SRC and SRC Vegan logo
My Vegan voyage has been going on for a long time now. For well over 2 years, we (myself and my family) have been fully Vegan. We have not purchased anything that is sourced from an animal. We have seen huge increases in our overall health, massive reductions in our shopping bills and are regularly complemented and commented on for our energy levels and overall fitness levels. Part of my "Voyage" is to be the fittest and healthiest I can be while eating a plant based diet.
Back to the Gym:
I have been back to working out for just over 4 months now and I have seen huge changes in my body, I am gaining muscle way faster than I had previously. I had been, while an omnivore, eating huge amounts of animal products in the belief that I needed to in order to gain muscle mass. I am a "hard gainer" as those in the fitness industry would say. I was told that I would have to eat huge amounts of calories to gain weight and indeed support muscle growth. As an omni this was completely true. I tracked everything I was eating, every gram of food was checked and recorded. At one stage I was eating almost 6000 calories per day in my aim to grow to my 100 kg goal! Crazy stuff,really crazy stuff.
Smashing my expectations:
In my 4 months working out properly in my home gym I have seen massive gains in my muscle mass. Now before you ask me the numbers, I have not been tracking them at all. I have not tracked my calorific intake nor my body composition. What I can tell you is that when I started back to the gym I weighed 84Kg dry (my dry weight is just after going to the toilet first thing in the morning) I try to keep my weight checks at the same time and conditions as possible. My jeans were getting tight around my waist and I was not happy with what I was seeing in the mirror, middle age spread anyone? At my latest weigh in I had grown a staggering 8KG! I am also leaner than I was 4 odd months ago too! My jeans are loose on my waist, tight around my thighs and I m nearly bursting out of some of my previously fitted tees and shirts! Myself and Natasha are attending a wedding this weekend and I have to try to fit into a fitted suit (one that was fitted when I was roughly 84KG! )
Captins log, 4 months underway, supplemental log:
So, has my Vegan voyage been successful so far? Hell yes! I just can not believe how much easier it is to grow on a whole food plant based diet! I mean, I am just smashing through my progression targets. I had thought that at 4 months in I would have at most gained 4 kg but to double that! It is almost impossible to believe. I intend on getting a body composition scales so that I can track my fat levels. My goal, as it was previously while an omni is to reach 100KG at 10%bf. An extremely tough goal while I was an omni but I have to say that I am feeling very positive this time round. I never got there as an omni, despite huge effort, I was in the gym 5 or 6 days per week 3 - 4 days weights and 1-2 days cardio, swimming etc.
So to say I am super excited this time round with my progression is an understatement!
That damn knee:
I should also note that I am still in rehab for a cartilage injury and subsequent surgery from last year so I still cant go as heavy as I would like to on my leg workouts! I cant wait to get back to some seriously heavy leg sessions. My right leg as you can see in the picture below is far stronger than my left, leftie had the injury! My left leg was nearly half the size of my right leg and I had near complete muscle atrophy there too!
Want to know more?
This is the second in my "Viable Vegan Voyage" series, you can find the first post here. I regularly post Vegan food that is geared with the Omni in mind so If you are looking to move to a more sustainable, healthy and compassionate lifestyle feel free to check them out on my feed here or reach out directly. I'm on discord too and would be happy to help or answer any questions you might have. I am not a medical person or involved in he fitness industry, I did train in Gym and aerobics instruction many, many moons ago but anything I post is my opinion only.
All images unless otherwise sourced and noted as such are my own. They are typically taken with my HTC ONE.
