Local gym owner hosts third-annual Daytona Beach bodybuilding show

Ormond Beach Observer
Neighbors

Michael Matassa beat a near-fatal intestinal infection to go on and win this year’s Mr. Florida bodybuilding show. He’ll host another muscle show this weekend.

BY MIKE CAVALIERE | ASSOCIATE EDITOR

Ormond Beach’s Michael Matassa will host the third-annual Daytona Beach Classic Saturday, Sept. 21, at the Seabreeze High School Auditorium.

“This bodybuilding and physique contest isn't like the old-time bodybuilding shows,” Matassa said. “We have many more divisions now.”

There are teen through 70-years-of-age divisions. Prejudging starts at 10 a.m.

Matassa began competing in bodybuilding shows in 1994 and won his first show at a national qualifier, before going on to win a top 10 medal at nationals.

“I never lost a bodybuilding contest here in the state of Florida,” Matassa said. And that’s on top of several top-five, and top-ten, national finishes.

Then, he opened Bodysculpting Personal Fitness, at 242 S. Atlantic Ave., but he had to stop working out in the early 2000s when he contracted clostridium difficile, a near-fatal intestinal infection.

“But I never gave up,” he said. “Over a dozen doctors said there was nothing I could do ... (but) I just kept working on a way to gain even just a part of my old life back. I became a father in 2005 of a son, which also grew a new urgency to become healthy again.”

Then he began experimenting with immune system-boosting supplements last year, until he felt well enough to work out, more and more each day.

He won the 2013 Mr. Florida competition a few weeks back.

He is “46 years young.”

Call 299-3487.