Healthy Nutrition Eating A Modern Plant-Based Basic Diet

Photographer: G Monkie (CC)

In the shadow of the “Standard American Diet”, the “modern vegetarian diet” has emerged. Although considerably healthier than the SAD, the “modern vegetarian diet” isn’t without its shortcomings. Mostly built on complex carbohydrates such as breads and pasta and fortified with processed soy products and laboratory created multi vitamins and minerals, the “modern vegetarian diet” lacks several health-promoting elements.

Interestingly, the “modern vegetarian diet” lacks vegetables, what ideally it should be built on.

When I first made the transition to a plant-based diet at the age of 15, I ran into several problems. As I learned more, and began to understand the subtleties of a plant-based diet, what mine lacked revealed itself.

Complete protein: Vital for muscle regeneration and hormone production, a lack of dietary protein quickly leads to a lack of optimal health. This is was one of my problems when I first adopted the diet in 1990. However, these days the chance of vegetarians lacking protein is slim. Due to a flood of soy and gluten-based products such as imitation hot dogs, hamburgers, steaks and even bacon, options are plentiful. Unfortunately, the availability of these products have lead to another concern. Soy and gluten sensitivities are becoming prevalent, simply because so many of our foods contain more soy and gluten than the body can handle. Resulting in mild flu-like symptoms, fatigue, reduced sleep quality and sometimes even irritability, an over abundance of soy and gluten in the diet should be avoided. I opt for as many raw sources of protein as I can. Hemp is an excellent choice. I also like sprouted legumes, seeds and pseudo grains such as amaranth, quinoa buckwheat and wild rice.

Continue Reading / See Additional Photos

Smart Nutrition / The New Hard Work

Photographer: G Monkie (CC), The Thrive Diet was created by Brendan Brazier

To become a great athlete requires work. Hard work, that’s a certainty. But, the often-overlooked smart work can play an equally large role in athletic success. While there’s no substitute for diligent training, as I found there are a few natural nutritional “helpers” that can directly complement the effect of exercise for a compounded performance boost.

We know that the best way to enhance the odds of becoming a better athlete is to put the body in a position in which it can physically and mentally handle progressively longer and more intense training. This is of course achieved by adopting a nutrition program that will support the fueling and regeneration process that an active person requires, one that’s significantly above and beyond that of a sedentary individual. The fundamentals on which this high-performance body can be constructed are, as you would expect, from building blocks that you supply it; food. Nutrient-rich, plant-based whole foods are the foundation on which optimal health (and eventually performance) can be created. Studies have shown that, when consumed post-workout, plant-based whole foods enable muscle tissue to grow stronger in a shorter amount of time than would be possible with the consumption of refined, fractionalized low-quality food.

Once this foundation of solid health has been built by means of premium building blocks, higher levels of both mental and physical performance can more easily be obtained as a logical next step. As I set my sights on professional triathlon racing in 1997, I began to search for additional ways in which nutrition could boost my performance as opposed to simply improving my health. While I had already obtained health, I felt it was time to take my well-being (and therefore my athletic performance) to the next level, a level beyond a simply solid bill of health.

Continue Reading / See Additional Photos