After burger phase, I adopted for pretty much the complete opposite – Vegan Phase. This project has changed from last year, where I only ate “bad” foods, to now focus on different popular diets and whether there is any material difference in how they affect my training, general well being, and weight loss (if any).

It also helps me to be more empathetic with athletes that I coach who are following a particular diet. That was a big reason for choosing vegan, since I’ve never really excluded meat, eggs and dairy from my diet before, and I was interested in how it would affect me. I was still sticking to the calorie counting of 2000 calories per day, just to provide some consistency across the various diets. 

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Over the 2 weeks of vegan, sticking to the same calories as the burger phase I did not lose any weight, and this is what I noticed:

• training was fine, no problems at all
• recovery was good too
• I never felt hungry, which is also probably why I did not lose weight
• I was surprised at how much carbohydrate I consumed daily
• on some days, the sheer bulk of food actually made 2000 calories quite hard to eat (unless I included nuts, then the calories would add up FAST)
• I found it very difficult to eat enough protein without supplementation

Ok so let’s focus on the last 2 points (calories and protein). Most people will be surprised when they see I did not lose any weight during the vegan phase. Most people report weight loss within the first 10 days of eating vegan. I believe the biggest reason for this is that they are not counting calories. If I had not been counting calories, I’d have been able to get away with about 1500 calories per day without feeling hungry. I’ve come to the conclusion that hunger is one of the best indicators of weight loss. If you’re not hungry, you’re probably not losing weight. If you want to lose weight, you should become comfortable with the idea of being hungry. The only times I’ve been somewhat satisfied and still lost weight was when eating a high protein diet.

Talking of protein, I did find it really difficult to get in my goal of 0.7g per pound of body weight. I base the 0.7g on various research studies I’ve read over the years. It’s a hotly debated subject, and I’m not saying I have the answer, but it’s less than bodybuilders suggest, and it’s more than the “anti-protein people” whoever they are, suggest. From practical experience, that seems to be the right number for me if I want to maintain muscle mass during periods of high activity.

I ate a lot of lentils, quinoa, and other plant-based sources of protein, but I’d struggle to get in over 80g protein per day. Sure I could buy supplements to get it easily, but I wanted to avoid supplements during this phase. Even at that level of 80g per day, I felt a lot of discomfort in the gut when eating that high a volume of lentils and quinoa. My recommendation for vegans would be to either supplement, or to become ok with eating eggs. Most vegans are vegans due to ethical reasons, but in my view there are good options for humanely raised chickens. Personally I am ok with eating eggs, so no problem there. But I am also ok with eating meat, which is why the next phase I basically took my vegan diet and added dairy, eggs and fish back into it, thereby pretty much adopting the Mediterranean diet. 

In my view, the med diet is the best one for me as an athlete. It’s largely based around vegetables, I feel very good all of the time, I recover well, and it’s easy for me to get enough protein without supplementation (although I have no issues with protein supplements and regularly take them for convenience reasons). Plus it is expected that one drinks red wine every night (in my interpretation anyway). Also, in my view there is no reason to avoid grains (such as in the paleo diet) or gluten (unless you have celiac disease). Since I am free from these afflictions, it works really well for me. Having  said that, if you wish to be vegan I think it works really well, as long as you also supplement. If you want a great source of protein, take a look at these good supplements from Arbonne.

So overall this has been an interesting phase of the experiment. I’ve made some great tasting dishes and felt very good health wise. It’s not quite as fun as eating burgers or ice cream, but it is more enjoyable in the sense that I did enjoy eating good wholesome food for all my meals.