What I learned as a Vegan Athlete

Veganism is taught to be a diet of “takeaways”. This belief serves a great injustice to plant based diets that posses life changing health benefits. These benefits not only meet the needs of athletes, but everyone. There are many examples of successful vegans in a wide range of different walks of life that go to show anyone can switch over to a more compassionate, environmentally friendly diet. There may be truth to the problems that are preached, but the solutions are simple and only takes time and education to overcome the obstacles of not eating animal derived foods.

The macronutrient percentage requirements given by the ADMR are 45%-65% for carbohydrates, 20%-35% for fats, and 10%-35% for protein (Zello 75). These percentages were given so they would be limited between avoiding the effects of having too much or too little of each macro. With this, it also allows freedom to fit anyone’s special dietary requirements.

This simple example highlights a pitfall for athlete who, although they may be seeking a lean physique, adopt a diet that is simply not going to allow them to perform over the long-run owing to incomplete muscle glycogen restoration. At this point, the performance-orientated utility of consuming higher protein intakes would be lost, at least for some athletes.

Vitamin B-12 is a lesser talked about vitamin, and a bacteria that is detrimental to one’s health. Historically, people received this vital vitamin through farming, but we cannot intake it through vegetables from the supermarket anymore because the produce is thoroughly cleaned leaving no B12 left on it. The way non-vegans intake this vitamin is through meat or dairy, and the meat has B-12 because of what the animal eats, but if people eat poor meat quality (such as beef that is not grass-fed), they are at risk of not receiving enough of the vitamin. Besides this, there are only a few other vitamins and minerals vegans have to worry about, and not nearly as much as B-12.Vegans excel at meeting most of essential vitamins and minerals because the intake of food tends to be an assortment of produce.

Phytochemicals are what gives vegetables and fruits their texture, taste, and smell. There are thousands of different types of phytochemicals that are separated into several large groups in various produce, one of these groups are flavonoids. A certain type of flavonoid that has shown great health benefits is quercetin:

Quercetin has been ascribed as health promoting and disease-preventing dietary supplement as it exert multiple pharmacological effects on mammalian cells and tissues. Many claims on the beneficial health effects of quercetin have been stated, including protection against various forms of cancer, cardiovascular diseases, and neurodegenerative diseases. Quercetin has also been attributed with anti-inflammatory, antibacterial, and muscle-relaxing activities besides being found to possess antiviral activity as well.

Becoming vegan for a majority of people is a huge lifestyle change, especially when only a minority grows up on a plant based diet. To successfully become a vegan; one has to actively want to become vegan, know why you are making this change, and be informed. There are an array of reasons people begin the path to veganism, whether it be for health or social issues, if not both. As stated earlier, there are many nutrients that need to be supplemented or planned around to prevent any deficiencies such as Vitamin B12 and calcium. It may not seem like it, but knowing why you are choosing veganism is important because for many, this is an outlandish choice that is not heavily supported. Becoming a lifelong vegan may not be in your interest, but taking aspects of the lifestyle should be in every single person’s agenda, especially athletes. Partaking in meatless Monday or increasing calories from produce can make the difference in your life. Being vegan may not be for everyone, but everyone can benefit on moving towards a more plant based diet.

Related posts:

I have been a fan of the alté sound for at least 2 years. My definition of alté is simply alternative music, different from the generic afro-beat/dancehall music in Nigeria. The alté music leaders…

1- The first thing we will do is declare a RelayCommand property that receives as parameter the IClosable interface. 2- We create the “CloseWindow” method that also receives as parameter the…

No fandom is a homogenous, monolithic, passive unit. Fanfiction arms fans with a role that is more than reactive, a voice to tell their own stories.