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"The Bova Story"
That's me in the photo in 1996
writing down my first ideas on the Spartan program after I recovered from a
serious martial arts injury . . . . . ahhh, memories!
When I was younger I was a total fitness fanatic. I
played Rugby ( Thugby as I
fondly prefer to think of it - great game),
was a long distance runner, a dedicated gym junkie, rowed, ran triathlons
and biathlons and just generally trained hard!
I attended a boarding school for 6 years and was the guy
who woke up early to go jogging while everyone else was asleep. I was the
one who kept doing sit-ups even when the Coach wasn’t looking.
The funny thing was I never excelled in any sport, I was
OK, but never in a highest team. That didn’t stop me training my butt off -
something inside me drove me to do it.
Like most people I had no idea about nutrition. I sure
thought I did! But I was wrong. I can't believe the way I use to eat ( see
Spartan Health Regimen manual for details)
thinking it was a 'healthy diet'. I followed all the so-called experts
advice and I would be willing to bet you're making the same mistakes right
now.
No wonder I was constantly catching any cold. I would
catch 3-4 a year and they would last for weeks at a time. This is the
sign of a poorly functioning immune system. Caused by the wrong diet.
Then I got bitten by the body-building bug. I stopped a
lot of other sport and exercise and trained full time in the pursuit of
getting massive. Over the course of a few years I ended up injuring just
about every joint in my body, some of which still give me trouble. I was
trying every routine and training like a mad-man.
What I didn’t realize was those body-building champions
were genetic freaks who munched steroids like candy! The average drug-free
person has no chance to look like that, and now I honestly wouldn’t want to.
(Now I train to be Tarzan not Conan. Achilles not Hercules. A lion not an
elephant. A shark not a whale. For real-world functional strength backed
with real fitness&conditioning, not just size for ego boosting.)
Over the next few years I slowly started losing my
previous fitness and began putting on fat. I was turning into the average
guy approaching 30 - a slob. It can happen to you so easily,
you wake up one day and find yourself out of shape and sick.
That’s right, sick. I didn’t have anything seriously
wrong with me but I didn’t feel healthy. I was still having multiple colds a
year. My knees were starting to hurt all the time with what I can only
imagine was the beginnings of arthritis pain. I also got spots of dry skin
and my energy levels were dropping.
Enough was enough.
So I started reading and learning as much as I could
about health and diet. But it wasn't until I discovered a few key rare books
and manuals that things suddenly made sense. One thing led to another and
soon I had a wealth of knowledge. I was like a shark on a feeding frenzy. I
spared no expense on getting my hands on hard to find information. I now own
several out-of-print rare books worth hundreds of dollars each. I have a huge
library of books, manuals, reports, audio-tapes, videos etc. I subscribed to
dozens of newsletters and have even travelled the globe to listen to
different speakers. I spent years of blood-sweat-and-tears and tens of thousands of dollars in my
ultimate dedicated health-quest.
But it was worth it because I found the answers I was looking for.
I started getting lean, I started feeling great. Full of
more energy than ever before. I started to record every thing I did or
learnt in note-books and diaries etc. I decided to live my life according to
these basic Spartan Principles I was developing. I would go against
convention and live my own way.
You have to understand I discovered I had a natural
talent for thinking differently. It's hard to explain but my students will
tell you the same thing. It was this talent that allowed me to discover so
many hidden truths in the areas of health, diet, training and lifestyle. Not
only did I do more research and testing than anyone else I know but all that
knowledge was filtered through my warped brain and the results were amazing.
Originally I wanted to record everything to pass on to my
kids and their kids, to build a wealth of knowledge about the truth in
health/diet and training. My kids wouldn’t have to follow it but at least
they would have all my knowledge if they decided to.
Of course to get all this information, like I said, I had to read
about and experimenting with every different theory I could find. I started
to notice that most programs were for average people who didn’t really want
to change their diet or do any exercise in the first place. The books gave
the minimum things to do, or advised moderation only.
That’s why I wrote the Spartan Health Regimen
program. It was written basically for someone like me - the fanatic who is searching for answers but can’t find them in one place.
I wish I
could have bought this manual when I was 16yrs old.
Although
I probably wouldn’t have had the wisdom to realize what I had found!
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