Vegetarian Diets: Perfect Prescription for Athletes

admin — Wed, 25 Jun 2008 12:52:21 +0000

by Susan M. Kleiner, PhD, RD, FACN, CNS, FISSN

You’ve decided to make the switch to some style of a vegetarian diet. Will your exercise performance suffer? What about your energy levels? Can you still develop body-firming muscle even though you’re not eating animal protein?

Put your fears aside. Vegetarian diets are typically rich in carbohydrates, with plenty of protein and high performance fats. That’s the perfect prescription for exercisers and athletes. With 60 percent of your diet coming from carb-packed grains, beans, fruits and vegetables, there’s no way your performance will drop off. And you can certainly get enough protein to pack on plenty of muscle. But you do have to plan your diet well.

And just for clarity-sake, although research has taught us that eating too much of animal-based foods may result in the development of chronic diseases like heart disease and cancer, the problem is not that eating any amount of these foods is bad for you. But if you make animal foods the center of your diet, you just don’t have enough room left to eat all the fabulous plant foods like grains, beans, nuts, seeds, fruits and vegetables necessary to ward off disease.

During the past decade millions of Americans have switched to a vegetarian style of eating. Their vegetarian diets fall within a large range of eating styles. So now you have a decision to make: what type of vegetarian do you want to be?

Pesco-vegetarians eat dairy foods, eggs and fish, but no other animal flesh.

Lacto-ovo-vegetarians eat dairy foods and eggs, but exclude animal flesh.

Ovo-vegetarians eat eggs but no dairy foods or animal flesh.

Vegans eat no animal foods of any typeAny of these styles will offer you the opportunity to expand the amount of plant foods in your diet and still meet your own desires for food, taste and performance.

ENSURING THE PROPER NUTRIENTS

Changing from a meat-centered to a plant-centered diet is not as simple as just eliminating the meat. The trick is to make sure you’re not skimping on any nutrients as you cut out certain foods. Vegans run the greatest risk of deficiencies because several vital nutrients including protein, vitamins B12 and D, iron, zinc, and calcium, are found in highest qualities or most significant amounts primarily in meat, eggs and dairy products.

SPECIAL FOCUS ON PROTEIN AND CARBOHYDRATE

Even women need to eat enough protein. The guys have this part down, but women have not focused on protein needs. When you are training your protein requirement is just the same as his, so join in on the protein fun. Protein is required not only for the maintenance, replacement, and growth of body tissues, but it is used to make the hormones that regulate your metabolism, maintain the body’s water balance, protect against disease, transport nutrients in and out of cells, carry oxygen and regulate blood clotting. If you don’t eat enough high quality protein during training you just won’t achieve your sculpting goals. And when you are not eating any animal sources of protein, you need to eat about 10 percent more protein to cover the variation in the quality of protein from only plant sources (see sidebar).

When it comes to carbohydrates, don’t be misled by fads. The research is clear: if you want to train hard and long, you need plenty of carbohydrate to achieve your goals. Eating a vegetarian-style diet will make this easy. Plant-based foods are great sources of all the different carbohydrates and fibers that will keep you healthy and fuel intense workouts.

PLANNING YOUR DIET

To get enough calories and nutrients, vegetarians should eat at least 1,800 calories a day. The following list gives you minimum servings for each day, with a suggestion of where to add more to increase calories.

Almost-vegetarians, pesco-vegetarians, and lacto-ovo vegetarians:

6-11 servings of bread, cereal, rice, and pasta

3-5 servings of vegetables

2-4 servings of fruit

2-3 servings of milk, yogurt, and cheese

3-4 servings of poultry, fish, dried beans, eggs, and nuts

3-5 servings of nuts, seeds and other high performance fats

Lacto-vegetarians:

8-11 servings of bread, cereal, rice, and pasta

3-5 servings of vegetables

3-4 servings of fruit

2-3 servings of milk and yogurt

1-2 servings of low-fat cheese

4-6 servings of dried beans and peas

3-5 servings of nuts, seeds and other high performance fats

supplement or use products fortified with iron and zinc

Vegans:

8-11 servings of bread, cereal, rice, and pasta

4-6 servings of vegetables

3-4 servings of fruit

6-8 servings of dried beans and peas

3-5 servings of nuts, seeds and other high performance fats

supplement or use products fortified with vitamins B12 and D, iron, zinc, and calcium

Serving size guidelines:

Food Group	Serving size
Whole grain bread, cereals, and grains	1 slice bread; 1/2 cup cooked cereal, rice, or pasta; 1 ounce ready-to-eat cereal; 1/2 bun, bagel, or English muffin; 1 small roll, biscuit, or muffin; 3 to 4 small or large crackers
Vegetables	1/2 cup cooked or chopped raw vegetables; 1 cup raw, leafy vegetables, 1/2 cup cooked legumes; 3/4 cup vegetable juice
Fruit	1 medium piece of raw fruit, 1/2 grapefruit, 1 melon wedge, 1/2 cup berries, 1/2 cup diced, cooked or canned fruit, 1/4 cup dried fruit, 3/4 cup of fruit juice
Milk	1 cup nonfat or lowfat milk or yogurt, or kefir
Meat, poultry, fish, eggs, cheese, beans	1 oz. cooked lean meat, poultry, or fish, 1 egg, 1/2 ounce cheese, 1/2 cup of cottage cheese 1/2 cup cooked cooked dried beans
High Performance Fats	1 tsp extra virgin olive oil, canola oil, sesame oil, peanut oil or other nut oil; 1/4 of a small avocado; 8 large olives; 1 Tbsp seeds; 6-8 nuts; 1 Tbsp natural peanut butter

A GOLD MEDAL LIFETIME

You are now on the road to improving your performance, and your life. Many successful athletes have chosen a vegetarian lifestyle. Not only could they perform at peak levels during their athletic careers, but they have maintained good health and longevity throughout the rest of their lives.

SIDEBAR

DETERMINING PROTEIN QUALITY

The quality of protein is generally classified in one of two ways. The traditional method, called the Protein Efficiency Ratio (PER), determines the weight gain of growing rats fed a particular protein in comparison to a standard protein (egg whites). The higher the PER value the better the protein. The more contemporary method compares the amino acid profile of a protein to the essential amino acid requirements in humans established by The Food and Agriculture Organization. This method, known as the protein digestibility corrected amino acid score (PDCAAS), is recognized internationally as the best method of comparing proteins for humans. A protein with a PDCAAS of 1.0 indicates that the protein exceeds the essential amino acid requirements of the body and are excellent sources of protein.

Approximate protein quality of various forms of protein found in food and supplements.*

Protein	PDCAAS	PER
Gelatin (Collagen)	0.08	-
Wheat	0.43	1.5
Beef/Poultry/Fish	0.8 – 0.92	2.0 – 2.3
Soy	1.0	1.8 – 2.3
Ovalbumin (Egg)	1.00	2.8
Milk Protein	1.00	2.8
Casein	1.00	2.9
Bovine Colostrum (BC)	1.0	3.0
Whey	1.0	3.0-3.2

*Data compiled by Dr. Richard Kreider, University of Memphis, Memphis, Tennessee

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Vegetarian Diets: Perfect Prescription for Athletes