Antonio Korajac Proves His Worth At ISF Open World Street Lifting World Championship 2022
One of the upcoming names in Calisthenics is of Antonio Korajac who has been talk of the town since winning two medals at the ISF Open World Street Lifting World Championship 2022. He is a calisthenics athlete and social media influencer. We at RDXSports took a deep dive into his callisthenic journey.
1. Who is your biggest calisthenics inspiration?
I would say that that’s Austin Dunham and Chris Heria. I watched them on YouTube when I started my calisthenics journey. I was very impressed with static elements such as plench, front reverse and handstand pushups. And I really wanted to get into that, so they were my inspiration. I still watch them throughout my calisthenics journey when I’m training because I always take tips from them. And yeah, they are people who I look up to not just regarding calisthenics but also regarding their lifestyle.
I am training by myself most of the time. I have some friends with whom I train, together in callisthenic parks but mostly it’s myself and I prefer training by myself because I get the most out of my workout. I am not distracted, I’m in my own zone with my music. And I have very specific training methods, which I use regarding statistics, regarding sets and reps. So to answer the question. I don’t train with anybody, I mostly train by myself and prepare by myself.
3. When did you first discover calisthenics and how did it make you feel?
Okay so my approach to sports and training was first. I did a lot of sports like kickboxing, basketball, but none of those sports were the ones that interested me so much to keep the longevity of my training. So I discovered calisthenics by getting a multi practical gym equipment such as a machine on which you can do chest pull or leg pull downs etc. and once I max out on that, I started watching YouTube videos with calisthenics’ people doing human muscle ups. I was very impressed by that, and it made me feel like calisthenics is more special than gym training and it’s like a show off training where you can show off how strong you are relative to your body weight and it looked more skillful than gym and the “not so monotonous” lets say.
And that’s why I wanted to learn it so I was looking at a lot of videos of how to structure your training programs. And what to eat and so on and so on. And basically with time I started getting my first muscle up tests and push ups. It made me feel very proud of myself to see what I can do with my body weight because I never realized that if I put in the work I will be able to do very skillful movements such as pushups. I never thought I’d be able to do those movements easily and I didn’t even know where to start from so it made me feel very proud of myself and strong.
I found those movements very skillful, joyful and very cool when you are outside and recording yourself so I really like calisthenics exercises and calisthenics training. First because it looks very cool and second because you can do it anywhere. Even when I’m on vacation, I always do some type of calisthenics training. It’s usually an easier training session but I can still do it and I prefer it more than gym training because as I said you can do it everywhere and it looks very skillful and that’s why it motivates me to keep going. When I’m somewhere and people don’t really know what calisthenics is because it’s not so famous, I can always show off some very exciting and cool moves to them.
5. When did you know that calisthenics and bodyweight exercises were the way for you?
I was in gym training for a couple of months and then I realized I don’t find it so enjoyable. I really like the elements of calisthenics and it looks very cool and you’re able to do it anywhere. That’s what I like the most about it. I also like training in fresh air, that’s another benefit. And I discovered that for me once I learn my hand stand and first muscle up, then i really discovered that I’m really enjoying the difference of all those exercises and then I realized that there’s so much stuff I can learn and progress throughout my calisthenics journey and I also liked that I find it more challenging than the weights because in calisthenics you have to change up the progressions and variations of the exercises and in gym or weight training, it’s just add more weight and I found this much more challenging and enjoyable in that sense.
6. What does moving, improving and evolving mean to you?
It means also evolving to be the best version of yourself so maintaining that discipline, doing hard stuff, doing the things which are challenging for you but you grow with them. Basically, it means for me never stagnating and always trying to make the best out of your day and out of your journey throughout say training and your mindset basically. Me as an athlete, I consider training as a very important of my life and I want to keep this calisthenics journey forever and I really see myself in future going through a lot of competitions and coaching and basically being a big thing in the calisthenics sports and in the calisthenics journey through future.
We wish this Champ good luck for the future and believe that he serves to be an inspiration for the young generation to take up the sport and eventually lead to its growth.
