How A Vegan Diet Can Improve Your Marathon Training

With the Marathon looming it seems to be all anybody is talking about (or at least posting about on Instagram!) And with so many people running year after year, many are looking for that change in their training to give them an edge. Detox-Fit, a leading London fitness brand specialising in personal training, encourages one key difference to make to your training – a Vegan diet.
There seems to have been a lot of hype to the Vegan diet – or should I say, lifestyle – recently, with the magnitude of Veganuary and a rapidly growing collection of people making the change. With so many athletes now swearing by a Vegan diet as well, maybe it’s something more of us should be looking into?
Evany Ibáñez-Banczer, co-director and co-founder of Detox-Fit, and author of “Run, Little Benjamin, Run,” explains why a Vegan diet is not only good for your overall health, but can give you that edge you need in the lead up to the marathon.
Improved Cardiovascular Health
Using meat and dairy products as main sources of protein results in high levels of saturated fats and clogged arteries. A plant-based diet of whole grains, beans, legumes and vegetables, however, will lower cholesterol, clear arteries, decrease plaque in your blood vessels, and provide protein and antioxidants to give you a cardiovascular system that will have you running longer and training harder.
Improved Digestive System
Loading up on calories through meat and dairy can leave you feeling full and bloated - bad news for a runner! A Vegan diet, however, is naturally high in fibre and nutrient rich, which helps support digestive health by keeping your body running smoothly while providing all the nutrition needed for a long race.
 
PDCAAS
The argument of whether a Vegan diet provides all the necessary protein and amino acids needed for training has long been battled out. However numerous studies, as well as professional athletes, are now experiencing huge benefits from plant-based proteins such as rice and pea. These proteins are proven to provide a Protein Digestibility Corrected Amino Acid Score (PDCAAS) equivalent to the PDCAAS of whey protein, without whey protein’s digestion difficulties and high acidity.
Improved Recovery
The go-to sources to promote recovery are often meat and eggs. However, these animal products also produce high levels of acidity in the body, which can affect the pH level in your blood and lead to inflammation – thus, impeding recovery. Plant-based sources of protein, however, react differently in the body, producing an alkaline instead which improves recovery by lowering inflammation.
Improved Physique Maintenance
Since a Vegan diet isn’t packed full of saturated fat and, largely speaking, involves less processed food, maintaining an athlete’s physique becomes easier without a great deal of effort. A well-balanced diet is still important, and too many sugary snacks will be detrimental, but a Vegan diet encourages a healthier way of thinking and drastically limits your intake of food which could hinder your progress.
Professional Athletes Do It!
Lauren Goss, a professional triathlete who only recently converted to a Vegan diet now swears by it for her training, reporting she now sleeps better, recovers faster, has more energy and less digestive stress.
Scott Jureck, author of “Eat & Run” and a vegan ultra-runner, explains he tried going Vegan purely to run faster and it worked. Running the Minnesota Voyageur 50-mile race three times before he won, Jureck says his Vegan diet was the key difference, after realising he could run smarter by eating smarter.
And finally, Ross Edgley, a professional endurance athlete, who famously ran 30 marathons in 30 days on a treadmill in his kitchen, goes Vegan before all of his events, explaining that animal protein requires more effort to digest and a plant-based diet is beneficial to his cardiovascular as well as overall health and immune function.