why am I not doing this?’ ”
And so, she did. But first came motherhood – she and now-fiancé Brad welcomed a baby boy, Apollo, in 2020. Three months later, she signed up for swimming lessons at a nearby pool, also home to a Master’s swim club. “To join, I had to take a 25-yard swim test,” she says. “Well, I got halfway dog-paddling and then I began to freak out because I couldn’t touch the bottom of the pool. But I fought my way to the end and finished.”
The coach appreciated her determination and agreed to work with her in a shallow lane. Fueled by her innate competitive drive, Lowery made rapid strides, and on Jan. 10, 2021, – a day before Apollo’s first birthday – her triathlon journey officially began at the Sarasota-Bradenton Triathlon Festival. “It was really cold, like in the 40s, but I was determined to race,” she says. “And it was an incredible feeling to finish.”
Lowery steadily progressed, learning to get past her worries about swimming in the open water and gradually building her confidence, skills and stamina. Her progress in the 30-34 age bracket, coupled with her passion, was enough to get former Olympian Julie Dibens to add Lowery to her roster of athletes, which includes the world’s oldest pro triathlete, Dede Griesbauer.
Dibens coaches Lowery remotely, mixed with some in-person guidance in Boulder.
“The progress Latifah has made in a short time has been remarkable,” Dibens said. “Her consistency in training shows me the potential I think she has. … For somebody to come into the sport so late, that’s kind of unheard of.”
Lowery is considering turning pro next year, and one of her goals is to encourage African American participation in triathlons. “I do want to be a role model, especially in the swimming part…” she said.
Julie Walker, a member of the Atlanta area “Tri-Sisters,” a group of African American women who compete as amateurs in triathlons, including a decade at St. Anthony’s, understands why. “Segregation caused us not to be able to go to indoor and outdoor pools, right?” says the retired judge. “And you could go to the beach, but if it was a white-only beach, you couldn’t swim there either. So many people didn’t have the opportunity to develop a comfort level or the skills with swimming.”
Lowery, for one, wants to change that, and has started with Apollo, who learned to swim at just 6 months – fearless of the water, unlike the little girl from the Green Sea so long ago.