I'm glad this is getting attention. I was vegan for a while, but couldn't handle the constant social pressures. However, I'm now mostly a home cook with basic non-processed ingredients, lots of veggies, and low fat protein -- I've taken this to the point where I make my own breads.
I find if I eat too many processed foods my chronic depression comes back. So eating simply and regular exercise is how I stay off antidepressants and perform better at every aspect of my life.
Social pressures? You put other people's opinions over your own health? Honestly man, scuse my french but tell them to fuck off. I don't care if it's your own family, your wife, do whatever you want. Hearing stuff like that makes me sick, because you're basically saying you value other people more than you and you are who is most important. It's liberating to just not care.
Social acceptance is a very powerful tool to manipulate people to say the least but yeah, I agree overall, people need to grow up in terms of their anti-veganism.
There are overt pressures and subtle social inconveniences to anyone on a non-mainstream or non-omnivore diet.
"Hey wanna come over to a BBQ at our place on Saturday?" might be awkward for a vegan to respond to, just as "Hey, wanna come over for spaghetti night?" would be for someone on a low-carb diet without any specific disrespect or disapproval from the host about the particular diet. I'm assuming you wouldn't recommend telling someone to "fuck off" for inviting you to a BBQ.
I just show up with mushrooms, vegetable skewers, salad and high quality sourdough to share. Even at company picnics and other events. Rarely is there an issue and very often people are very complementary of my food. Don't make it other people's problem and they won't make it yours.
This is the correct answer right here. The only deviation of this is cooking services. When I did a cookout 2 weeks ago, I just told the vegan that she should be aware that the grill is heavily seasoned by meat. She used the stove and no one cared.
yes, exactly - social pressure hardly ever takes such an overt form. it's easy to dismiss a friend who tells you "veganism is stupid", not as easy to ignore a constant nagging feeling that your choices are inconveniencing friends or family.
Start by being more selfish. The number of times I've had people store meat in my fridge that STINKS to high hell... or me going to steakhouses with a group of 3 people because they don't want to eat something healthy... it's just give and take. People should stop feeling bad or apologizing for how they live their life. Other people live their life, what doesn't give you the right to live yours exactly how YOU want to live it.
> overt pressures and subtle social inconveniences
That's what my original post was about. None of that stuff even matters. It's cliche to say but it's only awkward if you don't have true self-acceptance, THAT is what makes it awkward. Otherwise, its your reality against theirs, and if you bend to their reality it's basically telling your own self "that person's beliefs are more important than my own"
If someone invites me to a BBQ I would just eat beforehand and then come over and socialize, have some water or carrots/hummus (if they have it), or nothing at all. If someone asked why I'm not eating I would just say I'm vegan (if they didn't already know) and I already ate for today. Anything beyond that conversation (i.e. making sarcastic jokes) I'm used to, I'd play along with it. There are rare times where the jokes get too much in which case I 100% ignore them so they get the idea that they should chill. Looking at people in the eye as they're talking, and then slowly looking away while they're mid sentence is a really good indicator that "ok... that's enough" without having to talk about it.
For all the quarterly meetings at my old job, we would go to steak houses every single trip. The amount of times I've heard a waiter/waitress say something to the effect of "You're at a steakhouse pussy, you want a salad???" ... I dunno it just doesn't phase me. If they're a huge asshole I will be an asshole back... "Yeah did I stutter", but this is quite rare and usually only at really meat-centric places like Brazilian steakhouses etc. One memory I have was at this famous BBQ place in a basement in Memphis. He called 3 or 4 people around to have a 30 second comedy show at my expense, but I played along with it and shot remarks back, after which we all laughed and I ordered a water and a thing of potato salad.
99% of the time though, no one even cares, and people are polite.
There are a lot of events that make being vegan inconvenient. I value myself by going out and having a good time with friends. Sure I can tell my friends and family to fuck off, but that sounds miserable.
Just don’t eat at the event. I’m not vegan, but I do eat fairly healthy. When I’m traveling and can’t find something that fits healthy I just go without. If your friends continue to bring it up and give you a hard time then they are not your friends.
Well if they're REALLY your friends they shouldn't care to begin with. I'd say only 1-2% of interactions out of hundreds result in people saying anything. Not even that many people joke about it.
Social pressure is easy to write off in theory, but it can add extra friction to your life. You might be fine telling the first guy to fuck off, but after telling the hundredth person to fuck off, you might be a bit weary of telling people about your controversial life choice. Even if you don't give a fuck about others opinions, this added friction can wear you down over time - it's death by a thousand cuts.
Not to mention the self reinforcing effects of social pressure - for example, if you're a vegan and you want to go out to eat with your friends, your options may likely be limited depending on the restaurant. If your friend group is considerate, they may take vegan options into account, or you might end up going out less with your friends as a result.
I dunno I quite disagree. I get what you're saying, but I definitely don't experience it being vegetarian or vegan. In my other message I wrote in this thread, I'd say I get shit about... 1 out of 50 or 100 interactions dealing with food?
Are you sure you have the causality right? Based on my own experience, it seems possible that whatever causes you to start eating processed food also causes your depression. And that having the bandwidth to make your own food only happens when the thing that causes your depression is gone.
You're right but I also wouldn't be at all surprised if there were a feedback loop between eating junk food and feeling various kinds of bad. I usually feel my best physically eating mostly fruits and vegetables.
I had a longer post containing family history and how I believe mine to be more genetics oriented then anything else. I decided that was inappropriate. The tldr, however, is I only have one blood relative in the past 3 generations who hasn't been diagnosed with chronic depression or has substance abuse issues. Both killed all the men in the previous generation by the time they were 45.
I've gone mostly plant based starting the first of the year. I haven't touched chicken or red meat thus far and don't plan on it. Per your social pressures statement, I found that most don't notice it. The only issue arises when dining with friends or family who serve a planned meal, which usually has some form of chicken or red meat - at least in the US. I do choose to randomly eat select fish or seafood, so that generally helps in those social situations, but my consumption level is once or twice a month at one meal - mainly if it sounds good My experience so far has been overly positive. After about 60 days I stopped considering it. After 90 days red and white meats started to no longer sound appetizing.
Eating at home was a challenge, at first, to switch cooking styles and get used to new ingredients I hadn't cooked with as much. I cook quite a bit and I feel as though this was my highest point of frustration my first few weeks. I bought about a dozen plant focused cook books and cherry picked what looked good right away and have ventured into odd and more complex recipes over the months. It's been far more fun than I would have guessed as there are so many plants I knew nothing about.
Healthwise I feel much better and blood tests have shown improvement over where I was at before (and I was probably above average compared to the average American at start). I'm about 5'11, started in the mid 170s and am now in the low to mid 160s. I noticed a significant improvement in my running. I'm averaging 8 minute miles on a 3-5 mile run a few times a week. I could probably run lower but I enjoy it and don't try to push it beyond that. Last year I was running mid to upper 8s for the same distance. Nothing has really changed outside diet.
TL;DR - Went mostly plant based at the start of the year, enjoying it. Hasn't gotten in the way and have seen improvements making the change.
I looked seriously at veganism after reading a WHO report that attributes 13% of world greenhouse gas emissions to animal farming. [Strike that. The figure is 18%, and the source is a 2006 FAO study sponsored by the World Bank and the European Union, among others.] I built a database from the USDA's and whatever credible recommendations for daily micronutrition I could find, and then I built a diet around that database. All recommended micronutrients can be had from non-meat, non-dairy foods except two: it is not possible to be a healthy vegan without also taking choline and vitamin B12 supplements.
An athlete would face extra challenges. Tudor Bompa cites research showing athletes tend to be deficient in important micronutrients compared to the general population, likely because of the stresses of training. And though the position paper on sports nutrition published by the world's most important scientific journal on nutrition recommends that athletes consume up to 1.4g of protein per 1kg of body mass per day, for a vegan athlete this means consuming approximately 1kg to 2kg of beans a day, or even more if the food is less protein-dense than beans. It's hard to eat that many beans.
Sources:
Livestock's Long Shadow: Environmental issues and options, p.112, Food and Agriculture Organization, 2006
United States Department of Agriculture Food Composition Databases
Tudor S. Bompa, Periodic Training for Sports, 2015
"Nutrition and Athletic Performance", Dietitians of Canada, the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics, the American College of Sports Medicine, December 2016
The fact that the article is about athletes might lead you to think that the protein needs of people(even athletes) are highly exaggerated.
I run ultra marathon distances, am vegan, and am Type 1 diabetic. I do no special meal or protein planning beyond estimating and somewhat limiting the amount of carbs I eat.
> It has long been assumed that B12 is produced by bacteria in the large intestine (aka the colon), but since B12 is produced below the ileum (where B12 is absorbed), it is not available for absorption. This theory is reinforced by the fact that many species of totally or primarily vegetarian animals eat their feces.
Note how obtaining all of one's choline from its most concentrated plant source, roasted soy, still requires eating two and a half cups of it daily. Though I suppose that can be done, eating two coffee mugs of soybeans every day would quickly become unpalatable.
I didn't remember hearing about choline before.. I'm vegan so I looked into it.[0] "Humans make a small amount of choline in the liver. ..no reports of choline deficiency in the general population... the choline made by the body (assuming a dietary intake of zero) may be enough" There are many plant sources. So not sure why you're saying choline can't be gotten from vegan sources. That seems both untrue and misleading (It seems nobody may need to get choline from food sources)
B12 is a different matter, but as it seems a standard additive to soy milk, which I often have on breakfast cereal, I've never worried about that either.
No supplements needed. (Anecdata: I've been going strong for almost 30 years of vegan diet)
I didn't say choline cannot be gotten from vegan foods. I'm saying, rather, that I was conservative in my sources for daily recommended micronutrient amounts, and the amount of choline those sources recommended were impossible to obtain from food sources given in the USDA database, which is the international standard for the nutrient composition of foods.
As an example of such a source, see tsmoctl's first link in this same thread to a US Department of Health & Human Services article on choline. Its authorship alone would have justified choline's inclusion in my database, though I acknowledge the National Institutes of Health may not be correct in their assertion.
One can be micronutrient deficient and still be athletic or observably healthy. Nutrient deficiency is not a guarantee of disease; it merely increases the likelihood of disease. Or you may be right about choline, and the NIS may well be wrong.
EDIT: I consider food additives to be supplements, such as vitamin B12 to soy milk. If you don't, then our disagreement on the point of vegans requiring supplements is a semantic one.
All recommended micronutrients can be had from non-meat, non-dairy foods except two
I can't really detect the difference between that and choline cannot be gotten from vegan foods.
Or you may be right about choline, and the NIS may well be wrong.
Passive-aggressive snark is still snark.
You made it sound like vegans need to take 2 different vitamin supplements, on top of their diet. I'm no expert, as I made clear in my opening words. What you said just sounded wrong. And it seems it was. If you then say what you had meant to say, speaking more carefully, great. But don't act like you're just saying the same thing and I misunderstood the first time.
I made my assumptions plain before making the first statement you quote about micronutrients, and I have no problem if you disagree with those assumptions. They're arguable.
I used conservative sources for my database as a way to minimize research without losing confidence in my results. The toxicity of choline is known, and if I'm well below that level but at or above the level recommended by conservative scientific groups, I'm reasonably confident that my diet is healthy.
Do you disagree when I say that the NIS may be wrong? I was sincere. Much greater follies of academic consensus have occurred in the past than overstating the dietary importance of some micronutrient.
Meeting that recommendation requires a diet with slightly higher average calories-from-protein than potatoes: 60kg * 1.4(g/kg) / 8(g/serving) * 290(kcal/serving) = 3045 kcal, which is around the TDEE of an active person of that weight.
That page uses the same source I do, which is the USDA's databases. The USDA gives a protein mass fraction of 0.0196 for baked potatoes.[1] Since
60kg*1.4g/kg/0.0196=4386g
a 60kg powerlifter would have to eat 4.3kg of baked potato to satisfy their daily protein prescription by eating baked potato alone. That is 3986kcal of potatoes, which is 1.3 times the TDEE we assumed, but in line with the food energy requirements of a high-level athlete in training (about twice their basal metabolic rate).
Interesting that there's a discrepancy as large as 1.3x between different varieties of potatoes, but my point is it's not hard to meet that protein goal given the corresponding calorie requirements. "Slightly more protein dense than potatoes" is not a high bar and mostly boils down to not getting a large proportion of calories from refined carbohydrates and fats, or supplementing proteins to match.
> It's not hard to meet that protein goal given the corresponding calorie requirements
Just to reiterate the scope of this, it's easy to get sufficient protein from plant matter if your protein requirements are nearer the consensus daily minimum of 0.8g protein per 1kg body mass.[1]
But it is hard if 1.4g/kg is your goal, as it would be in a power-dominant sport like NFL football. I should have used the exact source of the data you linked to the first time around (mea culpa), which reports a protein mass fraction of 0.0250 [2]:
60kg*1.4g/kg/0.0250=3,360g
It is exceedingly difficult to consume 3.3kg of plant matter in a day, assuming these potatoes are representative. Beans are much easier, and even those are hard to sustain at the 1.4g/kg level.
Also consider that we're talking about the mass of a female powerlifter here. I believe most women in training would balk at more than three kilograms of plant matter every day. The 95kg, 175cm running back Emmitt Smith would have had to eat 5.3kg of plant matter every day, and he was a smaller man in the world of power athletics.
At the minimum daily protein requirement for seniors of 0.8g/kg, the numbers are more palatable:
60kg*0.8/kg/0.0250=1,920g
Assuming the protein content of potatoes is representative of plant food generally, an inactive senior citizen could get by on 1.9kg of plant matter every day.
Sources:
[1] Protein and Amino Acid Requirements in Human Nutrition, World Health Organization, p.114, 2007
Ok, I'm not sure what's going on here. That does sound like a lot of plant matter, but potatoes don't have much fiber or other low-caloric content; they're 3.7 kcal/g dry mass (going by the same Russet data point), compared with 4 kcal/g for pure starch. Is it really such a struggle to get enough calories (and protein) from something with 92% of the energy of pure carbohydrates? Do power athletes normally eat a very high fat diet to get enough calories?
In my own experience: I eat 3 meals, generally within an 8 hr window, and it's not unusual for me to cook myself a 1 lb bag of lentils as the major ingredient of any one of them. I don't weigh my prepared food, but comparing usda data for "lentils, raw" vs "lentils, boiled" I'm getting a factor of 3 mass difference for isocaloric quantities; I usually have 1.5-2 x 4 cup bowls of food per meal, which is consistent with the calorie-based estimate of their weight increase on cooking. (Sorry to mix imperial units into it, but I'm surrounded by them!) Translating to respectable units, that comes to over 4kg/day of plant matter. I'm apparently smaller than a female powerlifter and certainly get less exercise; the reason this is an equilibrium amount of food for me is I only eat every other day[1]. I don't have any trouble eating that much, though the quantity of food was daunting when I starting alternate day fasting a few years ago. So, I'm inclined to think that the answer is: what sounds like a huge amount of plants is actually a manageable amount of food once you get used to it; it is a lot of volume, but digestive tracts are adaptable and plants are mostly water.
[1]: if I have convinced you yet that I am crazy, please try not to let that cloud your judgment of my reasoning :)
After reading about your personal experience, I felt some nagging doubt. I went back to my database to see how much my food would weigh if I set the protein ratio of my diet to 1.4g/kg body mass by increasing the protein-rich bean and grain meals. The total mass of food eaten per day would come to 2840g. That would be sufficient protein for hard weightlifting, and it sounds doable.
But my experience was different. At 1.1g/kg I found it too hard to eat the amount of food my diet prescribed. I would just stop salivating.
Then maybe the underlying problem isn't the amount of food but my lame-ass cooking.
The article claims that "there's a new performance hack taking hold in the NFL — going vegan," mentioning Tom Brady as an example. Article later clarifies that "though not vegan, his personal diet is reportedly 80 percent plant-based." So the performance hack is just eating healthy food?
Which easily means that he does LCHF Paleo or an exceptionally clean Keto, maybe combined with OMAD, which is what I personally recommend for both physical and mental performance reasons.
I'm not saying it'll turn an everyman into a Tom Brady, but it could explain why Tom Brady performs so well against his peers (which is just enough of a gap to near-consistently win; and all of these people, even on the Browns, are all absolutely amazing athletes at the top of their field).
I guess I'm in the "most people" category, thanks for the pointing this out. I found someone studying this https://harvardmagazine.com/2017/07/the-rise-of-vegan-cultur... -- https://www.ninagheihman.com/ writing a book "Veganized: How Cultural Entrepreneurs Transformed a Fringe Movement" but it seems they are vegan, so presumably this book will just further the influence you mentioned. Do you know of any neutral academic studies of vegan influence in media?
It's about time I have a link to send people that make super played out vegan jokes. I love teasing and having a laugh at the expense of myself, but it's super old to see vegetarian-hating jokes equating it to being weak.
Anecdotally, after moving to a plant based diet, I feel a lot healthier and have a lot more energy.
I think that the main reason is less that meat itself is unhealthy though, but that I used to basically eat meat and carbs with little in the way of vegetables. Steak and chips isn't a very nutritionally complete meal.
Of course it's possible to eat shit food while still being a vegan. Oreos and fries are vegan.
Been plant based for over a year. I wouldn’t say I have noticeably more “explosive” energy (it’s not worse), but but my recovery after a workout is much better and I’m back to full energy quicker.
> No, Oreo have milk as cross contact and therefore they are not suitable for vegans.
That's definitely a minority view. The point is to avoid creating demand for animal products, so most vegans don't worry about cross-contamination as if it were an allergy.
Cross contamination is still vegan. By consuming something that's potentially cross contaminated in a factory, you're not increasing the demand for animal abuse.
I'm slowly shifting myself towards a vegetarian diet as well, and I've found that the days I don't eat meat I sleep much less. I wake up feeling just as refreshed as I ever did, but on less sleep. Like, < 6 hours.
I got no real problem with going meat free, and most of my diet is meatless, my partner was super keen to do this and she started making a lot of meat alternative type meals, and for the most, it's pretty good. Not as bad as I thought. Comes down to the flavors you use mostly.
however going dairy free is a whole other ball game, We've tried some alternatives, and things like banana ice cream is a pretty good ice cream alternative, but cheese alternatives are not so good.
So don't eat cheese. I find anything with small amounts of cheese in it (e.g. pesto) has to me now a very unpleasant tang, like smelly rancidness or something, that I'd much rather avoid. (Long-time vegan, huge cheese-on-toast fan as a kid) ..I've never liked meat-alternative, fake meat, TVP etc food. There's a whole world of vegetarian cuisine out there.
I would seriously advise ignoring diet advice gleaned from elite athletes. A huge part of being an elite athlete is having good genetics for whatever sport you play. And when you’re a genetic freak, you can get away with doing a lot of sub-optimal stuff.
Is it true that one can get away with doing a lot of stuff that's sub-optimal for short term performance in an extremely competitive league like the NFL? There's someone almost as freakishly good waiting to replace you.
On that note, is there any measure of how closely clustered top athletes are in different sports? Are there some in which the best are more separated from the rest than in others, so that the best in those sports can get away more sub-optimal stuff?
> Is it true that one can get away with doing a lot of stuff that's sub-optimal for short term performance in an extremely competitive league like the NFL?
You should read up on the training regimen of Usain Bolt. Fastest guy who ever lived. His training regime is basically that he doesn’t train. I can’t imagine that his dietary adherence is any better. Short of malnutrition or massive sugar consumption, there’s probably not much he could do to screw himself up. Clearly his genes want to build a very specific phenotype.
Same link also says Bolt has a freakishly long stride. I wonder if sprinting is one sport in which the very best are further from the rest relative to other sports due to sprinting involving exactly one activity? I'm not much of a sports fan but I can't recall another accounting of a great in my lifetime that didn't involve intense training.
That link refers to a 90 minute daily workout. For a point of comparison, 90 minutes per day would not be considered abnormal for a "fit" amateur (as in, the person in your office who is training for a marathon, iron man, crossfit games, etc.). It is not at all what most athletes would consider serious training.
Brady has survived for so long because he gets rid of the ball quickly and knows how to fall down without getting hurt. His diet and all the other snake oil he subscribes to has nothing to do with it.
I'm a competitive athlete (powerlifting) and I've been experimenting with a flexitarian-style diet where the vast majority of my calories are from plant-based foods but I "supplement" with sardines and eggs to fill in the deficiencies.
With vegan diets, the most commonly deficient nutrients are: protein, calcium, choline, selenium, vitamin B12, vitamin D, iron, and zinc.
2 cans of sardines can provide almost all of the vitamin D, selenium, and B12 you need in a day, and a majority of calcium and protein, with a serious dent in your choline RDA as well. Not only that, they are among the most sustainably-caught and lowest-mercury fish you can eat.
Add in 3 pasture-raised, farm-fresh eggs and you've hit your RDA for choline (via the yolks) and protein.
The rest of your nutrients can be covered with vegan foods...for the remaining common deficiencies, a few scoops of vegan pea protein to finish up your RDA for iron with that athlete boost I need of additional protein.
Sesame seeds, pumpkin seeds, lentils, garbanzo beans, cashews, and quinoa are all excellent sources of protein and zinc.
68 comments
[ 2.5 ms ] story [ 122 ms ] threadI find if I eat too many processed foods my chronic depression comes back. So eating simply and regular exercise is how I stay off antidepressants and perform better at every aspect of my life.
"Hey wanna come over to a BBQ at our place on Saturday?" might be awkward for a vegan to respond to, just as "Hey, wanna come over for spaghetti night?" would be for someone on a low-carb diet without any specific disrespect or disapproval from the host about the particular diet. I'm assuming you wouldn't recommend telling someone to "fuck off" for inviting you to a BBQ.
That's what my original post was about. None of that stuff even matters. It's cliche to say but it's only awkward if you don't have true self-acceptance, THAT is what makes it awkward. Otherwise, its your reality against theirs, and if you bend to their reality it's basically telling your own self "that person's beliefs are more important than my own"
If someone invites me to a BBQ I would just eat beforehand and then come over and socialize, have some water or carrots/hummus (if they have it), or nothing at all. If someone asked why I'm not eating I would just say I'm vegan (if they didn't already know) and I already ate for today. Anything beyond that conversation (i.e. making sarcastic jokes) I'm used to, I'd play along with it. There are rare times where the jokes get too much in which case I 100% ignore them so they get the idea that they should chill. Looking at people in the eye as they're talking, and then slowly looking away while they're mid sentence is a really good indicator that "ok... that's enough" without having to talk about it.
For all the quarterly meetings at my old job, we would go to steak houses every single trip. The amount of times I've heard a waiter/waitress say something to the effect of "You're at a steakhouse pussy, you want a salad???" ... I dunno it just doesn't phase me. If they're a huge asshole I will be an asshole back... "Yeah did I stutter", but this is quite rare and usually only at really meat-centric places like Brazilian steakhouses etc. One memory I have was at this famous BBQ place in a basement in Memphis. He called 3 or 4 people around to have a 30 second comedy show at my expense, but I played along with it and shot remarks back, after which we all laughed and I ordered a water and a thing of potato salad.
99% of the time though, no one even cares, and people are polite.
Not to mention the self reinforcing effects of social pressure - for example, if you're a vegan and you want to go out to eat with your friends, your options may likely be limited depending on the restaurant. If your friend group is considerate, they may take vegan options into account, or you might end up going out less with your friends as a result.
Eating at home was a challenge, at first, to switch cooking styles and get used to new ingredients I hadn't cooked with as much. I cook quite a bit and I feel as though this was my highest point of frustration my first few weeks. I bought about a dozen plant focused cook books and cherry picked what looked good right away and have ventured into odd and more complex recipes over the months. It's been far more fun than I would have guessed as there are so many plants I knew nothing about.
Healthwise I feel much better and blood tests have shown improvement over where I was at before (and I was probably above average compared to the average American at start). I'm about 5'11, started in the mid 170s and am now in the low to mid 160s. I noticed a significant improvement in my running. I'm averaging 8 minute miles on a 3-5 mile run a few times a week. I could probably run lower but I enjoy it and don't try to push it beyond that. Last year I was running mid to upper 8s for the same distance. Nothing has really changed outside diet.
TL;DR - Went mostly plant based at the start of the year, enjoying it. Hasn't gotten in the way and have seen improvements making the change.
An athlete would face extra challenges. Tudor Bompa cites research showing athletes tend to be deficient in important micronutrients compared to the general population, likely because of the stresses of training. And though the position paper on sports nutrition published by the world's most important scientific journal on nutrition recommends that athletes consume up to 1.4g of protein per 1kg of body mass per day, for a vegan athlete this means consuming approximately 1kg to 2kg of beans a day, or even more if the food is less protein-dense than beans. It's hard to eat that many beans.
Sources:
Livestock's Long Shadow: Environmental issues and options, p.112, Food and Agriculture Organization, 2006
United States Department of Agriculture Food Composition Databases
Tudor S. Bompa, Periodic Training for Sports, 2015
"Nutrition and Athletic Performance", Dietitians of Canada, the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics, the American College of Sports Medicine, December 2016
I run ultra marathon distances, am vegan, and am Type 1 diabetic. I do no special meal or protein planning beyond estimating and somewhat limiting the amount of carbs I eat.
From https://ods.od.nih.gov/factsheets/Choline-HealthProfessional...
And in regards to B12,
> It has long been assumed that B12 is produced by bacteria in the large intestine (aka the colon), but since B12 is produced below the ileum (where B12 is absorbed), it is not available for absorption. This theory is reinforced by the fact that many species of totally or primarily vegetarian animals eat their feces.
https://veganhealth.org/intestinal-bacteria-as-b12-source/
I don't blame you for taking a supplement instead.
Note how obtaining all of one's choline from its most concentrated plant source, roasted soy, still requires eating two and a half cups of it daily. Though I suppose that can be done, eating two coffee mugs of soybeans every day would quickly become unpalatable.
As for the second link? Oof.
B12 is a different matter, but as it seems a standard additive to soy milk, which I often have on breakfast cereal, I've never worried about that either.
No supplements needed. (Anecdata: I've been going strong for almost 30 years of vegan diet)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Choline#Dietary_sources_of_cho...
I thought old “Element 17” was made by fusion in stars.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stellar_nucleosynthesis
<Oops: choline not chlorine!>
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Choline
As an example of such a source, see tsmoctl's first link in this same thread to a US Department of Health & Human Services article on choline. Its authorship alone would have justified choline's inclusion in my database, though I acknowledge the National Institutes of Health may not be correct in their assertion.
One can be micronutrient deficient and still be athletic or observably healthy. Nutrient deficiency is not a guarantee of disease; it merely increases the likelihood of disease. Or you may be right about choline, and the NIS may well be wrong.
EDIT: I consider food additives to be supplements, such as vitamin B12 to soy milk. If you don't, then our disagreement on the point of vegans requiring supplements is a semantic one.
I can't really detect the difference between that and choline cannot be gotten from vegan foods.
Or you may be right about choline, and the NIS may well be wrong.
Passive-aggressive snark is still snark.
You made it sound like vegans need to take 2 different vitamin supplements, on top of their diet. I'm no expert, as I made clear in my opening words. What you said just sounded wrong. And it seems it was. If you then say what you had meant to say, speaking more carefully, great. But don't act like you're just saying the same thing and I misunderstood the first time.
I used conservative sources for my database as a way to minimize research without losing confidence in my results. The toxicity of choline is known, and if I'm well below that level but at or above the level recommended by conservative scientific groups, I'm reasonably confident that my diet is healthy.
Do you disagree when I say that the NIS may be wrong? I was sincere. Much greater follies of academic consensus have occurred in the past than overstating the dietary importance of some micronutrient.
Meeting that recommendation requires a diet with slightly higher average calories-from-protein than potatoes: 60kg * 1.4(g/kg) / 8(g/serving) * 290(kcal/serving) = 3045 kcal, which is around the TDEE of an active person of that weight.
[ nutrition info from here: https://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/vegetables-and-vegetabl... ]
[1] https://ndb.nal.usda.gov/ndb/foods/show/11829?fgcd=&manu=&fo...
Just to reiterate the scope of this, it's easy to get sufficient protein from plant matter if your protein requirements are nearer the consensus daily minimum of 0.8g protein per 1kg body mass.[1]
But it is hard if 1.4g/kg is your goal, as it would be in a power-dominant sport like NFL football. I should have used the exact source of the data you linked to the first time around (mea culpa), which reports a protein mass fraction of 0.0250 [2]:
It is exceedingly difficult to consume 3.3kg of plant matter in a day, assuming these potatoes are representative. Beans are much easier, and even those are hard to sustain at the 1.4g/kg level.Also consider that we're talking about the mass of a female powerlifter here. I believe most women in training would balk at more than three kilograms of plant matter every day. The 95kg, 175cm running back Emmitt Smith would have had to eat 5.3kg of plant matter every day, and he was a smaller man in the world of power athletics.
At the minimum daily protein requirement for seniors of 0.8g/kg, the numbers are more palatable:
Assuming the protein content of potatoes is representative of plant food generally, an inactive senior citizen could get by on 1.9kg of plant matter every day.Sources:
[1] Protein and Amino Acid Requirements in Human Nutrition, World Health Organization, p.114, 2007
[2] https://ndb.nal.usda.gov/ndb/foods/show/11674?fgcd=&manu=&fo...
In my own experience: I eat 3 meals, generally within an 8 hr window, and it's not unusual for me to cook myself a 1 lb bag of lentils as the major ingredient of any one of them. I don't weigh my prepared food, but comparing usda data for "lentils, raw" vs "lentils, boiled" I'm getting a factor of 3 mass difference for isocaloric quantities; I usually have 1.5-2 x 4 cup bowls of food per meal, which is consistent with the calorie-based estimate of their weight increase on cooking. (Sorry to mix imperial units into it, but I'm surrounded by them!) Translating to respectable units, that comes to over 4kg/day of plant matter. I'm apparently smaller than a female powerlifter and certainly get less exercise; the reason this is an equilibrium amount of food for me is I only eat every other day[1]. I don't have any trouble eating that much, though the quantity of food was daunting when I starting alternate day fasting a few years ago. So, I'm inclined to think that the answer is: what sounds like a huge amount of plants is actually a manageable amount of food once you get used to it; it is a lot of volume, but digestive tracts are adaptable and plants are mostly water.
[1]: if I have convinced you yet that I am crazy, please try not to let that cloud your judgment of my reasoning :)
But my experience was different. At 1.1g/kg I found it too hard to eat the amount of food my diet prescribed. I would just stop salivating.
Then maybe the underlying problem isn't the amount of food but my lame-ass cooking.
edit: I double checked, and it is clearly linked. I was in reader mode before and didn’t notice the link.
I'm not saying it'll turn an everyman into a Tom Brady, but it could explain why Tom Brady performs so well against his peers (which is just enough of a gap to near-consistently win; and all of these people, even on the Browns, are all absolutely amazing athletes at the top of their field).
It sounds more to me like the DASH diet, or Mediterranean.
Sure, but what the hell is going on with the Bills?
They're often willing to mislead.
A non-activist writer would have given us answers to some obvious questions like "What exactly does a 300lb vegan eat in a typical week?"
Instead it moves into naked activism.
(My wife is a registered dietitian with a PhD in nutrition, so obviously we tend toward veganism.)
I think that the main reason is less that meat itself is unhealthy though, but that I used to basically eat meat and carbs with little in the way of vegetables. Steak and chips isn't a very nutritionally complete meal.
Of course it's possible to eat shit food while still being a vegan. Oreos and fries are vegan.
That's definitely a minority view. The point is to avoid creating demand for animal products, so most vegans don't worry about cross-contamination as if it were an allergy.
however going dairy free is a whole other ball game, We've tried some alternatives, and things like banana ice cream is a pretty good ice cream alternative, but cheese alternatives are not so good.
The core reason that many ethical vegans are vegans is that they decide not to put their taste preferences over an animal.
On that note, is there any measure of how closely clustered top athletes are in different sports? Are there some in which the best are more separated from the rest than in others, so that the best in those sports can get away more sub-optimal stuff?
You should read up on the training regimen of Usain Bolt. Fastest guy who ever lived. His training regime is basically that he doesn’t train. I can’t imagine that his dietary adherence is any better. Short of malnutrition or massive sugar consumption, there’s probably not much he could do to screw himself up. Clearly his genes want to build a very specific phenotype.
Same link also says Bolt has a freakishly long stride. I wonder if sprinting is one sport in which the very best are further from the rest relative to other sports due to sprinting involving exactly one activity? I'm not much of a sports fan but I can't recall another accounting of a great in my lifetime that didn't involve intense training.
With vegan diets, the most commonly deficient nutrients are: protein, calcium, choline, selenium, vitamin B12, vitamin D, iron, and zinc.
2 cans of sardines can provide almost all of the vitamin D, selenium, and B12 you need in a day, and a majority of calcium and protein, with a serious dent in your choline RDA as well. Not only that, they are among the most sustainably-caught and lowest-mercury fish you can eat.
Add in 3 pasture-raised, farm-fresh eggs and you've hit your RDA for choline (via the yolks) and protein.
The rest of your nutrients can be covered with vegan foods...for the remaining common deficiencies, a few scoops of vegan pea protein to finish up your RDA for iron with that athlete boost I need of additional protein.
Sesame seeds, pumpkin seeds, lentils, garbanzo beans, cashews, and quinoa are all excellent sources of protein and zinc.