WNBA star Te’a Cooper is gearing up for her strongest summer ever! The 26-year-old Los Angeles Sparks point guard shared a video of herself wearing black shorts and a matching tank top, going through an intense weight training workout at the gym. “Let’s turn the summer up ‼️💪 #beenonmygrind👑,” she captioned the post. “I love everything you are doing for women in sports, keep inspiring women all over the world! 🐐” a fan commented. Here’s how Cooper stays fit, focused, and on top of her game.
Cooper was forced to adjust her training schedule after getting injured at University of Tennessee. “I had to go to practice at, like, six in the morning by myself, and my dramatic self, I felt like I was all alone,” she told Slam Online. “I’m like, it was just me against the world. You know you play sad music to make you sadder? Jhene Aiko has a song called ‘W.A.Y.S.’ and I had it on repeat, walking through the gym, and I worked out by myself. You don’t have anybody to push you when you’re working out by yourself, but I had to run sprints by myself, like, who was I racing? I had to find that in myself and that was…ooh, it took me a minute to do that.”
Cooper says going vegan for a few months positively impacted her energy levels. “A variety of vegan foods are rich in protein,” say the experts at Harvard Health. “They include soybean products (tofu, edamame, tempeh), seitan, lentils, beans or peas, nutritional yeast, spirulina, soy milk, cashew milk, nuts and seeds, nut and seed butters, veggie burgers, and meat alternatives.”
Cooper is thrilled to have posed for Sports Illustrated. “When I got the call, I initially [thought], ‘Did they call the right person?'” she told the magazine. “It kind of felt like I was getting ready for a game. It was really comfortable. I was super excited to just be with them and see them be out of their element, too. They are so empowering. They just really make you comfortable in your own skin.”
Cooper is proud to have her own hair brand called Hollywood Luxury Hair. “Anyone can sell hair, but I think making the customer experience personable and relatable is what sets us apart,” she told Femina Magazine. “We want people to feel like they are buying hair from someone they know and trust while knowing they will get a great product out of the experience.”
Cooper has a glass-half-full approach to life. “I think people think my life is so perfect because I never look defeated,” she told rolling out. “No matter what I’m going through, I’m always excited about what’s next. Something terrible could have happened, but I’m excited that I’m still alive to be able to learn from that and grow from it… Learn what you can control. Anything that you can’t control, just leave it alone.”