Post by Vitamin G on May 30, 2013 6:56:24 GMT -6
The Origin of Vitamin G,
by Vitamin G
One question I tend to get a lot is "how did you come to be called "Vitamin G." Well, it all started when I fell into a vat of radioactive alphabet soup...
Just kidding. Truthfully, the story isn't all that exciting. But since the Globalverse wants to know, the Globalverse will find out. And as I always say, it's important to begin at the beginning.
My name is Paul Gideon Reece, as I've said before. Paul after my father, and Gideon from the Book of Judges. Because my father's name was also Paul, I usually got called Gideon, or Paul G., or eventually just G. This kept on all the way into high school.
It was in high school that I started wrestling. They wanted me to do a sport in Freshman year, and I picked wrestling. It soon became clear that I had a knack for it. By the end of the year, I was beating seniors that outweighed me by a good thirty pounds. I don't think anyone really understood how I was naturally so talented at it; looking back at it now, I think that I just had quick reflexes and a really intuitive grasp of leverage. I competed in the nationals for my weight class three times in high school, and made the final four twice.
I know this is a bit of an unusual story for a Globalstar. Most of my colleagues came to wrestling the hard way-- having been forced to fight through their whole lives, they eventually learned to wrestle. I, ever the exception, started out wrestling and had to learn to fight.
It was actually my high school wrestling coach, Coach Langlois, who coined the term Vitamin G. He was a great wrestling coach, but not the most creative man. One day in my junior year, at a local wrestling meet, he turned to me and said, "Reece, you go out there and give that North Van wrestler a big ol' dose of Vitamin G." After that, it just kind of stuck with me.
I wasn't sure quite what to do with myself after high school. I didn't have the money or the grades to go to college, and athletic scholarships in Canada are pretty thin on the ground compared to the U.S.A. So I scrounged up as much money as I could find and headed east to the Flatlands Wrestling Association, a small but very well-respected school and a developmental territory for a developmental territory for the CSW. I got in about a year of training there, picking up paid matches where I could and working nights in a bar the rest of the time. I had stars in my eyes, and figured when I "graduated" from their program, I'd eventually work my way up to CSW.
As it happened, the best offer I got was for a small but notoriously violent federation in Mexico called "Lucha Loco." They put me in red and white tights and a maple leaf mask and called me "El Canadien," which means (believe it or not) "The Canadian." It was here that I really started to make connections within the business and get my name out there. In fact, I wrestled a few hard-fought matches for Lucha Loco against a young Leon Corbin (then Leon Taylor), none of which ended well for me. But I knew that style of wrestling would not lead to a long and healthy career, so when I started to get offers from American companies, I knew I had to accept.
Now I wrestled in the US for a lot of small territories-- The TWF, the TCW, and a lot more that you've never heard of unless you keep a close eye on the independent scene. But it was at a tiny, short-lived federation called the TECWC that I first got the opportunity to choose my own name and gimmick. I chose the name Vitamin G, because like Coach Langlois, I'm just not that creative. I would come out on the stage with my microphone in hand, put on my best deep gravelly voice and tell my opponent "You've been moody, irritable, and downright annoying. What you need is a good strong dose of VITAMIN G."
That gimmick only lasted a couple of months, because there are only so many new and creative ways to say "You need a good strong dose of Vitamin G." Also, the gravelly voice was hard on my throat. So my gimmick eventually got dropped and I just became myself-- the good-natured, easy-going gentleman of a pugillist we all know and love-- but as in high school, the name stuck. By that time, I had recognized the good sense of keeping my real name and real past a secret, and I had begun to build up a following on the independent circuit, so I just kept going with it.
And that's the real story of how a boy from East Vancouver became Vitamin G. Thanks for reading, and keep an eye out for my next column, "My Friend Tambo."
by Vitamin G
One question I tend to get a lot is "how did you come to be called "Vitamin G." Well, it all started when I fell into a vat of radioactive alphabet soup...
Just kidding. Truthfully, the story isn't all that exciting. But since the Globalverse wants to know, the Globalverse will find out. And as I always say, it's important to begin at the beginning.
My name is Paul Gideon Reece, as I've said before. Paul after my father, and Gideon from the Book of Judges. Because my father's name was also Paul, I usually got called Gideon, or Paul G., or eventually just G. This kept on all the way into high school.
It was in high school that I started wrestling. They wanted me to do a sport in Freshman year, and I picked wrestling. It soon became clear that I had a knack for it. By the end of the year, I was beating seniors that outweighed me by a good thirty pounds. I don't think anyone really understood how I was naturally so talented at it; looking back at it now, I think that I just had quick reflexes and a really intuitive grasp of leverage. I competed in the nationals for my weight class three times in high school, and made the final four twice.
I know this is a bit of an unusual story for a Globalstar. Most of my colleagues came to wrestling the hard way-- having been forced to fight through their whole lives, they eventually learned to wrestle. I, ever the exception, started out wrestling and had to learn to fight.
It was actually my high school wrestling coach, Coach Langlois, who coined the term Vitamin G. He was a great wrestling coach, but not the most creative man. One day in my junior year, at a local wrestling meet, he turned to me and said, "Reece, you go out there and give that North Van wrestler a big ol' dose of Vitamin G." After that, it just kind of stuck with me.
I wasn't sure quite what to do with myself after high school. I didn't have the money or the grades to go to college, and athletic scholarships in Canada are pretty thin on the ground compared to the U.S.A. So I scrounged up as much money as I could find and headed east to the Flatlands Wrestling Association, a small but very well-respected school and a developmental territory for a developmental territory for the CSW. I got in about a year of training there, picking up paid matches where I could and working nights in a bar the rest of the time. I had stars in my eyes, and figured when I "graduated" from their program, I'd eventually work my way up to CSW.
As it happened, the best offer I got was for a small but notoriously violent federation in Mexico called "Lucha Loco." They put me in red and white tights and a maple leaf mask and called me "El Canadien," which means (believe it or not) "The Canadian." It was here that I really started to make connections within the business and get my name out there. In fact, I wrestled a few hard-fought matches for Lucha Loco against a young Leon Corbin (then Leon Taylor), none of which ended well for me. But I knew that style of wrestling would not lead to a long and healthy career, so when I started to get offers from American companies, I knew I had to accept.
Now I wrestled in the US for a lot of small territories-- The TWF, the TCW, and a lot more that you've never heard of unless you keep a close eye on the independent scene. But it was at a tiny, short-lived federation called the TECWC that I first got the opportunity to choose my own name and gimmick. I chose the name Vitamin G, because like Coach Langlois, I'm just not that creative. I would come out on the stage with my microphone in hand, put on my best deep gravelly voice and tell my opponent "You've been moody, irritable, and downright annoying. What you need is a good strong dose of VITAMIN G."
That gimmick only lasted a couple of months, because there are only so many new and creative ways to say "You need a good strong dose of Vitamin G." Also, the gravelly voice was hard on my throat. So my gimmick eventually got dropped and I just became myself-- the good-natured, easy-going gentleman of a pugillist we all know and love-- but as in high school, the name stuck. By that time, I had recognized the good sense of keeping my real name and real past a secret, and I had begun to build up a following on the independent circuit, so I just kept going with it.
And that's the real story of how a boy from East Vancouver became Vitamin G. Thanks for reading, and keep an eye out for my next column, "My Friend Tambo."
