Tag Archives: fitness

Health, News and Activism

Plant-Based Knock Out

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On Saturday March 5, plant-based fighter Nate Diaz defeated featherweight champion Conor McGregor by rear naked choke in the second round. Although the fight wasn’t for the belt, it was the biggest win in Diaz’s career.

JakeShieldsVegAdUnspoken by many in the media, Diaz is notable because he eats a plant-based diet. At times, Diaz
describes himself as a raw vegan, and at other times he claims that he eats no land animals or dairy products. Also underrepresented in the media, there are many vegan, vegetarian, and plant-based fighters in the UFC. In addition to Nate, his brother Nick, their training teammate Jake Shields,Ricardo Moreira, Jon Fitch, retired fighter Mac Danzig, and even hall-of-famer Randy Couture. Some of these fighters have fought for championships, and some have won belts. Most of these fighters did not choose to eat a plant-based diet because of ethical reasons, but because they recognize the health benefits of eliminating animal products from their diets.

To add another layer of vegan interest, Conor McGregor’s movement coach is Ido Portal, who is notorious for saying that he will not train with vegans. According to Portal, vegans lack the strength and energy that he expects in his training partners.

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Health, Lifestyle

Vegan Body Building

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Before I jump into this, a word on promoting male stereotypes:  We do not, in any way, promote an ideal male or female body type or image  (please read these articles on toxic masculinity and why we should recognize what we do to reinforce these cultural norms ourselves) .  This is intentionally an article about male competitive body building, and why going vegan is totally applicable to this lifestyle, and also healthier.  I have included some names of competitive female bodybuilders at the end, but it is not the focus of this article.

We advocate for health, which definitely does not need to involve body building, in fact, I think many or most body builders do ENORMOUS damage to their body in the pursuit of the single minded goal of bulking up, not to mention stress injuries and other common sports injuries that are a risk factor in any athletic pursuit.  I (Suzi) am not a physical trainer, but I have clocked several hours in Rehab medicine, assisted on many studies, read many protocols for treatment and do a  lot of research.  Therefore, I can say it is likely POSSIBLE to be a bodybuilder, maybe even a competitive one, and to be healthy while doing it.  I don’t have the answer, but what I do know is that going vegan responsibly would go a LONG WAY to addressing some of the health concerns that would be generated by ingesting that much saturated fat, and animal protein.

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