Daniel Jay
powerlifter strong vegan strongman/strongwoman
As a gym owner and strength competitor, Daniel has thrown himself into strength sports in a big way – and taken some incredible successes.
- Three-time record breaker at Static Monsters
- Natural Strongman English Champion
- International strength competitor
- British Powerlifting Champion as a junior
“Deadlift is probably my strongest lift but bench and log are close second” he says, “but we don’t talk about squat”.
Incredibly Daniel says this as a lifter who has raw squatted 210 kg in the 74 kg category, in competition – which emphasises how big his other lifts are.
His bench personal best stands at a double bodyweight 157.5 kg and he’s deadlifted 280 kg.
In August 2025 he had four regional records at u59 kg, three at u66 kg and deadlift and total at u74kg.
Daniel also competes in strongman and has broken the Static Monsters world record for log with 115 kg and the 18 inch axle deadlift world record with a massive 333 kg. He jointly broke the under 70kg deadlift world record with a 280 kg lift. This has since been broken, although he cheekily claims “I’ll have it back at some point”.
In strongman he won the 2024 world championships with AL Fitness and in 2025 took the England’s U72 kg crown with Natural Strongman.
It must be hard to pick out a career highlight, but we did ask Daniel – and it’s the log record.
“I have won The British Powerlifting Championships as a junior, competed in multiple international competitions and held multiple records in powerlifting over multiple weight classes. I won The U70 Worlds Strongest Man last year as well as most recently Natural England’s Strongest Man.”
“There are more achievements to list but what I would really say is my ‘proudest’ Achievement was holding the log world record, not because the lift itself meant much to me but it was a promise and challenge I set myself to honour my friend and business partner that passed away in 2020. He also had the log record for his weight class so having my name next to his in the record books meant a lot to me.”
“if anyone is still under any doubt you can’t get stronger on a vegan or plant-based diet send them my way”
Vegan!
For all of these successes and most of his growth, Daniel has been vegan. He made the change in 2015 after a few years vegetarian. Before that, he was pescetarian from 2010 aged 15.
“As soon as I really questioned my diet and its impact on animals, I removed meat from my diet when I was fairly young” he reflects. “At the time I didn’t really know what being vegan was because it wasn’t as popular then. I’ve always loved animals and remember going to a lambing weekend, and immediately knew I never wanted to take part in any animals suffering again.”
As a strength athlete, Daniel needs protein, and he gets it, eating “tons of tofu”.
“It’s not that it’s my favourite food but it’s so versatile. A lot of people will try plain tofu and be put off it but if you actually enjoy cooking or experiment a little there’s so much you can do with it. I’ve made scrambled tofu that tastes just as good as eggs, tofu steaks with seaweed layered onto to create a similar texture to fish, there’s so many possibilities!”
It fuels his training which centres on the three powerlifting lifts but includes more.
“Primarily I’m a powerlifter, so mainly squat, bench and deadlift but if I’m preparing for a strongman comp there could be anything and everything in there. Anything that involves log or pressing I’m a fan of.”
While myths remain around difficulties in building strength as a vegan, Daniel has a wealth of strength at his gym. They include world champion natural strongman Tom Butts, and multiple national powerlifting competitor Cat Phipps whom he coaches. Amelia Fox also trains at the gym and Daniel coaches his partner Tzveti, a vegan strongwoman who has podiumed twice at Natural Strongman’s English championships, including a win. James Hamilton is another vegan strongman who trains there, and has competed at the English Championships, taking silver – and at the world’s.
“I never ran into anyone really seeing it as an issue” Daniel says “but rather people are shocked that I can do what I do whilst on a vegan diet.”
As he reflects on his past and looks ahead to the future, it’s clear that Daniel loves his training and the personal growth he is still seeing.
“Currently I just want to get bigger and stronger. I feel I’ve ‘been there and done that’ with competition and really only do it now to impress my peers and give me a challenge to work towards, but really, I just enjoy training and getting stronger.”
All of this will be vegan fuelled.
“Just to say that if anyone is still under any doubt you can’t get stronger on a vegan or plant-based diet send them my way and get in contact with myself, because I have so many incredible athletes that we coach you’ve already featured on your page that have been successful in multiple different sports!”