Vegan Bodybuilding & Fitness

Everytime I sign into the forum, I look at this section and think I really should make a topic. There's no turning back now!

I went vegetarian when I was 11, but was always very unhealthy. Moved out of the house a year and a half ago, and decided it was time for a lifestyle change. After more research I began leaning towards a vegan diet.
I am not completly vegan, I eat about 1-2 servings of dairy a week. This is usually when I get a wrap at school I will get cheese on it, or icecream occasionaly when I'm out with friends.
Finally I've made the choice to go 100% vegan and know this would be a FABULOUS place to be held accountable! There will be a lot of difficult times where I will be turning to you guys for advice. My Mom is more understanding of my diet choices, so I'm not too worried about when I visit her (however, this will be my very first year without a Dairy Queen IceCream cake on my birthday. Silly, I know, but it is the only thing I look forward to about my birthday!).
However when I visit my Dad and Stepmom, she is very forceful about foods. she makes a big enough deal about me being vegetarian, it is also impossibly hard to eat healthy over there. I have tried buying my own food for the weekend, but she gets very offended. I'm considering for awhile just not visiting (they are a couple of hours away, so I have to stay overnight) until I'm a little more confident in my will power and ability to say no!

When I started this journey, I was 149 pounds. I know weigh about 123 pounds, but still have a long ways to go. For awhile now I have been doing a 3 day split, twice a week. I've found that I'm just going through the motions now and not really working out. So I've decided it's time to shake it up! For the next two weeks I will be doing sports-conditioning based workouts as a way to learn more exercises and get my body working better as a unit. Tomorrow will be the first day, I'm excited!

Todays log:
Workout: Day off (walked about 7km)
Food:
-Brown and wild rice with pesto & nutritional yeast
-Banana
-Smoothy (carob powder, Vega chocolate Shake N Go, dulce, chia seeds, banana, apple, blueberries, water, shredded coconut)
-Coconut (my first time trying fresh coconut, and I could not stop eating it! I've been dipping it in natural peanut butter, and it's filled me right up. So not a great eating day)

Todays workout:
The best workout I have had in a very long time! I am so happy I decided to give the split a break.
My workout lasted about an hour and a half, focusing on upper body type working using mostly BOSU balls, bodyweight and the TRX (I did a few weights, mostly focusing on shoulders).

Food:
-Brown and wild rice with pesto
-Watermelon
-Recovery Pudding (bananas, blueberries, maca root, carob powder, water, coconut milk, Vega Shake N' Go, dulse leaves). Got a lot of compliments from omnivores (it somehow ended up getting passed around the table. People are so fascinated by my food!)
-Green grapes
-3 tbsp natural peanut butter (REALLY gotta break that habbit)
-Red potatoes with pesto

YEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

And the old spoon in the pb jar. Yes, quite a difficult habit to break. I hear ya.

Todays workout wasn't too hard, I can't believe how beat up my body is after yesterday! I did some partner core exercises, and some speed work on the BOSU ball. Oh, and jumped onto the BOSU platform for the first time-made my day!
I haven't decided about tomorrows workout. Either cram in plyometrics, or save the plyo for Thursday (when I have a 3 hour gap inbetween classes-so plenty of time!) and do a yoga class.

Food:

-Red potatoes with mustard (ya, I said mustard!)
-Recovery pudding
-Coconut dipped in natural peanut butter
-Grapes
-Salsa and tortilla chips
-Whole wheat bread

I never realized just how much dairy they sneak into products! Today was my first day grocery shopping (buying something other then fruits and veggies), so I spent a lot of time looking at labels. There were a lot of foods that went back on the shelf!

I'm thinking about the 80/10/10 diet for awhile. I never binge on foods that I have completly eliminated from my diet, so that will be a great way to avoid a repeat of tonight.

Thank you for sharing your journey. We're with you all the way I'm glad to hear of your vegan choices and motivational spirit. Glad that your workouts are going well also. It will flow in time. Stick with it

I hear you, I have binged on bread before. I don't buy myself treats very often because I can't seem to have things in moderation, I have to scarf it all down at once.

What is in your recovery pudding? Is it the one from Thrive?

Thanks for your support!

My recovery pudding started out as the Thrive recipe, but I change it everyday. Today I decided to make vanilla pudding using
-Banana
-Raspberries
-Coconut milk
-Vanille Vega Shake N' Go
-Maca Root
-Tiny bit of cinnamon (I had no nutmeg )
-Vanilla extract
-Pinch of salt

Todays workout:
Lasted a little over an hour. The gym was CRAZY (common hours for students in the entire college-yikes!) so I had to change around my plan. Ended up doing core and stability, weights (legs) and a bit of balance stuff on the BOSU. Oh and 12 minutes of cardio (at intense effort). Me and cardio don't see eye to eye, so I try to do my cardio by keeping my heart rate up during workouts.

Food:
-Tortilla chips and salsa (with veggie ground)
-Banana
-Vanilla recovery pudding
-Apple
-Coconut dipped in natural peanut butter (LOTS of peanut butter!)
-Whole wheat pasta with pizza sauce (I have been on a very self indulgent kick the past few days. I better get that under control fast!)

Starting tomorrow: 80/10/10!!!

In other news...
I took progress pics :S Will work on posting them now!

I hate taking progress pictures, I feel like I'm not making changes near as fast as I should be.
So to make myself feel better:
Before I started losing weight

Another amazing workout today!!
Did upper body again, still can't get over what a difference changing up a routine can make.
I almot never do cardio, need to break out of that habit! Finally did so today and felt amazing. I did 30 minutes worth of intervals on the bike (and WOW was I ever sweating when I was done!). Workout lasted about 2 hours total.

Eating:
-Red potatoes with mustard
-2 bananas
-a cantaloupe
-Vanilla recovery pudding
-2 tbsp natural peanut butter
-coconut
-brown pasta with pizza sauce and veggie ground


As a new vegan, are there any tips you can give me about eating out? Is there a website that lists what foods are vegan at what resteraunts? I have been looking at the nutrition sections of the individual websites, but they aren't uually helpful.

Hey Subtitles! Congrats on the major progress so far! Happycow is a decent resource for finding veg restaurants but it's often outdated/incomplete. Are you looking for what's vegan in chain restaurants? If so, check these -

http://www.peta.org/living/vegetarian-l ... rants.aspx
http://veganmasterlist.blogspot.com/

or just google vegan chain restaurants.

Thank you vegimator! The links were really helpful.

Yesterdays workout:
Amazing!
40 BOSU jumps, agility work, 15 minutes on the tredmill doing jogging intervals (first time I have braved running in months, and felt very little pain. I might be a runner again yet!). Workout lasted just over an hour.

Food:
-Watermelon
-Vanilla 'pudding'
-Flatbread with veggies
-3 bananas
-Chocolate macaroon

What are you taking for fat burners ?

A big daily dose of exercise and healthy eating!

I think this is a very common problem! This is why I can't buy sugar, PB, chips, etc. because I will just eat them all! I try to minimize the amount of control that my brain thinks my stomach has, so it's better to just skip those things all together. It also looks like you have a sweet tooth like me! I don't know if you are still on the 811 diet, but if you are, pile on the fruits! I have found that those are a big help for me to stay away from less healthy sweets. Also I have a list of 'personal bests' measuring how long it's been since I have had a certain junk food. For example, no candy or soda since July 4th for me, so that's a nearly 6 month record that I don't want to break! This strategy might not work for you, but it has helped me cut down on some things.

That's an awesome idea! I'm going to have to try that! And I am a huge fruit lover, so no problem there lol!


Today:
CRAZY awesome workout today!! Did my very first box jump!

For some reason I have always been terrified of the box jump. I made myself do it today, and ended up doing it about 20 times. I'm not very good at it, I have A LOT of work to do. No matter what I did I couldn't quite my landing-I made the gym sound like an indoor thunderstorm.
But still...super exciting for me!!
Weights-legs and some stability, workout lasted a little over an hour.

-Green smoothie (kale, banana, celery, pear, raspberries, water, agave nectar, carob powder)
-Veggie wrap
-Apple
-Pear
-Brown pasta with mustard
-Brown & wild rice with pesto (I FINALLY made the perfect pesto sauce!! YAY! The secret-Enough garlic to kill with my breath)