mooska

I used to be vegetarian for a little over 4 years. I'm thinking about going back to improve my health and avoid all the health problems that come with it.

If there are any vegetarian cyclist on the forum, how does your diet work around cycling? My main concern is getting protein after rides and keeping the same muscle growth I have going on right now, especially since I'm still new to cycling and my leg muscles are hardly done growing.

Andy Somnifac 

Yes.

I don't even think of my diet at this point. Just eat a balanced diet, get your protein from things like legumes and/or soy, lay off the junk food. Junk/crap food is an easy trap to fall into, especially when you exclude meat.

Seattle Forrest

Eleven pages of them: https://www.bikeforums.net/showthread...ght=vegetarian

Get some protein drinks, or powder to mix with a yogurt, or whatever. It's not a big deal. Most people in the US get more protein than they need, anyway.

VA_Esquire

go over to weight weenies. They have a few raw vegan riders (a lot more strict than vegetarian)

HMF

Yep. I couldn't do vegan though.

mihlbach

You don't have to be a vegetarian or a vegan to be healthy. In fact, its easier to have a healthy balanced diet by not imposing dietary restrictions on yourself (as your worries about protein plainly indicate). Eat a good mix of everything and pay attention to where your food comes from and don't eat cheap factory farmed low-grad ultra-processed ****...plant or animal. Eating healthy animal protein (e.g. wild salmon, turkey, grass-fed beef etc.) will actually help you avoid the common vegetarian/vegan trap of eating too much junkfood crap.

mooska

I know to an extent, you can be healthy eating meat the right way, but it seems that when people take meat, dairy, and processed foods out of the equation, they are completely eliminating the potential for cancer, heart disease, MS, diabetes, as well as a number of other illnesses that are largely found in the Westerners diet. I don't want to act like I'm an authority on any of this. I watched Forks Over Knives recently and it's really affected my thinking about what foods I'm putting into my system.

BrainInAJar

represent.

I don't really give it that much thought. I ran a journal for a while and between my cottage cheese for breakfast ( the real 4% stuff, none of this low-fat crap ) and the chocolate milk I get more than enough protein to build muscle.

johnny99

Dave Zabriskie, former US national champion, raced this year's Tour de France on a vegetarian diet.
https://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000...184873028.html

mihlbach

WOW! No! Being vegan doesn't make you immune to any of these things, in fact it may make you more vulnerable to sedentary diseases, depending on how well you manage your vegan diet. Cereal grains are just as responsible, if not more responsible for western diseases than eating factory-farmed meat. In fact, its the grains force fed to farmed animals that makes the animal fats unhealthy.

No food eaten in moderation is likely to kill you, but relying too much on some foods leads to malnutrition and can possibly kill you. The most robust and sustainable dietary approach is to eat a diversity of foods, don't overindulge, and avoid junk and over-processed foods when possible (although occasional indulgence if fine if it helps you keep your sanity)

You can, of course, be healthy on a vegan or vegetation diet, so go ahead if you feel inclined, but its harder and less pleasant than just eating healthy without imposing severe dietary restrictions on yourself.

Nachoman

I think I'm called a pescatarian. Vegetarian. But I eat fish.

Wesley36

Sounds like you might want to check out Brendan Brazier and the Thrive Diet.

mooska

Thank you. Look's like exactly what I need.

AdelaaR

What health problems are you talking about here? Lack of B12?
I know of quite a lot of people having health problems because they eat too much greasy meat but I yet have to encounter the first vegetarian being unhealthy ... not counting the ones that eat generally unhealthy apart from not eating meat, obviously.

Maarten Tjallingii is a vegetarian Tour de France cyclist ... if he can do it ... you can too

andrewluke

98% of the time yeah. I still eat meat (actually, mostly just fish) when I'm out with others and there are no real options but otherwise, my kitchen is meat-free. I did it as a means to force myself to eat healthier and it's definitely worked.

To be honest though, vegetarian != healthy automatically. It takes work to get the proper protein if training hard. I personally do things like mix whey isolate into oatmeal and yogurt and eat a lot of soy products. You don't have to balance protein at each meal but getting a mix throughout the day is important. You also have a lot of junk food that's still considered vegetarian and that is what gets you into trouble, not necessarily just meat for the sake of meat.

mooska

I quit being vegetarian a year ago. I want to go back to be vegetarian to improve my health.

mihlbach

Or is it the loads of bread, chips, french fries and corn syrup laced products that they eat along with it?

AdelaaR

Don't be like my sister though, as in hardly eating any vegetables or healthy things at all and then suddenly deciding to be a vegetarian just for the heck of it.
That's not healthy at all.

Personally I'm like andrewluke in that I do not use meat in my kitchen but will eat it from time to time when I eat at other people's houses and they happen to have meat on the menu.
My wife has been a vegetarian all her life and cooks wonderfully with hundreds of ingredients and she has always been healthy.
We eat many different varieties of rice, beans, pastas, potatoes, wheats and we get our vegetables from an organic farm not far from here. We eat maybe 25 or more different vegetables every month. The trick is to eat healthy things and in great variety.

AdelaaR

I don't think so.
I myself eat quite a bit of bread, chips and greasy things like mayonaise and the likes.
In general I eat very fat, although I'm 95% vegetarian.
Most of those fats come from plants and are a lot more healthy for you than animal fats.
I train quite a bit lately and have been losing weight and getting stronger without changing my diet at all.

datlas 

Yes. Lots of us. It works well with cycling but it's certainly not mandatory.

I have been ovo-lacto since age 20 and am now 46.

Just make sure you eat a wide variety of foods, including ideally fresh fruits, vegetables, grains, legumes, and nuts.

teetopkram

This is about the only vegan protein power I can tolerate taste-wise on its own. Has 4-5 different types of vegetable protein. Drink it on its own, mix it in cereal, smoothies, and oatmeal.

https://www.progressivenutritional.co...otein-overview

Andy Somnifac 

That is 100% false. Eating healthy, regardless of it being vegetarian, vegan, or carnivore all require thought and consideration. Cutting meat out of your diet does not automatically make it less pleasing. I enjoy my vegetarian diet of the last 13 years perfectly well, thank you very much.

Tio

There's some debate in the organic chemistry world relative to these "facts", one side of which would dispute the causative inferences you espouse here. Brilliant people on both sides of the argument (e.g., paleo vs. macrobiotic) and enough science coming from either camp to make such debates almost arbitrary and more contingent who the orator (sophist) is rather than what science they cite.

OP, a diverse vegetarian, vegan, omnivore, etc. diet has been shown to be effective and sustainable in a lot of different people, endurance athletes included.

Very true. Nutritionist colleagues I know will tell you that those individuals who would have been a casual eater in one type of diet would have been equally as causal in another diet. Eating healthy is about what you actually include in your meals, not what you restrict.

mihlbach

[QUOTE=Andy Somnifac;13075575]That is 100% false. Eating healthy, regardless of it being vegetarian, vegan, or carnivore all require thought and consideration. [QUOTE]

duh.

mihlbach

That statement is just not true in a generic sense. There are good and bad fats in both kingdoms, and how those fats are grown (raised) and processed is relevant to the issue of health. You have to watch what you eat and where your food comes from on both sides. However, there is a common misunderstanding about plants being better for you than meat, which is just not always true. And just because someone is unhealthy, doesn't mean its because they eat too many greasy hamburgers. People who eat like that tend to have unhealthy lifestyles all around and eat just as much plant-based junk food as they would meat junk food and both have detrimental health effects.

To argue that a box of macdonalds fries, or a disgusting slab of white bread with mayo, is better for you than a lean venison loin, or a fillet of salmon, or a turkey breast with your salad, as you seem to be suggesting, is patently absurd.