Calum von Moger: muscle missionary
Calum von Moger, Mr Universe, is surprisingly humble, despite his huge following. Stephen Brook takes a body building class for beginners.
The mid-morning crowd at the Lift Performance Centre are big blokes, but when Mr Universe enters the cathedral to fitness in Sydney’s Redfern, it’s like a stable of shetland ponies being displaced by a clydesdale.
You don’t actually do a double take when you clap eyes on Calum von Moger. More you have to widen your aperture to fit his 21-inch biceps, 50-inch chest and 27-inch legs into your field of vision.
The 24 year old Geelong man is 6 foot 2, weighs 112kg and has 224,000 followers on Instagram. His Mad Desire video got 3.5 million YouTube views. Last June he won the World Fitness Federation Mr Universe title in Seoul. Yet, astonishingly, Australia doesn’t seem to have heard of him.
Von Moger is extremely polite, easygoing and chirpy. There’s no “mad desire” on display here. I’m expecting breakfast to be steamed chicken, brown rice and broccoli, but he has just had a coffee and a croissant. Is he allowed? “Of course, I competed on the weekend, it’s OK.” Nicknamed Schwarzenegger 2.0, von Moger actually sounds a bit like Arnie, thanks to his Austrian and Dutch heritage.
Winning the Mr Universe was really “humbling” after a year “grinding out” in the gym and dieting. But, von Moger says, “body building is not everything, it is just a small slice of my life. I love training, knowing that I am improving my body and becoming fitter and stronger.”
So if he is not in it for the ego, what’s the motivation? Body building gets a bad rap. Competitors wreck their bodies with steroids and die young. Narcissism is rampant. Top global competitors in the rival Mr Olympia contest trash talk each other down. In Muscle: Confessions of an Unlikely Bodybuilder, Oxford graduate Sam Fussell memorably detailed his descent into a Californian world of maladjusted freaks.
Yet now the social media appeal of body building has never been greater. Everyone wants to be bigger. Except von Moger, who barely fits into an Instagram pic. To compete in Mr Olympia he’d need an extra 15kg of muscle but it doesn’t appeal. Online there’s quite a touching video of his wheelchair-bound dad explaining their philosophy, lamenting the grotesque body builders who have “lost control” of their physiques.
In October, von Moger moved to the fitness mecca of Los Angeles, leaving behind his girlfriend. Back home life was “going around in circles and I didn’t have room to grow”. LA is a shortcut to his goals, one of which, intriguingly, is to “really make a difference ”.
But in the meantime there are contests to win. He came a disappointing third on the weekend at his first pro event in Sydney, but the imperative is to defend his Mr Universe title in France in June.
He must be a total show-off to stand in front of thousands of people in tiny posing trunks, “on full advertisement” as he puts it.
“To a degree you have to be, if you want to stand out and be noticed. You can have a very confident smile and let nothing bother you and connect with the judges and show that you are the winner, without being arrogant and belittling anyone else.”
The von Moger family (five boys and one girl) grew up on a hobby farm in central Victoria and moved to Geelong when Calum was eight. He went to the gym because he wanted to copy (and beat) his older brother. They used to break in to a local warehouse and use the weights stored there. He loved Schwarzenegger: “I thought, I want to look like that one day.”
He admits he was “a skinny little boy”. This I already knew, as fossicking around the News Corporation library had thrown up a local newspaper photo from Oberon High School. Is the skinny science student with a dorky haircut in this picture really him? “Yeah,” he says, bashful but rather chuffed. “Aw, it is. That’s crazy!”
But what drove the monster transformation? Like many young men, post school von Moger was lost. He tried studying, the army, skippering yachts, he failed to get into animal husbandry, tried landscaping, health food stores, lifesaving, adventure tour guiding. “Mum said you have to continually improve,” he says.
Then the realisation hit: if he couldn’t go to the gym then he didn’t actually want any of these jobs. That thing he had followed his brothers into was actually his thing. “I got to a point where I wanted to create my own legacy. I wanted to introduce my style of body building and fitness and I wanted to motivate younger kids.”
So he’s a muscle missionary, with his own fitness and lifestyle app. “Now I have found this perfect groove, I get paid monthly by sponsors, I can travel around the world and reach out to people.
“If I am changing their life in the smallest little way, getting them out of the house and getting them into the gym ...”
OK, but to present the prosecution case, what about steroids, body image problems, health dangers. He tackles this head-on. “People frown on steroids and sporting organisations ban them. In the world of body building it’s very relevant. If you are a competitive body builder and you want to win and really want to do well, there is not much option not to go down that road.” He worries about the health impacts and warns that ignorant use is very dangerous.
Out on the gym floor, von Moger’s enthusiasm makes our brief workout fun. “You have to tell yourself you are going to beat those weights!” he says, counting my bicep curls. I finish a set and he arches his eyebrows in approval. “Do two more next time. You are stronger than you look. Look at those veins, you’ve got it going!”
The word God appears at the top of von Moger’s Instagram page. He’s not talking about himself. “I have a relationship with God, I am a Christian,” he explains. “I have Him as the anchor in the middle of my life and don’t try to take matters into my own hands. I really feel that everyone here is put in this world to do something and that He knows the best for us. It gives me a sense of peace.”
He says there’s a lot of “fluff” in his industry. “The fitness family can be all looking inward. We can be all so self-centred. I am genuinely interested in other people’s lives, what they do and where they come from.” Proving this, after I switch off the recorder, he interviews me about my career, a rare occurrence in 20 years of journalism. “For me, it’s like, how can I talk to them or how can my experience impact them?”
At this point tears form in his eyes. Is he really just a big softie? “No, no, no, it’s just I have got something in my eye!”
His faith was on hand eight years ago when a motorbike accident snapped his father’s C6 vertebrate and left him a quadriplegic. Dad’s continued enthusiasm inspires his son, who recently put on Instagram a picture of them both in wheelchairs “after Dad took me through an extremely heavy leg workout”.
Faith was also on hand in January at the memorial service for US fitness star Greg Plitt, who died accidentally while filming a video. Von Moger recalls one of Plitt’s family reading out a comforting passage from John 3:15. “It does affect you,” Mr Universe says earnestly. “If you have faith it can give you strength.”
Calum’s Body Building for Beginners
- If you’re striving for a world class herculean physique don’t expect it to come fast and easy. It takes time and patience.
- Don’t be afraid to fail as long as you’re willing to get back up and have another go
- Your mind will always give up before your muscles so tell yourself when you’ve had enough that you’re not finished yet!
— Never worry about what anyone else is doing, focus on yourself and your goals
— Lastly, whatever you do, do it with CONFIDENCE. Be happy, be positive and smile
Day 1: Chest/Triceps
Bench press 4 sets x 6-8 repetitions
Dumbbell incline press 4 x 6-8
DB flys 3 x 6-8
Weighted dips 4 x 6-8
French press 4 x 6-8
Push downs 2 x 6-8
Day 2 Legs/Abdominals
Squat 4 x 6-8
Leg presses 4 x 6-8
Leg extension 3 x 6-8
Lying leg curl 4 x 6-8
Seated leg curl 3x 6-8
Crunches 4x 10-15
Day 3 Back/Biceps
Wide grip chin-ups 4 x 6-8
Barbell bent over rows 4x 6-8
Deadlift 3x 6-8
T-bar rows 3x 6-8
Barbell curls 4x 6-8
Standing Dumbbell curls 4x 6-8
Day 4: Shoulders/Calves
Military press 4x 6-8
DB shoulder press 4x 6-8
Side lateral raises 3x 6-8
Rear cable flys 3x 6-8
DB shrugs 4x 6-8
Standing calf raises 5x 6-8