Yes, I was very active throughout my entire life and continue to be active now.  As a child and young teen I was always involved with multiple sport teams: Football, hockey, soccer, and baseball.  Besides the sports, I was always outside playing with my little brother. We were riding bikes, running around, or swimming.  Strength training became a part of my life when I was about 12 years old.  I used to go down in my basement and do push ups, pull ups, and sit ups, every single day.  I loved the way they made me feel and I loved the feeling of my little muscles filling with blood.  In other words I loved the “pump.” When I was around 14, I was given my first total body workout machine.  I started various exercises on a day to day basis.  Around that time I was getting involved with wrestling and boxing.  I loved contact, I loved the intensity, and I loved pushing my body to new limits.  My muscular definition really came in when I was 15. I looked bigger than my friends, and had a nice lean physique.  Even though I looked good, I was hungry to be bigger, faster, and stronger.  Every day I trained hard in the wrestling room, and trained even harder in the weight room.  I would say that wrestling shaped my work ethic into what it is today.  By the end of my senior year I was a 2 time Division 1 All State wrestler and had college offers.  My physique in high school was second to none, and throughout high school, I was accused of using steroids, and performance enhancing drugs.  Deep down I loved it because I knew in the back of my mind, I’ve never used those kinds of drugs and had a better physique than most of the people that did!  I also trained MMA for a long time, and excelled in that as well. The only reason I had to stop was for my modeling and acting career, that I value and love to do a little more than fight.  My body transformation from when I was 16 to now is simply because of knowledge that I gained over the years, proper diet, supplementation, and my work ethic in the gym on a day to day basis.  These things are critical to being fit, healthy and looking great.

The reason that it is hard for so many to be healthy and fit are primarily because of poor food choices.  We are surrounded by food that is high in fat, carbs, sugar, and artificial crap.  Look at the food our public school system feeds our kids.  There are very rarely healthy choices, and when there is one healthy choice, there are 10 fried, heavily salted, or sugary choices to go along with it.  A kid in elementary or middle school is not concerned with what is good or bad for him, he wants what tastes good.  Growing up, if you are constantly eating garbage, you will develop that habit as an adult  So who takes the responsibility? Is it the kids making the choices? Or is it the school serving the choices?  I feel like the responsibility falls upon the parents.  If your parents are feeding you the same garbage at home, eating it themselves, what kind of eating habits are you modeling for your children?  We wonder why we are the most overweight and obese nation in the world.  The primary food choices that we as Americans choose are bad ones.  On top of poor food choices, there is also a lack of emphasis on physical activity.  Kids now sit inside and live their life through their video games instead of actually going out side and playing real football with their friends and family.  If parents and schools stressed the importance of eating a well-balanced healthy diet, and proper exercise every day, we would see more fit people. That is a question that I really don’t have the answer too, because the majority of people I meet and talk to that are overweight, say they are lazy or simply do not care.  And many make excuses, what people do not realize that being healthy and fit is a state of mind, if you believe you can achieve it.

My family is a big motivator for me.  My brother is currently playing professional soccer in Europe at 20 years old.  Not only is he playing for the Division 1 Norway team, he is starting!  If he can go across seas where he can’t even speak the language, be one of the youngest guys on the team, and start on top of that, I can be a very successful actor and model in New York, LA, or wherever my career takes me.  I would say that my mom and dad are also big motivators in my life, especially my father.  He was a 4.5 All American college football player and his accolades speak for themselves.  He has always told me how it is and not how he wants it to be.  If I wasn’t doing well at something, he would tell me, just like if I did something well, he tells me.  My dad never sugar coated anything for me or my brother and I use him as my primary motivator besides myself.  For me the biggest motivator to keep myself healthy, fit, and at an elite level, is simply myself.  In the back of my mind I know what I want to accomplish in my life.  I keep my goals, and what I want to accomplish in my thoughts with everything I do in life.  I even write down self motivating quotes on 3 by 5 cards, and post them all over my wall.  My belief is if you can’t motivate yourself to accomplish your specific personal goals, no one else is going to be able to motivate you either.

1. I love to better myself, I love to push myself past my limits, and I love keeping my body on an elite level of fitness.

2. I want to be the poster boy, motivator, and inspiration for teens, adults, and even other models to live and breathe a healthy way of life.

3. Knowing that the gym is my office. Many people go to their jobs and sit at a desk. I go to the gym, bust my ass, and love every minute of it. Love what you do and make a living doing it!

4. Being able to take my shirt off and have many admire all my discipline and hard work. I don’t look the way I do by sitting around doing nothing.

5. Knowing at the end of the day I did something to become better than the day before, always be prepared for shoots, and films, and move forward with my career.

Monday: Legs: Tire flips, sledge hammer.

Tuesday: Chest: Bleachers, sprints, push ups.

Wednesday: Back: Tire flips, boxing, and pull ups,

Thursday: Shoulders: MMA style cardio

Friday: Arms: MMA style cardio Saturday: 1,000 push ups, 3-6 mile run. Sunday: 800 push ups, 1,000 sit ups, walk a couple miles:

This is a sample week for me, but it varies each week so that I can confuse my body and look forward to different kinds of training each week.  I also have a very active girl friend, and she and I will go to the beach and walk a couple miles and throw the football around.  On the days that I am on set filming a movie, or doing a photo shoot, I keep my diet very clean and avoid training because I want my muscles to be lean and full.  My cardio is second to none and I challenge others to keep up with me and my cardio routines. Keep in mind that I am low carbs the majority of the week, and lift for 45 minutes to an hour and do about 45 minutes of intense non stop training.  My competition used to be in the cage or wrestling ring, and now for me it’s about out working everyone in the gym, in different states and countries.  It keeps me motivated and makes me want to push myself harder than I did before.

On a regular basis I eat lean meats such as chicken, Flank steak, London broil, Tilapia, tuna, turkey, I also eat egg whites, protein shakes, and lots of green vegetables.  I keep my carbs under 100 grams a day Monday-Friday.  I get my carbs from whole oats, sweet potatoes, brown rice, rice cakes.  I get my fat from all natural peanut butter, almonds, egg yolk, and olive oil. and on Saturday, carb up, including cheat meals, such as cheese burgers, fries, pop tarts, kids cereal, sandwiches, pizza, and sweets.  On Sunday I do a low carb day with a cheat meal at the end of the day.  These ways works very well for me because I have figured out my body, and know how to manipulate it when needed.

Yes I am a men’s physique competitor and my first show was June of this year in NYC.  I competed at Atlantic states and decided to do this show the night before.  I was not prepared and had no idea what I was doing.  No tan, no posing technique, looked great, and just didn’t know how the system worked.  I ended up taking 14th out of 30 and was over looked because of all the factors that I just explained.  After this competition I was hungry for more and randomly ran into Nick Freglete at the gym I was training at.  He was in charge of the Peak Performance Prep team that Read Jarrar and he started.  They prepared me for 7 days before the Garden state competition in New Jersey and ended up placing 2nd and qualifying for the Team U national show.  Then I realized that these guys were legit and taught me a lot about learning my body and training the proper way.  I decided to stick with them, and we became a family, along with all the other successful competitors that worked with Peak Performance Prep.  I ended up taking 3rd at the Team U competition missing my IFBB pro card by one place.  I was very discouraged but that gave me the fire to continue busting my ass, working with Peak Performance Prep, and getting ready to compete in 10 weeks for the Miami national show.  Big thanks to Peak Performance Prep, they are like my family, and I am proud to be part of their team.

I want to be where everyone else wants to be; on top!  For me it’s not about the money, fame, woman, or perks.  It’s about doing what I love doing, and making a living doing it.  I love to inspire people to become fit and healthy.  I love everything that I do, the cooking, the training, the shoots, and the films.  I am currently pursuing my acting career, and ideally I enjoy acting more than modeling.  They both go hand and hand because I love doing photo shoots, but with pictures, people can’t really see your true personality, and I feel that’s where I am unique because my personality is very rare.  I would also like to accomplish some things in my modeling career, such as modeling for Calvin Klein, Nike, Under Armor, catalog, Men’s health, Men’s Journal, and Men’s fitness.  I would also love to be sponsored by a supplement company, and market their products that I believe work for me, to others.  With my acting career I want to become the next action hero, or even bad guy.  You can look out for me in the movie “Fun Size” hitting theaters in October 2012.  This movie takes place on Halloween night where I am dressed up like the “Hulk”, I’m sure that many will enjoy Mike Puglio and the Hulk.  Coming up I am doing a 3 day Nike fashion show for the NCAA, and a fitness show for HSN.  I think that acting and modeling is the right career for me because I am good at it, love to do it, and have the right mind set to do it.  If you believe in yourself anything is possible.  I see myself as a very successful fitness model and actor in these up coming years.  Keep an eye out for me, and if you want to see more photos check out the Stefan Gatt Fan Club on Facebook.