I've been hitting the gym recently which means I'm constantly sore and there has been a notable uptick in how many Dragon Ball Z clips I watch a day.

It gets me hype, what can I say.

Pictured above: GAINS. (Vegeta to the left and Goku to the right)

However after watching a few scenes of the aforementioned Japanese cartoon I noticed something interesting. Vegeta, the titular antagonist character turned sort of good guy in the Z-Fighters (yes that is actually what they call themselves) universe was actually really bad at training. That being the case he is still probably the second most powerful character in the show. Any fan of the DBZ Universe knows how broken power scaling is in the show but specifically in the instance of Vegeta it shines through.

As to why this shocking revelation made an impact on me it is important that I give a little context. Here we go:

Dragon Ball Z is an anime about an alien race who love to fight but are wiped out by another stronger space alien who wants to conquer the galaxy, Vegeta and Goku (sometimes called Kakarot) are both from the first race of space aliens called Saiyans. Being a saiyan comes with perks, power ups, and the very convenient ability to grow a lot stronger after recovering from a near fatal injury. These dudes (saiyans and in particular Goku and Vegeta) are ridiculous and they remain ridiculous throughout most of Dragon Ball Z. Saiyan pride comes up a lot in this show; in fact the character this article is about could be seen as the personification of pride, and it's negative affects. Both Goku and Vegeta are prideful; it's simply that Goku isn't consumed by his pride. Vegeta is pretty much incapable of controlling himself where his pride comes into play.

Now that I've provided some context for the show, I will provide further context for the show.

These guys work out; a lot. In fact in the case of Vegeta he has literally worked out so hard that he's almost died; he has done this several times. It would be easy to assume he thinks that if he almost dies every time he trains than he will get stronger than his rival ( Goku is his rival) faster, but I feel like that explanation is too easy. Vegeta's a complex character, an intelligent fighter and he's smart enough to realize when something isn't working. So why does he train so hard, for so long, sacrificing his health and putting himself through torture?

I have no idea, but I can tell you four of the most brutal ways he's done it.

4. As a result of over training Vegeta is almost killed by an asteroid.

We are starting this list off with the kind of faux pas anyone could make if they go to the gym a little too angry. Vegeta stepped into his version of a gym (machine that can increase the intensity of gravity up to and above 1000 times) with something to prove. He needed to be better than Goku, and he knew the only way he could get there was grueling, brute force training that left him physically and emotionally wrecked. Say what you want about the "Prince of All Saiyans" but the man takes his training very very seriously. He trains at four hundred and fifty times gravity for days in a row. We're never told how many days, but suffice it to say the cartoon does show him entering the machine and going through rigorous training till he is actually bandaging himself up in order to keep training.

The point being that he is actually damaging his body more and more as he prolongs his training. Eventually, he decides to do some off planet soul searching to discover the reason he can't seem to grow stronger (hint: it's because he was crippling himself severely while being too mentally unstable to register what he was ding as self-abuse), hops in his space ship and fly out into the great inky void, and while he is traveling an asteroid threatens to destroy him and his ship.

I'd like to take a moment to remind readers that this is a cartoon, and physical feats of strength and power are pretty much a given in any character building moments; so of course, Vegeta destroys the asteroid by blowing it up with a huge energy blast. Despite the fact that he still has enough raw destructive power to turn an asteroid into hundreds of smaller misshapen asteroids, the fact that he had overtrained the day before having to do so pretty much made it one of the hardest thing's he had ever had to do. On the plus side after the ordeal was over he realized that he didn't need to rely on his pride to become stronger than Goku and he turned Super Saiyan for the first time.



He wasn't happy about it but hey; he got there.

Readers should understand that from his own account Vegeta realizes it wasn't the training that got him to the Super Saiyan form, but actually acknowledging that he wasn't the strongest and it didn't matter. He also says some stuff about having a heart of pure evil that allowed him to attain the form. So there is that...

3. As a result of over training Vegeta is actually too weak to fight Cell

The DBZ world was facing its biggest threat yet, an android from the future had come back in time to destroy the planet after mercilessly killing the Earth's strongest fighters in a tournament style fight to the death. Of course, Vegeta wants to solo the boss before Goku can take a crack at him so in this series of episodes known as the Cell Saga we see Vegeta underestimate Cell, underestimate his son Trunks, and then over train in the hyperbolic time chamber. It's important to note that Vegeta did have an opportunity to fight and kill Cell when he was less powerful, but he opted to allow Cell (again basically the Terminator but of the entire planet) to get as strong as possible first. After Cell becomes perfect; he decides to put everything off for a while so the z-fighters can be at peak physical condition in order to fight him. Since he essentially outclasses every fighter except for Goku and Gohan (Goku's nerdy son) he's really just giving them time to get their affairs in order and say goodbye to their loved ones. Vegeta, however, remains wildly optimistic about his ability to dumpster Perfect Cell and save the Earth single handedly. Of course he does, because the entire Z-fighter squadron pretty much won't stop talking about how Goku needs to be strong enough to beat Cell. Even Future Trunks, Vegeta's son from the future hence the qualifier, is depending on Goku to attain enough strength to beat Perfect Cell. After his father allows Cell to become Perfect and then get utterly destroyed by Perfect Cell Trunks fights him and realizes he is too green as a fighter to win the match.

Vegeta goes into the Hyperbolic Time Chamber, another fancy training apparatus that is used to conveniently fit in a years worth of training in one day, with the knowledge that Cell is perfectly capable of taking him apart, and also the knowledge that he still isn't sure as to where Cell's power level actually is. So, of course, Vegeta does what he feels like he has to do in order to carry the team. He goes so hard that at one point the air is on fire from the amount of excess heat he is putting off. Does this make him strong enough to beat cell single handedly? No, no it does not. Although he does reach a new transformation that he calls "Super Vegeta".

Pictured: One buff vegetable

Cell then promptly slaps him back to regular Vegeta and into the ocean.

2. Instead of training Vegeta allows himself to be overtaken by mind control in order to be stronger.

Frankly this is my favorite Vegeta. He's always been a big talker in the anime but this is the side of him that backs the talk up with sheer unadulterated evil. Some people may argue that Vegeta isn't really letting himself be taken over by the evil wizard Bobbidy (who has sister named Bibbidy and a pet demon named Buu) and that he can't help being turned into a murderous super powered puppet. I would argue that if he could break Bobbidy's spell with pride after he decides to murder a boat load of people to get Goku to fight him, then he most certainly could have done it before. He does get a sick tat for his trouble though.

Pictured: An incorrigible psychopath.

1. The time he literally had Krillin blow a hole in his stomach so he could almost die.

No, but actually though that's something he for real did. He had this adorable cueball,

blow a hole in his stomach. Then he had this adorable... green magic space alien,

Heal him. He did this in order to beat yet another bald villain named Frieza who I don't like so I won't show a picture of. Did it work? Take a wild guess.

Pictured: Vegeta getting killed by Frieza. He looks surprised because he just almost died a little earlier.