WACO, Texas (KXXV) — Waco high's Shanija and Shaniya Smith recently competed at the State Powerlifting competition.
"It felt really good to like put Waco High's program out there a little bit more and a little further out in Texas," Shaniya said.
"There's a lot of negativity out there in the world right now and coming from Waco High, we like that we're bringing positive to the school and to the athletes in the athletic program," Shanija said.
In the competition, Nija placed sixth and Niya placed seventh.
"I have bragging rights. I definitely have bragging rights. I beat her," Shanija said.
With this being the twins senior year, it's the last time they will compete together as Waco Lions.
"It makes me tear up because like I'm not ready to go. These are the years that I enjoy most, like especially my junior and senior year," Shanija said.
"I made a lot of accomplishments, a lot of growth personally, mentally, a lot of accomplishments not only with myself but with my sister," she said.
These sisters have been a big part of the powerlifting program. As they get ready to graduate and move on, the girls are confident they are leaving it better than they found it.
"I hope so. I hope we did we did a lot of hard work, a lot, a lot of hard work bringing people from different types of communities together," Shanija said.
"We've been helping the girls in the younger class have more of a leadership, like build them up leader wise, and we're just putting that onto them," Shaniya said.
Their next chapter will include serving their country and they realize their time together is going to start slowing down.
"We're actually both enlisted in the military, so we're going active, we're going active duty. She's going into the medical field. I'm going into like finance," Shanija said.
"We're starting to acknowledge that we're not gonna always be with each other. Don't make me cry," Shaniya said.
I covered these sisters when they were sophomores and it's been amazing to see how much they've grown and I'm excited to see what's next for them.
