Natalia Kovaleva

Hello everybody and thanks for reading my story.
My name is Natalya Kovalyova, I was born in Russia, Tver city, January 19, 1989. I was born premature, quite ironical considering my current built:) I have lost my parents early: at age of 12 my mom died, my father didn’t raise me. I was raised by mom’s sister and my elder sister. My sister was a multiple national judo champion (in her youth). I’ve decided to do wrestling too and the coach noticed that I have a great potential, but somehow a school mate told me ”you have developed huge shoulders and it’s ugly for a girl” and do you know what happened? I quit, I thought my mate was right, at that time I was 15, this was the first and the last time that I have listened to and followed someone’s opinion.Then I tried basketball when I entered the university ( where I studied journalism and Russian language and literature). After I’ve tried kickboxing and I had good results, even if there wasn’t any category for women and no opportunities. I was training with the guys, some of them had multiple champion titles. I started going to a very old and hardcore gym just to loose weight; I wanted to look like a model, at that time it seemed to me that they have both (muscles and thinness) that’s what I wanted to achieve and I achieved that look.

One day I did a deep clean of my house and found magazines with bodybuilder women; I remember I saw Lenda Murray and Ursula Sarcev and then I understood who I want to be. Lenda Murray impressed me the most and was enough to start collecting magazines, videos, to start training.I never thought that I would look like a bodybuilder and not even in my wildest dreams could I imagine that one day I would be on the same stage with professional bodybuilders. There was a period in my life when I left bodybuilding for one and half year and didn’t train at all, trying to decrease to the Physique category. I relived this way that the Physique class is not for me, I am a Bodybuilder!
What do I want? I want to make a contribution to the development of women’s bodybuilding.Maybe someday some girl will see my photos or video and say: “Now I know who I want to be’’. 
I am currently preparing for the IFBB Pro League Tampa Pro; thank you for following my journey in this sport that I love.