Vegans are weak and/or fat

Crossfit
Today while I was researching "vegan + crossfit", I came across a forum on crossfitbrandx.com that was upsetting. Someone posted this question...

"I have been on a vegan diet for a couple of months now and was wondering how that would mesh with crossfit?"

Most of the responses were ignorant, uneducated and some actually disrespectful:

"You’ll never be able to do a pull up."

"...meat will best facilitate adaptation to the CrossFit stimulus (and any of the other of life’s stimuli for that matter)."

"...it is very difficult to get the amount of protein necessary to support CrossFit on a vegan diet. It can be done, its just harder and generally more tiresome."

"Marla Singer was a ten year Vegan who started at our gym...she wanted to do pull ups. I told her that there was only one thing everyone that could do pull ups had in common in our gym. Tall people, short people, skinny people, muscular people…..they all ate meat. "

" I have yet to see a committed vegan who isn’t weak and/or fat." <----Don't get me started on this one

etc. etc. etc,

I started at Crossfit Newton at the end of October, although I've only been vegan for the past 30 days, I've been vegetarian for 3+ years, and I have seen amazing progress since I started. In just 3 months I have:

- lost 3.42% body fat
- gained 5.2 lbs lean body mass
- lost 6.2 lbs of fat
- Gone from black banded pull-ups to band-free kipping pull-ups (I just did 7 in a row this past weekend!)
- 1RM deadlift has increased from 185# to 215#
- 1RM front squat has increased from 135# to 155#
- push press from #95 to #120
- power clean #85 to #125

(I've gained a ton in most areas, but my workout log is at the gym and this is all I could remember off the top of my head.)

This is why I started this blog; I want to prove that one can be vegan and be a successful crossfitter. I don't care what your diet preference is, just don't hate on mine! let me gain muscle, get stronger and improve without the criticism :) Thanks!


Tuesday's WOD

10 rounds

10 calorie row

10 box jumps@24/20

10 banded kbs (35# with small blue band)

10 burpees

This was hands down the hardest WOD I've done since I started crossfit back in October. 3 rounds in I thought there was no way in hell I was going to finish! My mindset was very negative, I was miserable. Then I realized I could kind of catch my breath during the row, so I used that as my motivation..."After these burpees, I get a little break". And of course, the burpees were the worst part, so I broke it down into 5's, never resting but keeping a nice steady pace. At 29:55 I had finished and collapsed on the floor, and couldn't do much for the next 5-7 minutes! The rest of the day I felt great, and I continue to look back at that workout and praise myself for completing it.


Diet
(The first number is calories the second number is grams of protein)

Breakfast
Vega Sport 120/26
Small bowl cereal 180/6
almond milk 60/1

Snack
Soba noodles 435/16.5

Lunch
2 cups black beans beans + spices 454/30
1/2 avocado 161/2
24 tortilla chips chips 280/4

Snack
Apple 100
Luna bar 180/9
Bag of lay's baked potato chips 130/2

Dinner
Ezekiel tortilla 150/6
BBQ sauce 20
Seitan 120/21
1/2 avocado 161/2

Smoothie (1 banana, 3/4cp OJ, 5 strawberries, kale)-250 cals

2800 cals
125 grams protein

I ate a lot today! WAY too many calories. BUT a ton of protein...on a vegan diet? no way! well, yes way. If you're a clean, healthy vegan, you can most definitely get all the protein you need. But I could have passed up the tortilla chips and potato chips to bring it down to 2390 calories. The WOD was long and rough, I probably burned a lot of calories, so 2400 calories is decent.