From espn.com
Ultramarathon running is already tough enough. A typical race can cover 100 miles or more, often in scorching heat, blistering cold or at dizzying elevation. As one of the leading ultramarathon runners in the world, Scott Jurek has had to deal with all of those challenges and more, vaulting scorpions in the desert, even meeting an occasional bear on the trails.
Scott Jurek is proof that athletic endurance doesn’t have to be compromised by a vegan diet. But Jurek adds another degree of difficulty to the mix. As a strict vegan, he goes through his grueling training regimen on a diet consisting of fruits, vegetables, grains and nuts. This seems completely impossible when you consider Jurek’s typical calorie intake during peak training periods: 6,000 to 8,000 calories a day. Despite all that calorie loading, he packs just 165 pounds on his super lean, 6-foot-2 frame.
“For breakfast it’s a dense, caloric smoothie,” Jurek explained. “Then you’ve got lots of fruits and almonds. People assume it’s all carbs. But there’s also fat — avocados, rich monosaturated fats, almonds, olive oil.”
He’s just getting warmed up.
“For protein you’ve got beans, lentils, combining whole grains. Tofu and tempeh. Then for carbs: whole grains, breads, cereals, fruits and veggies, whole foods, unprocessed foods. There’s three main meals, then lots of smaller snack foods and mini-meals throughout the day.”
Jurek’s background didn’t seem to portend a vegan diet years later. Born and raised in Minnesota, Jurek lived on meat and potatoes, regularly going out for hunting and fishing expeditions. After competing at Nordic skiing in his younger days, he ran his first ultramarathon in 1994.
As his ultramarathon career progressed, Jurek began phasing out meat from his diet. In 1999, Jurek read “Mad Cowboy,” the investigative book about the beef industry that prompted Oprah Winfrey to famously declare she’d never eat another burger. He became a vegetarian that year. Then, just before taking on the 100-mile Western States Endurance Run, he went vegan.
“I had my doubts, sure,” Jurek recalled. “Am I going to be strong enough, have enough protein? There were all those common disclaimers, how it would affect my performance. When I went on to win the race, I realized it was all just this mental barrier. After performing well on [the vegan diet], I never really doubted it afterwards.”
Neither did Jurek’s rivals. Not after he went on one of the most dominant runs in the history of his sport, including seven straight Western States victories. Instead, he often gets feedback from other distance runners, with everyone from beginners to high-level competitors telling Jurek that he inspires them to train harder and to seek out alternative diets.
Still, Jurek says he never tries to impose his personal choices on anyone else. Nor does he see his vegan eating as a way to enhance performance. Like Danzig, Jurek says his diet does help him indirectly, in that it helps him recover from the pounding that his sport dishes out. A lot of people excel at ultramarathon running while living on unhealthy diets, he says.
“But where are they going to be in 20 years?” Jurek asked. “For me, it’s about optimizing health. It’s about lifestyle and longevity. Then you think about what vegetarian diets can do for the mass population, in terms of lower consumption of resources. When you look at the numbers, it’s pretty staggering.”
Traveling around the world, while competing everywhere from Death Valley to Greece, Jurek has learned how to maintain his vegan diet wherever he goes, without skimping on taste.
So, Scott, any tips to pass along to others thinking about going veggie, or even vegan?
“It’s really not that hard once you get things down,” he said. “You just have to be a little creative. Sometimes you may not find a great vegetarian protein source in a restaurant — no tofu, for instance. So you can do something like add chick peas to salad. Ethnic foods are good, too. Mexican beans, Asian tofu, Indian lentils. [To] some people it’s this weird diet. But most grocery stores have a plethora of foods. Just keep variety in your diet, and you’ll be good.”
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Tags: athletes, famous veggies, running
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