Nice to meat you

I read two interesting perspectives on the diets of high level ultra runners last week. One was by Devon-Crosby Helms, who runs the Fast Foodie Cooks blog. She is a holistic/natural chef and a very accomplished ultra marathoner. Her interview is on being an ex-vegan and why she brought meat back into her diet.
Unlike a lot of vegans, she did not become a vegan for environmental, or ethical reasons, she did it purely for health and she went back to eating meat for the same reason. She had a hard time balancing her nutritional needs without feeling controlled by her diet.
I have considered trying a vegetarian diet before and although I am not a big meat eater, opting more for fish and eggs as my protein sources, I am just too lazy to commit. It seems like you have to have a real passion for food preparation and a great attention to detail to make sure that you eat properly, especially if you are trying to eat for performance, I don't. I also happen to like the odd bison burger.

One person who does do the vegan diet and food prep well, and who seems to have that passion for it, is Scott Jurek, the well known vegan ultra champ. Canadian Running magazine, has an article by Scott about his diet. It is well worth a read.

The Scott Jurek article inspire me to play around with a liquid breakfast before some of my longer outings and I am quite pleased so far. I normally go with 2 slices of Ezequiel bread, almond butter, honey and some hemp hearts on top, but it isn't always enough food. The mix that I have gone with is:

-1 heaping scoop Greek Style Yogurt
-1 scoop Vega meal replacement
-1 scoop Amazing Grass Green Superfood
-1 pack of Samabazon Acai
-1 shot of Ascenta Nutra Sea HP oil
-Almond milk+water to top it up

If I am riding I'll pour it over cereal, but for runs I have it solo. It looks like mud, but tastes like chocolate.

I had that combo yesterday before a long run on the North Shore yesterday and felt well fueled for the effort and my stomach was good throughout. I met up with Oliver Utting and we covered some ground on the trails. Lots of great running on slick trails. This is somewhere on Mt.Seymour: