Joel Kirkilis

Can you tell us about your­self?

I’m your av­er­age 20 some­thing year old guy who en­joys weight lift­ing, watch­ing sports and spend­ing time with fam­i­ly and friends. I work full time in the sports nu­tri­tion field and like to spend my free time with my two dogs (a Mal­tese X and bea­gle) and try­ing out dif­fer­ent foods to help with build­ing mus­cle and lift­ing more weight.

How and why did you go ve­g­an?

I went ve­g­an be­cause I don’t think it is right to ex­ploit an­i­mals in any way for my ben­e­fit. I have dis­cov­ered so many other foods which are very nu­tri­tious and tas­ty and have helped me not on­ly feel good but al­so en­hance my ath­let­ic abil­i­ty. I have eat­en an­i­mal prod­ucts in the past but ev­er since I cut them out of my di­et I have felt more en­er­get­ic and al­so feel bet­ter mo­ral­ly.

Did you en­coun­ter any dif­fi­cul­ties? If so what were they and how have you dealt with them?

I have nev­er re­al­ly en­coun­tered any dif­fi­cul­ties with eat­ing a ve­g­an di­et or fol­low­ing a ve­g­an lifestyle. There are cer­tain things, es­pe­cial­ly be­ing in­volved in body­build­ing, that are not of­ten ve­g­an friend­ly, like weightlift­ing belts, sup­ple­ments and tan­n­ing prod­ucts. Hav­ing to look for al­ter­na­tives for th­ese have been the on­ly dif­fi­cul­ty that I have come across. The food it­self has nev­er been a problem.

How have your fam­i­ly and friends re­act­ed to your ve­g­an­ism? Have you in­flu­enced any­one else to go ve­g­an?

My fam­i­ly have al­ways been sup­por­tive. I was brought up to be aware of where food comes from and how foods can af­fect health so for the most part I have been eat­ing healthi­ly. Hav­ing trained and com­pet­ed for four years now, peo­ple of­ten ask about my di­et which pro­vides me with the op­por­tu­ni­ty to tell them that they do not need to eat an­i­mal prod­ucts to grow and build mus­cles. As a re­sult a lot of peo­ple I have spo­ken to have de­cid­ed to re­duce their in­take of meat, milk, eg­gs and milk de­rived pro­tein pow­ders.

How do you feel switch­ing to ve­g­an­ism has im­pact­ed your health?

It makes me feel a lot healthi­er and stronger.

What are some of your favou­rite meals, take­away or home cooked?

Dur­ing my di­et­ing sea­son I tend to eat a lot of to­fu, broc­coli, spi­nach and pro­tein brownies. The brownies are made with sun­war­ri­or brown rice pro­tein pow­der, al­mond but­ter, flax meal, wal­nuts, cin­na­mon and al­mond milk.

Off sea­son I like to eat ve­g­an sch­nitzels, len­til burg­ers, pi­ta wraps with hum­mus and sal­ads. For treats I like to­fut­ti cu­ties, tart n’ round peanut caramel balls, ve­g­an piz­zas, ve­g­an lasag­na/par­mi­gia­na, ve­g­an dark cho­co­late and raw food bars.

Have you en­coun­tered any ab­surd stereo­types, com­ments or neg­a­tive at­ti­tudes?

Be­ing in­volved in the body­build­ing in­dus­try I come across a lot of ‘meat heads’ who be­lieve that they need to eat ki­lo af­ter ki­lo of meat to put on mus­cle.  Th­ese in­di­vi­d­u­als are clear­ly mis­in­formed and re­ly on mag­azines and out­dat­ed in­for­ma­tion.

Is there any­one who has par­tic­u­lar­ly in­spired or helped you?

I have un­der­tak­en a lot of my own re­search with re­spect to body­build­ing and nu­tri­tion how­ev­er with re­spect to pow­er­lift­ing, MVS (Mel­bourne Ve­g­an Strength) have been re­al­ly sup­por­tive.

What do you think are the most ef­fec­tive ways of help­ing ve­g­an­ism to be­come more main­stream?

I be­lieve that there needs to be more ad­ver­tis­ing, par­tic­u­lar­ly in the health and fit­ness in­dus­try, as this in­dus­try is spe­cif­i­cal­ly tar­get­ed by the meat and dairy in­dus­try. Al­so, ve­g­an friend­ly food needs to be more read­i­ly avai­l­able and stocked at reg­u­lar su­per­mar­kets.

How did you be­come a pro­fes­sio­n­al body­builder?

For me body­build­ing is just a hob­by and I have been com­pet­ing for four years now. Pri­or to body­build­ing I played soc­cer how­ev­er I sus­tained a knee in­jury which end­ed my abil­i­ty to cont­in­ue play­ing (I was a goalie so I need­ed a pret­ty stur­dy knee when throw­ing my­self on the pitch). As a re­sult I turned to weight train­ing and the rest is his­to­ry.

What do you think of the stereo­type that ve­g­ans can’t get big and strong?

I be­lieve that it is just an ex­cuse that peo­ple use to cont­in­ue eat­ing meat.

What do you eat and do you take any sup­ple­ments?

Re­fer above for di­et. I take the fol­low­ing sup­ple­ments; sun­war­ri­or and ve­ga pro­tein pow­ders, cre­a­tine mono­hy­drate, glu­tamine, es­sen­tial ami­nos, spir­uli­na and ve­g­an ome­ga 3 DHA.

How do you feel be­ing ve­g­an has ef­fect­ed your progress as a strength ath­lete?

As a strength athelete I do not feel as though I have yet reached my max­i­mum po­ten­tial, how­ev­er I feel as though me be­ing ve­g­an has not hin­dered my progress. It is dif­fi­cult how­ev­er train­ing for both pow­er­lift­ing and body­build­ing as they have com­pet­ing in­ter­ests.

Any ad­vice for as­pir­ing ve­g­an body builders?

Train hard, eat clean and don’t be fooled in­to be­liev­ing that you need to eat huge amounts of pro­tein! Al­ways look for ad­vice from rep­utable sources (not just mag­azines).

 

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