01 Mar Mike Scarpa’s Transformation

BEFORE:

AFTER:

After condensing the 12 week transformation into 7 weeks I feel AMAZING! I’m a believer that greatness comes from within and from creating your best self, sometimes we just need a little reminder and encouragement to keep improving.

For the past two years I had been saying I wanted to try a martial art, finally when I entered this challenge I decided it was time and I joined a local Aikido dojo. Just two months of Aikido 3-5 days a week has significantly boosted my confidence all while learning a valuable life skill.

I am a firm believer in cross training so I decided to rejoin the local climbing gym that I had belonged to a few years back to add some excitement into my workouts. I was able to fit climbing in 2-3 nights per week, and was thrilled to learn that they also offered yoga for climbers which I attended once per week.

I believe strength works in unison with flexibility and both should be improved upon simultaneously. From climbing I was able to metric my improvements week after week and it created a nice friendly competition not only between myself and I, but between my climbing partner and I.

Another important aspect of the transformation has been cardio. In high school I constantly won races and awards running, but I didn’t keep up with it after graduation. A few years ago I started up again and for 2016 I set a goal to run 1,000 miles throughout the year which translates to approximately 20 miles per week. I fell 3 miles short of where I should be at the end of February, but given the cold weather and snow we’ve had I’m pretty happy to be where I am. I run 3-4 mornings per week and my times have been getting consistently quicker, my latest PR is a 7.4 mile course I absolutely love with 500ft elevation gain which I completed at 6:25 /mile pace.

I also integrated some strength training for my upper body, mostly free weights and body weight exercises 2-3 days per week.

I believe all of this physical training would amount to nothing if I had not also integrated a very healthy diet into the mix. I follow a loose paleo diet, I believe in choosing a diet that suits your particular body and not necessarily following one that may work for someone else.

Overall this transformation has been amazing for me both physically and mentally and my life has drastically improved in the past two months. Let’s all keep it up through the rest of 2016!