Vegan Bodybuilding?

Our buddy Kevin pointed me to a recent piece in The New York Times about vegan bodybuilders. According to the article, the website veganbodybuilding.com has "more than 5,000 registered users," and vegan bodybuilders have been a "steady, small presence" in the International Natural Bodybuilding Association for years.

This is fascinating. Bodybuilding's not my thing, so I can't profess much knowledge about bodybuilders' diets -- but developing muscle on a vegan diet can't be easy.

“Is it possible to be a good bodybuilder and be a vegan? Yes,” said Jose Antonio, the chief executive of the International Society of Sports Nutrition. “But is it ideal? No.” 

Vegan bodybuilders may face challenges getting sufficient amino acids, found in meats, Antonio said, adding that although protein can be found in vegetables and nuts, they must be consumed in greater quantities to get the same amount as their counterparts in meat. “The amount of rice and beans you need to eat would fill up a Mexican restaurant,” he said. 

Other nutritionists and bodybuilders have argued that a disciplined vegan diet, consisting of things like hemp-based protein supplements, peanut butter, nuts, vegetables and legumes, can yield similar, if not better, results than a meat- or dairy-filled diet. Carefully monitored, vegans can get the same amount of protein with less fat or toxins, they argue. (For a midafternoon snack, [bodybuilder Jimi] Sitko sometimes eats 10 bananas.)

What? Rice? Beans? Peanut butter? And just how does eating 10 bananas provide a bodybuilder with "the same amount of protein with less fat or toxins"?

Of course, there are a good number of athletic folks who say they're thriving on vegan diets (see, e.g., the Old Spice Guy, Mike Tyson, elite ultrarunner Scott Jurek, the folks in the vegan and vegetarian CrossFitters' Facebook group, etc.). While I'm sure many of them choose veganism primarily due to ethical or environmental beliefs (which I won't bother to address again here, other than to point to Lierre Keith's book) -- some also attribute their fitness and athletic successes to veganism itself. But isn't it just as likely (if not more) that these athletes have accomplished their physical achievements despite their veganism? I wonder how much better they'd perform if they started eating some animals.

On the plus side: More meat for me, I guess.

Offal-y Good

Gotta hit the sack. I'm back in L.A. tonight (this time, with M) for the Ancestral Health Symposium, and we had an enormous meat orgy of a dinner at Animal tonight with Melissa and Dallas of Whole9 and Melissa Joulwan of The Clothes Make the Girl. We ate nose-to-tail tonight (including brains, face, ears, pancreas, liver, heart, marrow and tails), and all that tasty organ meat in my belly is making me drowsy.

Read all about our feast o' flesh over at Nom Nom Paleo.

Racing Animals

Remember the whole Art De Vany / Dan Lieberman dustup over whether humans are -- from the standpoint of evolutionary biology -- "born to run"?

The (frankly crappy) Time Magazine article about Paleo stirred up the pot by pointing out that De Vany (like many other Paleo luminaries) believes that "no caveman ever jogged for miles while pursuing dinner or being chased by a predator." Rather, humans are best suited for "short bursts of cardiovascular exertion that may also include hauling a heavy weight, as you might after a successful hunt."

But Lieberman and his fellow barefoot running advocates (Christopher McDougall included) take the opposite view: Humans, they say, have a unique knack for endurance running because our genetic ancestors engaged in long-range persistence hunting.

We can run all day, the theory goes, because there was once a caloric advantage to it. Our two human legs, packed as they are with long slow-twitch muscle fibers, make us better runners over long distances than most quadrupeds. And our three million sweat glands give us the ability to cool our bodies with perspiration. An antelope, by contrast, sprints -- for up to 15 minutes -- while wearing a fur coat and relies on respiration (panting) to release the heat that builds up with exertion. Add to the mix our ability to organize and strategize and, well, you can see how persistence hunting might actually work.

So who's right?

Outside Magazine just published an article featuring nine elite marathoners who put the persistence hunting theory to the test. Powered by their own feet, they chased a pronghorn antelope -- the world's second-fastest land animal -- to see if they could wear it down and kill it.

By the end of their attempt at persistence hunting, the marathoners had each covered 20 miles -- not quite a marathon, but close. Did they succeed in bagging the antelope? Read the article and see for yourself.

Regardless of the results of this test, my take is that John Durant is right: To a certain extent, both camps are right. Yes, humans evolved to be capable of covering long distances -- but the optimal way to improve your overall fitness is through intermittent sprinting and lifting heavy stuff. After all, "high-intensity training and strength training can improve performance in endurance activities, but the reverse doesn't hold.  You can get better at marathons by doing CrossFit, but you can't get better at CrossFit by running marathons."

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Ronald McDonald Kills & Eats His Friends

Subtlety is not PETA's forte, as evidenced by its latest comic book for children:

First, it was your mommy and daddy who murdered animals. Now, it's the guy in whiteface who taught you how to ice skate. So, so sad.

Thankfully, the Fry Guys are safe from the evil clown's poultricidal rampage, but Mayor McCheese has taken to traveling with an armed security detail.

[Source]

Good Meat is Dead Meat (Not Meat That Was Never Alive)

PETA has announced that it's offering a $1 million reward to "the first scientist to produce and bring to market in vitro meat."

According to PETA, test tube meat would be super-awesome because it'd "mimic flesh and could be cooked and eaten" without hurting any animals. Of course, only the unwashed meat-addicted hordes would need to eat the stuff:

[H]umans don't need to eat meat at all -- vegetarians are less likely to get heart disease, diabetes, or various types of cancer or become obese than meat-eaters are -- and a terrific array of vegetarian mock meats already exist. But as many people continue to refuse to kick their meat addictions, PETA is willing to help them gain access to flesh...

(Wrong, wrong, wrong. But I digress.)

I can't wait to supplement my "terrific array" of Tofurky patties and Quorn chunks with a big, juicy slab of lab-generated, vat-grown, 100% processed "meat." I mean, who could resist a steak that looks this appetizing?

Who's with me?

“We’re Gonna Take Ducks, and We’re Gonna Use Every Single Part of ‘Em”

As evidenced by the fact that we have a pig’s head sitting in our freezer, we’re thinking about dipping our toes into “nose-to-tail” eating. Before I start rippin’ out and roastin’ up cow tongues and pig brains in the name of ecological sustainability, though, I figure I should start small.

Luckily, The Perennial Plate has just the thing: Ducks.

Watch as whole ducks are transformed into confit, sausage, rillette, stock, pâté and prosciutto:



My stomach’s growling.

Men vs. Lions

What could possibly motivate 3 guys to face off against 15 ravenous lions? Hint: It's not tofu.

We Are Not Cows

Except maybe these people.

At some point, you've probably come across the claim that vegetarian diets are better for you because "meat humans can't digest meat -- it just rots in your colon and causes colon cancer." Humans, the argument goes, are natural herbivores.

But science says otherwise. Even in studies dating back almost a hundred years, it's been consistently shown that meat doesn't rot in your colon. Beans, grains and vegetables do.

It turns out that pepsin, trypsin, chymotrypsin, and our other proteases do a fine job of breaking down meat protein, and bile salts and lipase do a fine job of breaking down animal fat. In other words, meat is digested by enzymes produced by our own bodies. The primary reason we need our gut bacteria is to digest the sugars, starches, and fiber -- found in grains, beans, and vegetables -- that our digestive enzymes can’t break down.

The digestion of sugars, starches and fiber also make you fart more. (Between you and me, since going Paleo over a year ago, I've noticed a drastic reduction in my personal methane emission levels. Who says I'm not doing my part for the environment?)

Humans aren't herbivores. We're omnivores -- though we're "primarily carnivorous":

[W]e have a limited ability to digest some plant matter (starches and disaccharides) in order to get through bad times, but we cannot extract meaningful amounts of energy from the cellulose that forms the majority of edible plant matter, as true herbivores can. We can only eat fruits, nuts, tubers, and seeds (which we call ‘grains’ and ‘beans’) -- and seeds are only edible to us after laborious grinding, soaking, and cooking, because unlike the birds and rodents adapted to eat them, they’re poisonous to humans in their natural state.

You can demonstrate the purpose and limits of human digestion with a simple experiment: eat a steak with some whole corn kernels, and see what comes out the other end. It won’t be the steak.

In fact, meat-eating made us human.

Fun activity: Google "meat rots in your colon" and count the number of articles arguing this point were written by PETA. Incidentally, my favorite PETA moment is when it produced a comic book for children, telling them that their non-vegetarian mommies are in fact evil murderers:

How would you feel if someone took away your kitten or puppy, stomped on their head, and ripped their skin off their bodies? It would make you feel sad, wouldn’t it? Why would someone be so mean? But there are truly terrible people who cause our furry friends to die that way every day. And guess what? One of those terrible people is your mommy.

(Source: Gnolls)

Animal Planet Plate Lunch

What -- you didn't believe that I'd actually go eat a big plate of animals for lunch?

Every Tuesday, I head over to the Ferry Building Farmer's Market's Prather Ranch stand for a Farmhouse Burger -- beef patty, ham, bacon, fried egg, no bun, extra lettuce, and a pile of fresh sauerkraut.

Sometimes, when I feel like something a little lighter, I add slaw:

But today, I just polished off the meat with a side of homemade venison jerky.

I love animals.

Yemeni Camel Jumping

You don't need fancy gym equipment. You don't even need shoes. Just get yourself a half-dozen camels and a Shrek muscle shirt, and you're good to go.



How much do you wanna bet that CrossFit HQ's already working on how to incorporate this into a main site WOD?

(Sources: Smithsonian Magazine, Ross Training)

Good to Know

Some folks take calorie counting to extremes.

(Source: BuzzFeed)

Replacing Gingerbread with Slaughtered Animals

I probably would have omitted the Cheez Whiz and puff pastry, though.

Check It Out: Offal Good

Chris Cosentino doesn't post very often (probably because he's busy running San Francisco's Incanto and Boccalone), but I enjoy his blog, Offal Good, which is devoted to organ meats and other animal parts that make most Americans squeamish. It's a shrine to head-to-tail eating -- the most sustainable (and Paleo-friendly) way to eat meat.

Bonus: Offal Good sells the best T-shirt ever:

Mmm. Bears.

Award-winning food blogger Hank Shaw has some fascinating observations about dining on bear meat:

• "Bear regularly made its way to market before the sale of wild game was outlawed in the early 1900s, and it retained a place in the American palate right through the late 1950s... [T]he 1957 edition of the Gourmet Cookbook includes three recipes for bear. Gourmet magazine never catered to the redneck hunter crowd: Putting bear in their cookbook means it was a legitimate facet of haute cuisine."

• "It's worth noting that the only land animal that routinely hunts and eats humans isn't the lion, or the alligator, or the tiger: It's the polar bear."

• "[B]ears a) are omnivores like us, and b) look disturbingly like people when skinned. The American Indians put bears in a different spiritual place in part for this reason. Of all the things humans eat with any regularity, bears come closest to being us."

• [B]ear meat is insanely variable. Eat a bear that had been dining on berries and manzanita and you are in for a feast. Eat a bear that had gorged on salmon and it'll taste like low tide on a hot day. Ew."

• "My first impression is that bear looks like lamb. Very red, but far lighter than venison and darker than most pork. Closest match would be the darkest part of a high-quality pork shoulder. I put my nose up to the meat and inhaled. Surprisingly, there was no smell. Everything I'd heard about bear was that it was smelly."

• "In the kitchen, the most important thing you need to know about bear is that it is the single biggest vector for trichinosis in North America. No one gets trichinosis from domestic hogs anymore, but they sure do from wild boar, bear and, oddly, walrus." So don't eat raw bear, people.

• "First bite? Juicy, rich, earthy, and savory, with a twang of something that said, "I am not beef." Holly and I thought it reminded us of the wonderful yak meat momos we'd eaten at a Tibetan restaurant in Minnesota years ago. No strong odor, no off taste. This was some damn good bear."

And I thought the freshly-shot venison steaks in my freezer were exotic.

(Photo: Harry Brignull)

A Very Paleo Bedtime Story

While cleaning the house, I found this book that my parents brought back from a trip to Asia as a gift for my kids. Either something's lost in translation, or children's stories in Hong Kong are just straight-up hardcore:

"In a hot summer day, there was a little thirsty lamb drinking water in the river."

"A wolf was passing by the river, too. He felt so happy when he saw the lamb."

"The wolf said to the lamb: 'I can't drink clean water because you make the river dirty. So I must kill you!'"

"The frightened lamb explained: 'Can't you drink clean water as you stay at the upper stream?'"

"The wolf replied angrily: 'I know you always spoke ill of me last year. So I must kill you!'"

"The little lamb argued: 'Mr. Wolf, I was not yet born last year!'"

"The wolf said impatiently: 'Your master and friends all want to kill me. Isn't it true?'"

"The little lamb still wanted to argue. But the fierce wolf had already pounced upon and ate him."

THE END.

The moral of the story: Lamb is super-tasty. (Though raw lamb's not my cup of tea. I prefer lamb kofta kebabs.)

Hmm.

(Source: Monsters are Everywhere)

Not to Put Too Fine a Point on It

My favorite paragraph from Robb Wolf's book:

Plant sources of protein, even when combined to provide all the essential amino acids, are far too heavy in carbohydrate, irritate the gut, and steal vitamins and minerals from the body via anti-nutrients. Remember that whole chapter on the double-edged nature of grains and legumes? Beans and rice, nuts and seeds, are what I call "Third World proteins." They will keep you alive, but they will not allow you to thrive. Your protein needs to have the following criteria:

1. It needs a face.
2. It needs a soul.
3. You need to kill it, and bring its essence into your being.
4. Really.

Caloric Restriction

You've heard of Caloric Restriction (CR), right?

As its name suggests, CR is a dietary approach that restricts caloric intake. Done properly, it slows the aging process and extends life.

No, I'm not making this up.

Lab mice on CR can live up to 50 percent longer than if they ate a more typical diet.

The maximum life span of a typical lab mouse is 39 months, corresponding to 110 years in humans. [UCLA Professor and Biosphere 2 crew member Roy] Walford and researchers have demonstrated that mice that eat only 60 percent of their preferred diet will live as long as 56 months -- the equivalent of 165 human years -- provided they start their diets before three months of age. Although these mice are smaller than their normally fed peers, they seem to retain their youthfulness and intellects well into their extended old age. “We’ve found that a 36-month-old restricted mouse will run a maze with the same facility as a six-month-old normally fed mouse,” Walford says. “That’s a substantial preservation of intellectual function.”

Similar results are seen in studies involving all sorts of living creatures, from yeast cells and roundworms to fruit flies and spiders. Even rhesus monkeys live a lot longer on CR, with significantly reduced rates of diabetes, cancer, and heart and brain disease.

There aren’t yet any published studies on CR’s effects on the average human lifespan, but research shows that humans on CR are healthier, with lower cholesterol, fasting glucose, triglyceride levels, and blood pressure. Based on available evidence, scientists believe that a 30 to 40 percent reduction in caloric intake could significantly extend human lives.

The problem?

CR is not fun. As Michael Eades points out:

When rats live out their little ratty lives calorically restricted in their cages, they seem to show signs of depression and irritability. Primates do for sure. If primates don’t get enough cholesterol, they can actually become violent. But if you’re willing to put up with a little irritability, hostility and depression, it might be worth cutting your calories by 30 percent for the rest of your long, healthy miserable life.

Plus, as characterized by a New York Magazine writer who hosted a CR dinner party, the hardcore CR lifestyle can seem deeply bizarre:

[T]he weirdnesses are starting to pile up, and my guests are looking weirder and weirder themselves, like emissaries from a future I’m not sure could ever feel like home: a world where the food grows in vats, where the porn industry just barely survives on government subsidies, where the physically ideal male has the BMI of Mary-Kate Olsen and the skin tones of an Oompa-Loompa.

I take a deep breath then and think, A world where 80 is the new 40. And suddenly, all those little weirdnesses seem quite manageable again.

At which point Michael, having finished his helping of asparagus and Quorn, picks up his plate without a word and does what any normal person who has not eaten a truly filling meal in years would do: He holds the plate up to his face and commences licking it clean. April looks on smilingly, and though I feel another tingle of vertigo coming on at the sight, it passes soon enough.

I’m not one to shy away from trying different strategies for better health, but I have zero interest in experimenting with CR. Call me spoiled, but I’m no ascetic. Eating’s too much fun to deprive myself of its pleasures.

And I ain’t eatin’ no Quorn. (Well… maybe I’ll give it a taste, just to see if it’s as unappetizing as it looks.)

But consider this: There’s evidence that Intermittent Fasting (IF) offers the same benefits of CR -- but without having to reduce overall caloric intake.

It probably won’t shock you to learn that M and I have been playing around with a variant of IF for a couple of weeks, limiting our daily eating windows to an 8-hour period. (Sound weird and complicated? Think of it this way: We don’t snack after dinner -- say, after 6:30 -- and we delay breakfast until later in the morning -- like 10:30.)

I’ll post more about IF (and our experiences with it) soon, so stay tuned.

Yoga Bear

It'd be nice if she put on some yoga pants, though.

(Source: Guardian)