Playbook Plates

By: Aidan DeMuro

Growing up in high-school, both of my parents entered an obsession with vegan foods and eating plant-based. Mostly to my personal dismay as a food lover and avid home cook. All of my meals around the home were changed to plant-based and vegan fare, which I eventually caught on to appreciate and love.

Looking into the diet, and hearing from my whole family who was vegan besides myself, I began to learn about the efficacy of the diet for many athletes as it has been to proven to help with muscle recovery, reduce inflammation, and increase endurance. As a sports fan, I then began to see athletes like Chris Paul, Venus Williams and Nate Diaz endorse this lifestyle, So I began to get curious. In this blog, we’re gonna discuss the plant-based lifestyle, and the athletes that swear by it.

Often, we hear shade in sports upon athletes who adopt this diet. Many accuse the plant-based diet of having not enough protein to adapt to the scaling strength of athletes. However, according to the International Vegan Association combinations of protein rich sources like legumes, tempeh & tofu can easily help people get up to 70 g of protein a day, much above the average. All the while providing high levels of antioxidants which help improve athlete performance.

We see athletes endorsing and promoting vegan brands everywhere now. Meatless substitute brand Quorn; had its showcase being endorsement by olympic runner Mo Farah and swimmer Adam Peaty. This push to normalization for the diet is big in the sports food space which was always dominated by a indulgent, carnivore lifestyle.

John Salley is a former NBA player and a vegan activist and investor. Salley had his hands on the earliest players in the vegan food market like Beyond Meat and Violife, understanding the value of the plant-based lifestyle in the future sports market. “I think the smart athlete realizes his body is the commodity…You’re not gonna let someone put regular gas in a high octane race car.” Salley said. This unwavering fear to push not just vegan products to athletes but to back companies to put it in the hands of normal people shows the dedication to the diet and lifestyle.

And many athletes agree, not just for diet and performance reasons, but on the basis of environmental and ethical ones as well. Adopting to an all plant-based lifestyle would help ease climate change, help feed more people around the world, as well as root out industries who engage in cruel animal practice. For many of these athletes, they say it’s a no brainer.

Cameron DeMuro, a vegan for seven plus years and and a personal trainer, swears by the lifestyle. “It’s the best decision I made. For personal reasons the diet has increased my health so much, and I have never felt more active than before.”

Learning about this lifestyle showed me how much diets vary in the wide world of sports, and the overall oush towards healthy sources.

Catch you next time on Playbook Plates.