Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Francesca Petrolo. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Francesca, appreciate you joining us today. Alright, let’s take a stroll on memory lane, back to when you were an apprentice or intern. What’s a memorable story from that time that you can share with us?

This story started 12 years ago when I was about to graduate from the Perugia University in Italy and I had to work on my last project. The project that I had decided to work on was about a fish farm. A fish farm is where the fish are created and feed in a laboratory/farm and then moved to the big cage in the open ocean. Then we let them grow naturally in their natural environment.

It is very complicated to understand, but it was very interesting and fun to work.

So, what I decided to do at that time was to spend 2 weeks of my internship in the south of Italy in a small town called Vibo Marina in Calabria where this farm was. I worked there with all the other doctors and scientists, I just wanted to study locally with the local people, learn more about this farm and practice what they were doing. So I did.

The place was very cool , huge with 2 floors. They had a different laboratory to work on the first floor with another section with big tubs, where they had the first tadpoles. On the second floor there were different rooms, it was a dormitory. It was there were I spent my 2 weeks. I am not going to lie, but it was scary being there by myself. Nobody from the laboratory was sleeping there. I was really alone in the middle of nothing and in the night there were weird sounds from the outside, some animals.

The day after I arrived the alarm rang at 5am. I was ready to go to work and learn new things. I was assigned to a man. One of them employees, his name was Gabriele. He was a really great man and friend now. Well, he was my supervisor and so he came to the dormitory to pick me up and go to the marina. There was a boat waiting for us, the mission was to go to the open ocean and feed the fish, fix the nets and eventually kill some of the some predator fish, that were trying to eat our fish. Pretty cool. I was already scuba dive certified at that time, so I used my knowledge to help the crew to fix problems.

Oh my god that was the best experience ever, swimming with a bunch of fish, feeding them and seeing them all together.
So, we did it for all the entire 2 weeks, I also learn how to drive the boat. Sometimes I was in the laboratory too to learn more about the starting process and working on some experiments.
I learned a lot and I was able to finish my thesis using the experience I had and a lot of good pictures and videos.
Of course, in the meantime I met other friends and Gabriele’s family. Lovely people, we are still friends and sometimes when I can I travel there to hang with them.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

A passionate kickboxer and boxer, excited about life, an animal lover, a businesswoman and a loyal friend. Hello! My name is Francesca Petrolo. I am 35 years old, I am from Rome, Italy and I am a movement trainer.
Sport and fitness have always been a strong point in my life and I have been always fit and healthy as you can observe on my social media platform.
My career started when I decided to change sports; from equitation to kick-boxing. When I found the right coach, he saw potential in me that I did not see in myself. He helped me to grow in this sport directing me to participate in several fights, which allowed me to be more confident. I’m an active boxing and kickboxing athlete and I’ ve been practicing this sport for the past 25 years, during which I also dedicated myself to learn and improve new skills. I have always worked with adults and children managing classes and also with private sessions.

A year ago I moved to San Diego, California. I decided to move here with my dog, Alaska because I have always been fascinated with U.S.A especially San Diego. Since I arrived in America, I immediately started training with Muay Thai, and shortly after, I decided to fight again. I also started to study again , I recently graduated in a master degree ” Sport Management”.
In the meantime, I personally met the kettlebell master, as well as the founder of IKFF, Steve Cotter, with whom a great friendship was immediately built and I started training with him every week. A year later I completed the training and became a kettlebell trainer.

I believe that I will never stop studying, learning, and discovering new things and new skills, because all I want to do is to pass it on to others and to get people into the world of sports, teaching healthy daily movement and healthy lifestyle as it is for me. Helping people to be stronger not only physically, but to be confident in any situation of them life is important to me.

During the pandemic nothing stopped me, in fact I started to put all my knowledge and equipment together and I opened my own training space called “Jungle Gym”. I worked really hard and I made new clients even during the lock down, some were online and some later, in person. I am still working with some of them.

In the same time I was studying, but also working on my website and my shop online where I sell sport clothes. You can check it out at www.francescapt.com

Going forward and with the end of the pandemic I started to work more and more and I was introduced to an non-profit organization “Any Body Can Youth Foundation” and since that day I never stop to work with them as volunteer and now I am the project manager and I am in charge to manage 2 location, one is in Market street Downtown San Diego and one is in Point Loma, Liberty Station. We are affiliated with USA boxing and we usually organize Boxing event all over San Diego and our recent one took place in Ramona.

I am very proud of all the progress I am doing at work and in life during this 4 years in USA. It is being a great journey!

What I want to share with all the people that are reading this article, is that the curiosity about life and what surround us every day is the key for success. Nobody has to do anything for you, you have to ask questions to your self and go find the answer, find the way to do what you want to do or be. So you can learn and be able to help others with your knowledge.
I have been always open to learn new thinks, new skills either for myself, but also to have something to share with others, because I believe that learning something new every day will keep us alive and stronger for a long period of time and sometimes you need to motivate people and be able to do that.

We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.

Well I can share, shortly 2 stories about my resilience.

The first story take place about 7 years ago after I broke up with my ex-boyfriend. We were working together ’cause, naively I got the job for him. When we decided to broke up he made the life at work impossible to me, it was a real nightmare go to work and try to be coworkers, even trying to talk with him and ask to work professionally was impossible, I was treated very badly every day. I some point I decided to talk with my boss and the manager, but of course they did nothing and when I decided to personally quit the job they were just happy so see me go without create problems to them company.
I quit, I left, I was needed my life back. At that time I was already working to another gym too and had my personal clients.
After I quit I applied for another job too and they accepted it so I was happy again to re-build my own thing without him. I always bein brave enough, I do not need nobody to work for me, I am strong and I can do it by-myself.

The second story is back when I moved in San Diego 4 years ago and lost $2000 over a real estate scam. Since that day I was sad and angry in the same time, San Diego was a completely new city for me, and I was alone and my parents were super worried and asking me to come back. But of course I did not.
I had no place to stay but only a car and my dog, so I decided to sleep in that car while trying to find a better solution, I had a couple of friands that I met during my past vacation helped me a little bit so I spend different night in different couch and posting on social media my story and that I was looking for a safe place to live.
One day a man contacted me from Facebook, but I was scare of another humbug so I asked the police to check for me that man and luckily he was ok, so I decided to accept to met him. He hosted me for 4 months while looking for another place to stay. After that period I changed to more places until I found the perfect one where I am now living by myself. I have my own business and my dog and I are happy.

What’s a lesson you had to unlearn and what’s the backstory?

This is a really good question.

What I deeply believe is that there are not bad experience that we have to unlearn. Every our experience is a blessing because we can definitely learning what to do in the future and even if in that moment we lost someone or we lost a job or we are in a very critical situation, it is going to be a bad storm only. What happened after the storm? the sun usually come out, so we going either to find a new solution or just another god thing is going to happen to us. There is no way that after an hill there is another hill, but always a downhill. We just need to be optimistic and believe in ourself more and more.

The backstory is the bad story. My experiences tough me that there is always something positive after a storm and I new it every time because every thing happen for a reason and the reason is God. God has a plan for each of us and is made with love, WE HAVE to decide if follow/believe in his plan or not.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.Francescapt.com
• Instagram: fpetrolo87
• Facebook: Francesca PT