Brendan Brazier

Photo by GLiving

Brendan Brazier is a professional triathlete who discovered that a nutrient dense, anti-inflammatory vegan diet is the best way to fuel his body for optimum performance and minimal recovery time between training sessions. Here is a brief description of some of his discoveries and insights during the past 15 years.

Net Gain

Brendan Brazier emphasizes the importance of increasing net gain from foods and decreasing nutritional stress. Net gain is the amount of energy provided by a food minus the amount of energy required by the body to digest, assimilate, and remove the waste products from metabolizing it. Nutrient dense, easily assimilated foods take less energy to process, so give you a greater energy return. Because they provide so much nutrition, they also allow you to eat less, which means even less energy expended for processing food.

Nutritional Stress

Brendan saw his athletic performance improve once he switched to a plant based diet, but he continued to look for ways to reduce his recovery time after training sessions, which he determined was the key to optimizing his fitness. He became aware of the effects of nutritional stress, which is the stress caused to the body by certain foods such as animal products, trans fats and refined carbohydrates. He found that eating high stress foods can result in low energy, poor athletic performance, long recovery time after a workout, excess weight gain, and poor sleep quality.

Brendan realized that one of the major reasons he needed so much recovery time was because of the stress to his body from what he was eating. He was eating 8000 calories a day, and just digesting that quantity of food puts an enormous strain on the body.

He also realized that a diet too high in protein is counterproductive. Eating excess protein can decrease performance. First, because it requires extra energy to process and second because it is burned by the body for fuel much less efficiently than carbohydrates or fat. Excess protein can also lead to extra body fat. Protein cannot be stored by the body, and if not used for energy it will be converted to fat.

Nutrient Dense Foods

Determined to minimize his nutritional stress, Brendan searched for nutrient dense foods, foods that are packed with nutrients but easy to digest and assimilate. He found that ground hemp seeds provide the most efficient and easily assimilated source of protein. He added flax seeds to increase his intake of Omega 3 fatty acids. He also recognized the importance of tryptophan, which is present in high amounts in rice protein, to aid in deep and efficient sleep which speeds recovery.

He began using the herb maca, which acts as an adaptogen to restore the adrenal glands. He added yellow split pea protein, which has an excellent amino acid profile and is an especially good source of glutamic acid. Glutamic acid aids in the efficient processing of carbohydrates. Brendan also discovered the value of chlorella for detoxification and for the growth factor it contains which speeds recovery.

Carbs Without Grains

Instead of eating grains for carbohydrates, Brendan eats mainly fruits and pseudo grains. Pseudo grains are seeds that have a lot of the same properties as grains and are often served in place of grains. Pseudo grains include quinoa, amaranth, buckwheat, and wild rice. He also eats a lot of kale and other green leafy vegetables, which are high in minerals and chlorophyll. He avoids soy, corn, wheat and other common allergens.

Once he put all of these elements together, Brendan was able to reduce his caloric intake by 30% and still add muscle mass and increase his strength to weight ratio.

Sharing the Benefits of a Vegan Diet

Brendan Brazier became a vegan at the age of 15 when he decided he wanted to become a professional athlete. His initial motivation was to speed his recovery time from training sessions and enhance his athletic performance. He later learned about the environmental, economic, and ethical impact of eating meat and has written articles and lectured on these topics to athletes, students and policy makers.

Brendan developed his own line of meal replacement products, energy bars and blender drinks called Vega. His goal was to create products based on his own diet, containing nutrient dense, easily assimilated ingredients that optimize nutrition and minimize stress. He is also the author of three books on diet and fitness: Thrive, The Thrive Diet, and Thrive Fitness: Mental and Physical Strength for Life.

Brendan's Gym Workout

Net Gain and Nutrient Dense Foods

Website

BrendanBrazier.com

Books