Melbourne Vegan Strength (MVS) saw the conception of my interest in strength training, once just a hobby with little purpose, with encouragement and guidance from the MVS crew, this quickly developed into a driving obsession for heavier weights, in the name of personal development but more importantly to help dispel ridiculous myths that developing and maintaining strength is only possible through the consumption of animal products. Check out the site: www.veganstrength.org

Held at Noah's house in an inner city suburb, MVS has been primarily focused on developing the three major lifts associated with powerlifting; the squat, deadlift and bench press. The setup is pretty informal, far from what you would see in any commercial gym... no state of the art equipment, no drink fountains and definitely no mirrors. The world of MVS is gritty, we would squat in the front garden (even if it's raining), deadlift in the vacant block nearby on the raw and uneven earth, and bench in the front room of Noah's house. It has to be said that I am yet to find a group of people who are as supportive and enthusiastic as the MVS crew. From day 1, I felt warmly welcomed.

Ivan deadlifting what looks like 210kg

MVS has earnt itself quite a reputation in the global vegan strength community, it has even been rumored that attending a lifting session will automatically add 10% to your previous best lifts. I have a feeling that we are pretty notorious amongst the neighbours as well, due to the amount of yelling and slapping that takes place psyching up for big lifts.

This is The Nothing, resident cat of MVS, keeping a keen eye on the lifting

Andy deadlifting 200kg

Knackers hitting depth

The MVS rack, where many Squat personal best lifts (PB's) have been forged

Some of the crew discussing something incredibly important

Ivan hitting depth (for the first time) haha joking...

Below are two links to some video footage from the last powerlifting comp that Noah and Andy competed in (10.04.10), both of which taking away second place in their respective weight divisions.

Andy's lifts:
Bench: 97.5kg Squat: 160kg Deadlift: 212.5kg TOTAL: 470kg
Noah's lifts :
Bench: 180kg Squat: 207.5kg Deadlift: 230kg TOTAL: 617.5kg

www.youtube.com/watch?v=CPBrNqjh6VQ&playnext_from=TL&videos=LMilBwjGDwo&feature=sub

www.youtube.com/watch?v=bq3Z1K08i_Q&playnext_from=TL&videos=LMilBwjGDwo

To introduce a little balance from the last post, puppies getting whats coming to them.



No new training videos as of yet, energy levels have been a bit down due to getting fuck all sleep (my own fault). If you are interested you can check out my training log on the site veganfitness.net (Hayden's Training Log) Any time I do some training, it will end up being posted on the site, pretty boring, but it makes it easier to track my progress.

HELLOOOO!!!
it rained like a muther-fucker at my work the other day, the draines were clearly not pulling their weight at this point, a lot of the stores along the strip actually had some flooding. Our store is a little higher than others so we were ok. Pretty exciting stuff huh? Every time a car drove past waves of water would spill over the step towards a number of startled yet excited shopkeepers sweeping it back visciously to the depths of whence it came. see below...

This is a shot of my freshly smashed mirror, on my recently acquired automobile... Also recently steered this vessel over a screw which penetrated the inner tube, requiring my wicked tyre removing skills to come into force. Working on a car on the side of a busy road made me feel more like a man... is this sad? So Quinne (the car) has had a pretty eventful time under my care, hopefully this is where the excitement ends for now and the years of happy companionship begin


I have a significant collection of interesting and funny photos that I have accumulated during the long boring hours at work... I felt that others might enjoy their hilarity... CAN YOU DEAL WITH THE HILARITY???? expect to see one with each post from here on. the poor kitten underneath reminds me of my housemates awesome companion Chester, one of the coolest cats i've ever had the pleasure of meeting.


Another video of me doing some technique work at the gym. This is a snatch to overhead squats for reps, the weight is light (40kg) but keeping balance is quite difficult while using correct technique. We have been working on these for a couple of months, and they are starting to feel pretty good...

Been a while since blogging, but I have a good excuse, just moved into an awesome new house with a group of mates, back to my old stomping grounds in Wyndham Vale. Takes the same time to get to work but its a bit of a hike to the gym now.... I don't mind though because its a great gym, and it is the only place on this side of the city (that I know of) that offers olympic weightlifting training. Also just got a new car!!! my old car (Ruthy - 96 Corolla) was getting tired with a mixture of accumulating kilometres and abuse. She started to make a ticking noise, I took her into a mechanic a little while ago for a diagnosis to which I was informed the motor would probable sieze in a matter of months. Within 2 hours of picking up my shiny new VW, some berk (which I looked up, is Cockney slang for Berkshire Hunt...... or Cunt) sideswiped my driverside mirror and smashed it! Thats enough whinging though, time for some pics! In no particular order...

Jade came around to my old house in Newport to help with the move, this is her, seemingly giving the finger to my bed because it got jammed on the way down the stairs, funny shit.


Josh and Maki chillin' at new place

The awesome feast that Jade and Maki prepared on the night I moved in, vegetable shepherds pie, roasted vegies, and mixed salad. NOM NOM!!!



This is the outside view of the Docklands Cottonmills where the gym I go to (Apollo) is located


Here is a video of me doing some Hang Power Cleans, we were working on my timing and technique. Tried to turn the video the right way up, but couldn't work it out sorry. The bar is 60kg, nothing too exciting just yet...

Puppies and work

I work for a fitness equipment retailer in an outer suburb of Melbourne called Just Fitness. Here we sell, deliver and (if the customer is lucky enough) install their newly purchased goods. I've been here for a couple of years now, and have to say it is actually a pretty good place to work. Below is my lovely workmate, we usually spend our time looking up funny stuff on youtube or trying to hit each other in the crotch with a rubber ball, fun times...



Anyways, I have been doing a lot of gym installations recently which has it's ups and downs. On the negative side, these installs usually take place after hours or on my days off... but on the plus side it usually means some extra pocket money for the week, I get to meet some cool people and their even cooler animal companions. Recently I've been the victim of a kitten walking all over me, a beagle puppy all up in my grill, a pitbull that wouldn't stop licking me and to top it off, today a puppy border collie that was tripping me up and nibbled on my knee.... who am I kidding I loved every minute of it, I wanted to steal this puppy soooo bad today, he was (is) awesome. I'm gonna try to remember my camera on all my installs from now on



Also came across this building on the way to the customers house, pretty cool.

FIRST BLOG!!!

Hi,

So this is my first ever blog...(unless you count my training log on veganfitness.net) Shout out to my good friend Jade, who encouraged me to get this bloggy blog happenin'. Check out her awesome blog at: http://subarashiblog.blogspot.com/

Not sure what I am supposed to do with this, but I guess some kind of introduction is in order. My name is Hayden, I was born in Holland, (although am in no way Dutch) and moved to Australia when I was a couple of weeks old. Skip forward a couple of years and I am now slightly taller and almost a quater of a century older ...sigh... I am vegan, so I do my darndest to avoid everything that comes from, uses, or involves animals for our own purposes. I've been vegan now for around 3 or 4 years, and am going on strong! One of my major interests is strength training, I am currently learning Olympic (style) Weightlifting, being trained by Paul from Apollo Personal Fitness in Footscray at the awesome and historic Docklands Cotton mills (I will get some photos to supply proof of the awesomeness) I also am into Powerlifting and Strongman but my main interest surrounds Olympic weightlifting. One day I hope to chuck on the leotard and compete, but I think I have a little while to go before I will comfortable to hit the platform.

Enough for now, stay tuned for more!