By continuing to use our site, you agree to our Private Policy and Terms of Use.
Step aside, Caitlyn Jenner: Another athlete known to the public as one of the world's strongest men has come out as transgender.
Janae Marie Kroc, the world record-holding bodybuilding star and record-smashing powerlifter, whose website promises to help others get "as big and as strong as inhumanly possible," announced her transition online via social media. She was formerly known as Matt Kroc.
Cyd Zeigler at Outsports confirmed that Kroc, 42, is now describing herself as both trans and gender-fluid and, according to the report, living in both genders.
Kroc told her fans via Instagram and in a subsequent statement to a bodybuilding website that she considers herself an "Alpha male/girly girl Lesbian in a male body" and that she is single.
"Being a total alpha male and transgender definitely makes me unique even in the transgender community," she wrote to Gymflow100, perhaps unaware, as she is in the early stages of her transition, that many trans women adopt "alpha male" roles to mask their genuine gender identity -- she's hardly the first former U.S. Marine to transition -- and that there are plenty of trans men who identify as "alpha male."
"And of course also makes me incredibly complex as a person. I often feel like two completely different people trying to share one body with both fighting over who gets to be in control."
Kroc, who has three sons, said in her statement she was still undecided about whether to fully transition and live as a woman full-time.
Some fans were in disbelief, thinking her transition was a joke, despite reports on GayStarNews, Headlines and Global News, and other sites. So Kroc wrote a second online statement to dispel any lingering doubts:
"First, yes this is really me and yes I am transgender. Second, one does not 'become' transgender, you are or you aren't. I have known this since I was five years old and it has been a very heavy burden to carry.
"I never asked for nor did I want this. For most of my life I would have given anything to not feel the way I do and at one point it drove me to consider suicide. Now I am perfectly comfortable with who I am and have been very open about this for many years."
Kroc has held the powerlifting world record in the 220-pound class since 2009.
She added that living true means the end of her bodybuilding career: "One thing that I am 100% certain of is that if I do eventually decide to transition I would never compete in powerlifting again."
"I feel that would be a no-win situation and I would never want to do anything that would reflect negatively on the transgender or powerlifting communities."
Read Janae Marie Kroc's statement here.
