Vegan Bodybuilding

[Benjie22]

Hello all,

I am sure this has probably been discussed a thousand times, but I just want some clear information. I recently took the steps In becoming a vegan, I have been enjoying the food and I have felt a lot healthier. However recently I have noticed muscle lose, I have dropped from 16 stone to 14stone12lbs in a month. My strength in the gym has also decreased, I know this is going to happen with muscle lose. I just feel deflated. I am pretty much eating what I would of ate as an omnivore, I ate a lot of oats etc anyway, but with vegan substitutes, and more fruit and veg etc. My job is quite demanding too, as in physical and also the hours I do. I travel a lot with it and I am sometimes working away and I am finding it difficult sometimes to even find vegan food to consume. Also a lot of people have mentioned how much weight I have lost and that I look ill! So long story cut short, what are the bodybuilder / weight lifters eating to gain and sustain weight?
Thanks Ben

 

[Emma JC]

hello Ben and welcome to the forum

I would suggest that you follow Simnett Nutrition on youtube as he is a vegan bodybuilder and eats mostly whole foods.

There are a number of other vegan body builders out there and if you watch the documentary Game Changers you will see a number of them.

All the best in your vegan journey and we hope being here is helpful for you.

Emma JC
Find your vegan soulmate or just a friend. www.spiritualmatchmaking.com

 

[Lou]

American here.
What is that? About ten pounds?
That is a lot of weight in a month - especially when its lost not on purpose. It might only be somewhat related to your diet. At some point you might want to check in with a doctor.

If it is your diet, the thing that comes to my mind first is that a vegan diet is much less calorie dense than a standard diet. You could be eating more than you used to and feeling full - but still not be getting enough calories. I wouldn't call this a common issue but it does come up fairly often.

when I provide advice to novice vegans I almost always work CronOmeter into the conversation. its a website/app that is a great tool for analyzing nutrition. It's free. There is a bit of a learning curve but it isn't that hard to figure out. It also takes some time to initially set up. It does require a daily investment of time but as you get used to it it takes less and less time. If you use the app you can probably do all the input as you eat. Personally, I like to do all the input at the computer at the end of the day. also it learns about you and provides short cuts. you can use some of its advanced features to save even more time as you get used to it. Plugging groups of foods into a recipe is a big time saver.

And its not like you have to use it every day for the rest of your life. you just have to use it for a week or two. but I do recommend using it every time you change your diet significantly.

Cronometer will use your info to determine your nutritional goals. To start off, I would leave those alone. but they are customizable - but you really should know what you are doing before changing them. it will take your height, weight and exercise to calculate a calorie goal. It will also calculate goals for fat, carbs and protein. anyway leave those goals alone for now. you can come back and change them later - but I think the most common mistake people make is when they set goals.

anyway, the great thing is once you have Cronometer set up and put in your daily meals it presents the info in easy to read and understand pie charts and bar graphs. If you meal plan in advance you can also fiddle with the meal plans till you get everything in the green.

also a nice benefit is that it tracks vitamins and minerals. So you can spot defiance's before they cause any harm.

let me know if you have any problems with Cronometer.