Whyalla fitness queen Vernice Gasper’s tilt at Ms Health and Fitness USA

In an international competition with thousands of entrants, a Whyalla girl has sweated her way to the top of Ms Health and Fitness USA – but she’s not number one yet.  

In an international competition with thousands of entrants, Whyalla’s own Vernice Gasper has sweated her way to the top of Ms Health and Fitness USA.

With one day of voting remaining to win the title, author, occupational therapist (OT) and Camp Gladiator owner Vernice Gasper is currently sitting at seventh place on the leaderboard.

The online competition sees up to 50,000 health and fitness enthusiasts apply annually.

Judged on physical fitness through social media upkeep and promotion, competitors are finalised to a top 5000, then narrowed down to 500, then to 60 then the final eight is determined by public vote whic also raises funds for charity.

After leaving Whyalla at 18 to study in Adelaide, Vernice, known as ‘V’, has covered tremendous ground in the 13 years since her departure.

Vernice’s passion for health, fitness and nutrition was amplified after graduation as an OT where she began fostering elements of her fitness training into her everyday work.

Whyalla's Vernice Gasper makes top eight of USA's Ms Health and Fitness competition

She met US husband, John Gasper, here in Australia and the pair relocated to Orlando Florida, where she began chasing her fitness dreams and building her empire.

After buying into the Camp Gladiator outdoor fitness franchise, Vernice directed her focus purely on “helping others be their healthiest selves.”

From coaching a handful of clients, to a couple of hundred, to becoming known as that “Aussie girl” with a thick accent, coaching 380 people from all over the world on Zoom.

In three years Vernice leveraged off the physical relationships she made in her outdoor training sessions and her business only continued to thrive when Covid-19 hit.

“Due to the impact of this world wide pandemic I now have a hybrid type of business; this means I juggle being onscreen in my home studio and then 60 minutes later I’m setting up in a parking lot high fiving and physically coaching people – I love it,” Gasper said.

“If it wasn’t for Covid-19, I would probably have never ventured into the online virtual coaching space.

It was Gasper’s clients who encouraged her to apply for Ms Health and Fitness and as the final hours of the competition approach, she’s took to Instagram to talk about the bidding war for the number one spot.

“It has become more apparent that this round is all about how much money is raised,” she wrote.

“We got to the final (sic) 8 ya’ll (out of 50,000) and that is a huge achievement.”

Although, the $20,000 prize money would help Vernice with her goals as an author and for further research for her book Meet The Macros, she’s happy to take number eight – unwilling to ask more of her friends and clients – and continue smashing both personally, and in her businses.