Vegetarian and Vegan Athletes

The terms "vegetarian" and "athlete" aren't often heard together. In fact, we often think of athletes as needing particularly large amounts of protein, for which meat, fish and poultry serves as the primary source for most people. However, a diet that incorporates animal sources of protein isn't necessary to being a successful athlete.

Bode Miller, world champion skier, is a vegetarian and an organic farmer. Check out his thoughts on organic farming in this video:

Vegan and authour of the Thrive Diet, Brendan Brazier, is a professional ironman triathlete and two time Canadian 50km Ultra Marathon Champion who achieves all this while living on a diet that is 100 per cent plant based.

Other famous vegetarian athletes: Hank Aaron (Baseball), Joe Namath (Football), Ruth Heidrich (Ironwoman) and Martina Navratilova (Tennis).

The key to being a vegan or vegetarian athlete is planning. Planning, planning, planning. Of course, vegetarian and vegan are two very different things. LactoOvoVegetarians eat milk products and eggs, and therefore, are generally able to get all their nutrient needs quite easily through foods.

Choosing a vegan lifestyle, which eliminates any foods that contain anythings from animal origin (essentially leaving only plants) takes more planning with your diet to begin with, but as athletes already have higher requirements for energy (Calories) and some nutrients, the combination of vegan and athlete means extra planning and care must be taken to ensure they are meeting their high needs.

Having a plant-based diet also means it can be much more difficult to get enough Calories to give athletes enough energy for long training sessions and tough races. Seeds, nuts, nut butters and vegetable oils provide plant-based sources for healthy fats and lots of Calories. Although things like nuts and legumes do contain protein, unlike animal proteins, they are only partial proteins so it's important to have a wide variety in your diet to get all the components to make complete proteins. Soy is the only exception to this rule.

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