Unwrapping the Gift of Health and Fitness
By: Michael Horner
Tags: Vegan, Fitness, Running, Fitness Tips, Health

Unwrapping the Gift of Health and Fitness

Plant-based diet for better health and fitness. Photo by Mike Von on Unsplash

This year I decided since it has been a year unlike any other I have ever known, that I would skip the mad scramble to find that perfect gift for my wife.

Instead, I decided that 2021 is a year to be healthier and more fit. So I am giving my wife and myself the gift of better health and fitness.

I’m not sure how to wrap this present, but I’m not really sure it needs to be wrapped.

The reason I decided to give better health and fitness as a gift this year is that my wife and I both have struggled with keeping the weight we lost off throughout the year.

You would think that running ultra-marathons, it would be easy for me to keep weight off. The challenge is that because I run ultra-marathons, I have re-developed some unhealthy eating habits.

My wife and I have talked about changing out eating habits and for her exercising on a regular basis. She is definitely not a runner and swears off before dawn doing anything as if it is the bubonic plague.

For me, at the beginning of my training cycle, my diet and nutrition are on point. The challenge is that once I get into my peak period of hundred mile weeks and back-to-back long runs on the weekend, I have less desire to think about what is going in my body and just crave food. LOTS of food.

Inevitably, I end the year weighing more than I would like to and being frustrated with having a great year of running but not having the body to show for it.

This whole getting older thing sucks as I can’t just eat half a pizza and drink a beer without it affecting my waist line.

So, I’m finally making the change I knew I should have made a couple of years ago.

Converting to a Plant Based Diet

Researching what goes into our bodies will probably surprise most. Photo by Gary Sandoz on Unsplash

One of the best parts of not being a TV watcher is that I have more time to read all sorts of different material.

A couple of years ago, I began reading about this whole plant based diet thing. I grew up a meat and potatoes guy, am not in love with vegetables and basically view vegan as the new word for hippy.

I stumbled upon a couple of articles that intrigued me though. First up was an older article that somebody emailed me knowing I love to read everything about ultra-running I can get my hands on.

This article from October 2015 was about one of my favorite ultra-runners to watch, Scott Jurek. “The Real-Life Diet of the Vegan Who Can Run Hundreds of Miles, No Problem” on GQ.com was a really good source of information.

At the time though, my wife and I were moving across the country in the midst of the pandemic, and I thought that was enough change for one season of life.

I was surprised to read that Scott was a meat and potatoes guy also. I guess when I view the vegan life style, I think this strange people must have popped out of the womb loving vegetables and thinking meat was gross.

One of my concerns about plant based diets has been what to eat during ultra-marathon races. After all, most aid stations look like a cross between a butcher and a candy shop.

I was concerned about not being able to get enough protein and carbohydrates by converting to a plant based diet. Fueling properly during races has always been one of my downfalls because I am a picky eater.

Different races come with different desires. One of my fantasy foods nearly all the time during runs over thirty miles is hot apple pie with bacon as the top crust. I’ve only eaten it once and it tasted wonderful.

As I considered making this switch, the thought of no more bacon and green types of food all the time nearly filled me with panic.

I needed more convincing.

More Influence for a Plant Based Diet

Plant-based diet doesn’t mean all green food. Photo by Shelley Pauls on Unsplash

As part of my extremely slow roll-out of my book, Living an Ultra Life, one of the things I wanted to do was to start a podcast to go along with the publication of the book.

The book, Living an Ultra Life, is the story of one man who found himself broken down, depressed and overweight after one of the darkest periods of his life. It tells the story of me going from being a non-runner weighing around 260 pounds to a ultra-marathoner who got down to around 180 pounds (every year I get down there, I just don’t manage to stay there and blossom back up to around 190 pounds every year).

As I began researching how to record, launch and keep a podcast going, I became interested in a number of podcasts. A friend I run with recommended Rich Roll.

I didn’t know anything about Rich Roll when I began listening to his podcasts but became very intrigued as time went on.

At first, I thought Rich Roll was one of those vegan warriors who damned everybody to a life of miserableness and bad health if they ate meat. As I listened more, I discovered he was just very passionate about this lifestyle and he had great guests on his podcast that offered a lot of proof as to why I might want to pay more attention.

It was a podcast where he had Dr. Will Bulsiewicz on that I really began to pay attention. As an athlete who has struggled maintaining weight and has had gut challenges during long runs, this was the podcast that probably convinced me more than anything that it was time for a change.

When these two began to talk about the connection between our brain function and weight management in conjunction with using a plant based diet to build a better immune system that I sat up and paid attention.

I thought about an article that I had saved for future reference, “10 Reasons Why to Eat a Plant Based Diet” and realized that whereas I don’t necessarily groove along with all ten reasons, reasons 7 and 8 struck home for me.

I had never really compared the amount of caloric difference between my meat and potatoes diet and a diet based around vegetables, legumes, beans, fruit and grains. It dawned on me that easier to lose weight and being closer to 60 than 50 was a good thing.

I had never considered the amount of bacteria in my intestines that arrive there with the meat I consume. Being able to lower my blood pressure with a change in my diet just made sense to me.

An article on a website, www.parsleyhealth.com, made me sit up and pay attention.

One line in “5 Reasons You Should be Eating a Plant-Based Diet” was probably the thing that made me decide this was the Christmas gift for my family this year.

“We know from experience that eating plant-based works; we see and feel the radical effects every day in the form of clearer skin, more energy, better moods, improved immunity, optimal digestion and the best bodies of our lives.”

The article backs that statement up with peer reviewed articles based on science.

Plant-Based Diets Take More Time to Prepare: False Thought

Making healthy meals doesn’t take more time, but it could be more colorful. Photo by Markus Spiske on Unsplash

At least that was what I thought until I really got into looking at some different menu options. There are so many sources of plant-based meals out there that it can be overwhelming.

Since I was already enamored with Rich Roll’s podcast and knew that any time I was doing a long treadmill run or had a long drive for a sales call, I would get more information, I decided to roll with his meal planner to begin with.

“The Plant Power Meal Planner” seems to be the ideal place to begin. Best of all for people that have busy lifestyles? I could pick only meals that take fifteen minutes or less to prepare.

My wife and I just began this weekend with our first shopping adventure and this afternoon, our first plant-based only meal.

I plan on keeping a journal of my progress through developing a plant-based diet including some really long adventures in the near future including a twelve-hour treadmill run to end 2020 and begin 2021. Yes, I am really strange with my New Year’s Eve practices.

I also have a eight-hour event at the beginning of January where I will be experimenting with foods I can pack with my and consume on the run.

For transparency purposes, I’m beginning this new adventure at a very fit, but still too much weight, 192 pounds with the goal to be down to 180 pounds at my first (hopefully) big race at the beginning of April 2021.