Are Vegan running gains real or BS?

We lost another one, boys… say goodbye to your running gainz

I read that book about 10 years ago. It was not bad, I kind of liked it for what it was. A total self promotion of a failed lawyer. Now he is a successful podcaster. But Rich Roll was never the athlete he pretended to be. He has almost zero race results.

Eating healthy is good, I do that for a very long time. Like Rich Roll I believe that processed foods are not a good thing. Does healthy eating makes you faster? Probably not, is my guess but it makes you age better and maybe you are faster than your piers in later stages of life.

The one single advise I have for every young person is: Learn to cook. Learn to make basic meals on a daily basis. This will be a great life skill to have for the rest of your life. Learn to read food labels and learn about food in general.

You don't have to be vegetarian or vegan but eating more healthy is a good way to go.

Thanks. I did not intend this to be about Rich Roll. I am struck by how many endurance athletes that are vegan but say nothing about it frankly. Some seem to even hide it like it is their secret. I have no other purpose to try it other than to see if it helps my fitness, energy etc. That is good advice for young people. I skipped that advice and will have to learn it from scratch.

F30 vegan runner. I choose to eat a vegan diet, largely unprocessed, for ethical reasons. Was vegetarian for 7 years, have been vegan for 5, so the shift for me was actually really easy as it wasn’t a huge jump. In this time, I’ve had a few different relationships with meat eaters, vegos, and for the past 4 years, a vegan. It is MUCH easier to eat similar foods to the person you live with, logistically and emotionally, in my experience.

That said, eating a balanced vegan diet is as easy as you make it. I saw a dietician last year as I was feeling fatigued and had unintentionally lost weight, which was really helpful as I realised I wasn’t eating enough food — you have to be quite intentional about this as a vegan runner (although probably all runners), eating lots of fats and carbs and protein, and of course B12 supplements (the only supplement you should need to take if you are eating well and balanced).

There are some great vegan cookbooks out there that are useful in making vegan eating enjoyable — Meera Sodha and Hetty McKinnon to name a couple. Since going vegetarian and subsequently vegan, I am much more conscious of what I eat, what I need to eat (from a nutritional perspective). I don’t think I notice a huge difference in terms of fatigue/energy levels, but I love cooking and the food I eat much more than I did when I was a passive meat eater!

Agreed, but please don't forget vitamin D3 (vegan or non-vegan), you'll just not get enough from the sun during wintertime.

Yes — very true. Last winter I learned you can place mushrooms on a windowsill/in sunlight and they will generate vitamin D — which can help boost your intake.

sbs.com.au

Boost your vitamin D levels by bathing mushrooms in sunlight before eating

@SBS_Food

“The sunlight falling on a mushroom turns it into a vitamin D factory."

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I am mostly vegan (would eat regular pizza every few months, and things like that).

My energy levels improved drastically and feel like I am recovering faster after workouts, I would recommend it. Also agree with focusing on vitamin B and iron supplements.

I am 57 years old and had never entertained the vegan diet for years. I talked with a friend of mine on a podcast who is a very strict plant-based eater, and he made it sound pretty good. I tried it. That was 2 1/2 years ago and I am still eating a plant-based diet. I am running times that are as fast as I was over 10 years ago. In the last couple of years I have run 16:36 for 5K, and 27:17 for 8K. I had never run an age-graded race over 90% until I changed to a plant-based diet. Now, I have run 4 or 5. It seems to have been a game-changer for me.

Now, having said that, I dropped about 8 pounds in the process. Is it all due to weight? I don't know, but I'm not going to change at this point. I absolutely have more energy than I did with a traditional diet. I never try to push the plant-based diet on anyone, but I love to talk about it when it comes up.

If you want to know more about the podcasts that got me hooked, it is the Run for God Run Club podcast episodes 13 and 14 with John "Spider" Sillery.

Initially, it might be difficult to make the change to a vegan diet in terms of food preparation but this will be temporary. In my experience it is key to get a wide variety of different plant foods every day including fruits, vegetables, beans, grains, nuts, and seeds. You just have to have a plan when you head to the grocery store.

I would not expect major gains in running performance due to a vegan diet unless it is due to weight loss as the poster above experienced. What you might expect is faster recovery from workouts, and thereby the ability to handle more volume. This is why you might expect slight improvement due to a vegan diet. The one thing you should expect major improvement is your health. Your cholesterol level will drop, along with improvements in most every marker on a typical blood panel. As mentioned above, you might also expect aging slightly slower than your peers and improvement via slowing down less than your peers over the years.

I’ll check it out. Thx

I am 56 by the way. I would like to tackle it like a scientific experiment and control for variables. that is why I don’t want to just eat slightly better. Or just cut out meat only. I want to go all in plant based and no processed food with my current mileage and fitness and see what happens and make a log of it. Been running for 20 years so I know my abilities and inabilities pretty well.

I am 63 and started running nearly 50 years ago. Unfortunately, I had to stop 13 years ago due to a hip surgery-torn labrum- and I still limped for days/ weeks after every running attempt. Last June, I started eating Vegan and within the first few days, I could run every day. I think that could be attributed to lack of bad sugar and processed food. I kept losing weight and got faster and faster. Bu the Fall, I was either winning my age group in races up to 1/2 marathons or finishing not too far behind the big dogs. I lost over 40 pounds and feel great. My wife started at the same time and does the cooking, so it is easy for me. We started with the Rip Esselstyn Fire Engine plan.

Is kipchoge vegan? No.

That is EXACTLY what I did. The difference was dramatic. It took me about a month to really feel the difference though. I did not feel well for about two weeks, but I had committed to one month and so I stuck it out. I think many people don't feel the difference because they don't go all in and do it long enough.

You'd be suprised how "plant-based" he is, and the low amount of animal products he consumes will be lower in crap (antibiotics, pesticides, etc.) than in our food supply.

I was vegan for about 5 months and then lightened up to vegetarian for another 1.5yrs before throwing in the towel. If you can do it right there are definitely noticeable benefits.

However, for me, it made eating a chore and became really hard to get all the calories I needed on a daily basis. Obsessing over my food was just something I lacked motivation to do. Really hard to eat out and feel satisfied with your meal. Easy to get stuck in the same limited menu at home. Have to eat way more than you even think, and have to be a label reader all the dang time. As much as I wanted to make it work for moral reasons, I didn’t have the energy to put into another obsession. And anyone who says it’s easy is lying to themselves to feel better about the restrictions they’ve put on themselves.

Most vegan gains are from the body's "honeymoon" phase where nutrients are grabbed from that body that are lacking in the consumed diet. Additionally, the placebo effect. Finally, typically when someone goes vegan they are making other changes that are positive to performance. However, like most restrictive diets and being a vegan is one of the most limited in choice you will hit a nutrient wall, injuries, and other issues. Leading to a crash that is even more difficult to rebound from both physically and mentally. Also, there is some evidence that points to a long term vegan diet increases chance of mental neurosis. B-12 issues is the most commonly mentioned problem.

I started my running career as a whole-foods eating vegan. I felt great for years, but once my training started really getting intense I experienced iron deficiency and low hormone levels that crippled my progress. I ended up reintroducing eggs and fish into my diet this year and feel much stronger/healthier/faster now. Ultimately, I think eating lots of plants is beneficial, but getting in enough calories/fats/protein becomes difficult when you're training at a high level and can ONLY eat plants. Hope this helps!

I once saw an 1 hour video on nutrition from this guy. It was very good.

My main takeaway was to eat high carbs on workout days and lower carb when you dont run that much on the day. I.e. Salat

High carbs > Performance boosting. A lot of vegan diat gainz are from going high carb hence the boost. You also cut a lot of junk food that way.

He said cleary, he only recomends people going vegan/vegetarian with working with a
diatition as severe deficits / health problems are unavoidable without supplements when going vegan.

tomhollishealth.com

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I think he is a diatition in a top hospital in the UK and a 2:40 marathoner, i think he was also vegan himself.