TWO years ago Novocastrian Nic Jovanovic took the plunge into the not-so-realistic world of reality TV to find love on Channel Nine ratings behemoth Married At First Sight.
Unlike many of his contemporaries, Jovanovic emerged from the experience of being thrust into the celebrity fish bowl relatively incident free.
His reputation wasn't slandered by cheating scandals and most viewers sympathised with the affable electrician's predicament of being paired with the volatile Western Sydneysider Cyrell Paule, known as "Cyclone Cyrell."
It was also impossible not to admire somebody who'd battled, and beaten, testicular cancer twice, including immediately after filming MAFS. Six weeks ago he received negative results in his yearly cancer check.
These days Jovanovic is happier than ever. Fit and healthy, the 30-year-old recently found love of the more conventional kind, with girlfriend and Newcastle woman, Kim Bath.
"I've found myself a young lady, I've got a girlfriend," Jovanovic says. "It's been a few years [between relationships], so that's going well."
Jovanovic is also kicking goals in the world of fitness. Last month he made his competitive CrossFit debut at the Torian Pro at Brisbane's Pat Rafter Arena as part of the Oceania division of the CrossFit Games.
For the uninitiated, CrossFit is a fitness regiment that involves high-intensity interval training, Olympic weightlifting, plyometrics, powerlifting, gymnastics, kettlebell lifting, calisthenics, strongman, and other exercises.
Jovanovic represented Kotara's Steelcoast CrossFit with teammates Sonya Cameron, Vicki Webber and Stew Dunstan. The quartet finished 27th from 60 teams.
"One person in our team was 42 and one is 40, I'm 30 and another was 35," Jovanovic says. "When you're battling against 21-year-olds in their prime, it's very interesting."
CrossFit is criticised as being "cultish" in some fitness circles due to the fervour in which followers advocate it's virtues, so why does it appeal to Jovanovic?
It's funny how people get so caught up thinking it's so real life.
Nic Jovanovic
"It's a full body workout, very hard," he says. "It's very competitive, very intense, and just challenging and rewarding. There's a lot of things you have to do with movements and certain weights that we try to lift.
"If you don't have the right technique you pretty much can't lift it. I see people who are 20kg lighter than me who are lifting 40kg more than me and it's impressive."
Healthy eating has also become central to Jovanovic's lifestyle.
"I've always been into fitness, but since having my health scares that was a massive turning point for me," he says.
"Having been through cancer twice I was, 'nope, I'm going to look after my body, keep watching what I eat and drink and how I train'.
"I've just been super-focused on trying to do everything right and do everything by the book and keep in a good frame of mind."
Walking around Newcastle these days Jovanovic is still regularly recognised by MAFS fans. There's also been an influx of new social media followers in recent months after his season of MAFS aired in the UK while the country was in lockdown.
"I got more followers from the UK than Australia," he says. "They loved that cringey reality TV. They loved it and it got a good response over there. It was so funny seeing celebrities watch it like [pop singer] Sam Smith. He uploaded a tweet about and a few guys from Geordie Shore."
Not surprisingly, Cyrell's volcanic behaviour drew plenty of sympathy from British fans.
"It's all in the past and everyone's moved on, but it brought back a lot of memories," he says.
"A lot them were acting really angrily towards Cyrell's brother. I got messages like, 'I can't believe you put up with that'. And I'm like, 'it's OK guys we've all moved on, we've all grown from it.'
"It's funny how people get so caught up thinking it's so real life. It's real, but heavily edited and you've got to take a breather and remember it's just a TV show."
