Steve Alexy, a 53-year-old powerlifter from Franklin, Virginia, has lived with cerebral palsy since childhood. His partner, 45-year-old Arlyn Smith, has permanent cerebellar ataxia from a stroke she suffered at 23. Together, the couple now holds powerlifting titles along with national and world records, competing in meets built for both para and non-para athletes.
The pair started competing in powerlifting roughly five years before now, according to The Virginian-Pilot. Both deal with muscle incoordination and slurred speech as part of their respective conditions, the paper reports, yet they train almost every day at Retro Flex Gym in Courtland, a facility owned by Hunter Darden. During workouts there, Alexy lifts 45-pound dumbbells while Smith trains with a 35-pound weighted vest, and the newspaper notes Smith has come to rely less on her walker while training alongside Alexy.
Smith was recognized in 2025 as the International Powerlifting Coalition world record holder in the 56-kilogram women's masters 45-to-49 deadlift division, pulling 264.5 pounds at a body weight of 123 pounds, per the same report. Alexy, for his part, set a United States Powerlifting Coalition deadlift record of 227 pounds in 2024 while competing in the men's masters 50-to-54 division at 67.5 kilograms.
A Childhood Diagnosis, a Teenage Start
Alexy was diagnosed with cerebral palsy as a child, a condition that affects muscle movement and coordination. The severity of his early prognosis was stark: when he was three years old, physicians told his parents he would never walk and recommended institutionalization, advice his mother rejected in favor of home care and exercise, according to ABC News. Cerebral palsy remains the most common childhood motor disability in the United States, affecting roughly 1 in 345 children, per Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data, and CDC tracking shows about a third of those diagnosed have limited or no unassisted walking ability and require devices like walkers or wheelchairs.
Alexy started lifting weights as a teenager, and his training eventually grew structured: he began working out in 2011 at Anytime Fitness in Suffolk, Virginia, with trainer Chris Lovelette, who adapted gym equipment to accommodate Alexy's spasticity and motor coordination challenges, The Mirror reported. He competed as a bodybuilder from 2014 through 2019, entering 13 competitions and winning almost all of them. “I called it trying to look pretty,” Alexy said, according to the Virginian-Pilot's account.
That bodybuilding chapter also made Alexy briefly famous. In September 2016, a 60-second video of him posing at an Organization of Competition Bodies show in Hampton Roads was posted to Facebook and drew more than 30 million views worldwide, after fellow competitor Suzi Farren Newman captured and shared the footage, per AP News.
Love, Recovery, and a Move to Franklin
Alexy met Smith through a mutual friend after one of his bodybuilding shows. At the time, Smith was in recovery from substance abuse and anorexia, and had not moved unassisted by a wheelchair or walker for 15 years, the Virginian-Pilot reports. Smith has said that during that period she had fully formed thoughts but could not verbalize them physically.
Smith's cerebellar ataxia traces back to a stroke she suffered at age 23, caused by an overdose, which left her with permanent balance and movement impairment. Cerebellar strokes damage brain stem pathways that regulate spatial balance, muscle torque, and voluntary articulation, according to research published by the American Heart Association, which notes that ischemic strokes in adults under 45 account for 10 to 15 percent of all stroke cases.
After a three-month courtship, Alexy moved to the Peninsula, and the couple relocated to Franklin six months later, per the Virginian-Pilot's reporting.
Records Set Lift by Lift
Powerlifting meets test three lifts: squat, bench press, and deadlift. Alexy no longer competes in the squat, and shoulder arthritis makes bench pressing too painful for him; his knees also turn inward under too much weight, limiting what his body can withstand under load.
Smith, by contrast, has built a full competitive record across all three lifts. She set a U.S. national powerlifting record with a 130-pound squat, a 103.6-pound bench press, and a 257.9-pound deadlift, totaling 491.6 pounds across her lifts. The United States Powerlifting Coalition sent her a certificate documenting the national record, the Virginian-Pilot reports.
Smith's competitive history stretches back further than her record-setting year. She deadlifted 113 kilograms and bench pressed 50 kilograms at the July 2024 Reaper's Rebellion meet, building on a 102-kilogram deadlift the year before, according to Fitness Volt. Those sanctioned results are logged in the OpenPowerlifting database, which compiles USPC competition records to verify raw totals. Smith has also taken on leadership roles within the sport, serving as an official meet judge for the USPC Santa Slay Powerlifting competition in Virginia Beach in December 2024.
Most recently, at the USPC Para Nationals & Monsters Power meet in West Virginia on August 15, 2026, Alexy recorded a 118-kilogram deadlift in the men's masters 50-54 division while Smith completed a 110-kilogram deadlift in the women's para open division, Fitness Volt reported. The sanctioned meet brought together 26 adaptive and open lifters across 10 weight classes.
Part of a Broader Shift in the Sport
Their continued presence on national platforms reflects a wider institutional change in competitive strength sports. Sanctioned powerlifting bodies, including USA Powerlifting and the United States Powerlifting Coalition, have expanded dedicated adaptive divisions, bringing adaptive powerlifters onto major national stages alongside open lifters, according to a Facebook post from the Virginian-Pilot. Nonprofit programs like Unified Strength train special-needs and veteran athletes to compete within those same sanctioning platforms.
For Smith, the records and titles carry a purpose beyond the numbers on the certificate. She has said she hopes her story will inspire others, according to the Virginian-Pilot's reporting — a message rooted in a sport where every lift the couple completes is verified under standardized coalition rules, not staged as exhibition.
