The Best Diet for Endurance
By Alfred R. Roos
Mistaken Notions Concerning Meat Eating—Extensive Experiments Lead to Unavoidable Conclusions
For centuries, men have partaken of flesh foods, to a large degree with the thought in mind that their strength and power to perform exhausting labor depended upon this. Until very recent years, this idea reigned practically supreme; but here, as along other lines, under the close scrutiny of scientific investigation, many surprising things have been discovered. Although many different phases of the question concerning flesh foods as a necessary part of man’s diet have been carefully considered, but little attention has been directed toward the relation of endurance to this form of diet. Within the last few years, however, several investigators—Chittenden, Mendel, Fisher, Folin, Caspari, Metchnikoff, and others—have discovered, by their experiments, some very interesting facts. A summary of a few of them will make clear the point in question. SURPRISING ENDURANCE TESTS
Prof. Irving Fisher, of Yale University, conducted a series of simple endurance tests on some athletes and nurses and physicians. He divided them into three groups, according to diet and occupation: first, flesh eaters, athletes, most of whom used meat two or three times a day—a distinctly high protein dietary; second, flesh abstaining athletes; and third, flesh abstainers, not athletes, but men of sedentary habits. Having no exact mechanical method of measuring endurance, Professor Fisher selected three simple tests: first, holding the arms horizontally as long as possible; second, deep knee bending; and third, leg raising with subject lying on his back. In order that there might be no doubt whatsoever as to the superiority of the winning side, every possible advantage was given to the flesh eaters. In exercise, time for rest and leisure, physique, fresh air, and other matters that might have some bearing on the results, he found the flesh eating athletes to be the more favored. The results seem, therefore, to be based on difference in diet alone. ARM HOLDING |
Number of Persons |
Average Record |
|---|
| Flesh eaters, athletes |
15 |
10 minutes |
| Flesh abstainers, athletes |
19 |
39 minutes |
| Flesh abstainers, sedentary |
13 |
64 minutes |
DEEP KNEE BENDING |
Number of Persons |
Average Record |
|---|
| Flesh eaters, athletes |
9 |
383 times |
| Flesh abstainers, athletes |
16 |
927 times |
| Flesh abstainers, sedentary |
5 |
535 times |
LEG RAISING |
Number of Persons |
Average Record |
|---|
| Flesh eaters, athletes |
6 |
279 times |
| Flesh abstainers, athletes |
6 |
288 times |
| Flesh abstainers, sedentary |
1 |
74 times |
From this general comparison, we see that the flesh abstainers had far greater endurance than the flesh eaters, all of whom were athletes. Concerning the individual comparisons, Professor Fisher says: “Even the maximum record of the flesh eaters was barely more than half the average for the flesh abstainers. Only two of the fifteen flesh eaters succeeded in holding their arms out over a quarter of an hour, whereas twenty-two of the thirty-two abstainers surpassed that limit. None of the flesh eaters reached half an hour, but fifteen of the thirty-two abstainers exceeded that limit. Of these, nine exceeded an hour, four exceeded two hours, and one exceeded three hours.” “In respect to deep knee bending, if we take the number 325 for reference, we find that of the nine flesh eaters, only three surpassed this figure, while of the twenty-one abstainers, seventeen surpassed it. Only one of the nine flesh eaters reached one thousand, as against six of the twenty-one abstainers. None of the former surpassed two thousand, as against two of the latter.” “In respect to leg raising, the records show little difference. None of the contestants reached their absolute limits.” Another evidence of the superiority of the flesh abstainers is found in their quick recovery from the after effects. Although the tests were painful to all, none of the abstainers were incapacitated by them, but some of the flesh eaters were very much incapacitated for several days, and one or two for two weeks or more. LESS MEAT AND MORE ENDURANCE
In another experiment, on nine Yale students, they reduced their consumption of flesh foods to one sixth the amount formerly used, guided only by their taste. By thorough mastication, they lost their taste for flesh foods. At the end of five months, although their strength was about the same as formerly, their endurance had increased on the average by over ninety per cent, according to gymnasium tests. At the University of Brussels, Belgium, careful tests and comparisons have been made of the endurance of vegetarians and flesh eaters. A few excerpts from their published accounts will suffice to show the results: “So far as strength is concerned, very little difference was discovered between vegetarians and carnivores. In endurance, on the other hand, a very remarkable difference was found, the vegetarians surpassing the carnivores from fifty to two hundred per cent, according to the method of measurement.” “The vegetarians recuperated from fatigue far more quickly than the meat eaters.” “Comparing the two sets of subjects on the basis of mechanical work, it is found that the vegetarians surpassed the carnivores, on the average, by fifty-three per cent.” “Comparing the two groups on the basis of the length of time the ergograph could be continuously operated, it was found that the vegetarian could work on the ergograph two or three times as long as the meat eaters before reaching the exhaustion point.” SUPERIOR ATHLETES AND VEGETARIANISM
In the world of sports also these facts are noticed. Dr. David Paulson, of Hinsdale, Illinois, said not long ago: “Several years ago, I attended a banquet in Chicago. The man who sat at my side was the sporting editor of one of the leading Chicago dailies. As he observed that I did not eat meat, the conversation naturally turned on the merits of vegetarianism, and he said to me, ‘Strangely enough, the long distance bicycle man, the long distance walker, the long distance swimmer, the champion tennis player, are all vegetarians.’” Horace Fletcher’s surprising endurance, as shown by his beating the records of Yale’s best athletes in their gymnasium and other training exercises, is probably now well known to the people of the country. Concerning these taxing exercises and the results, Dr. Anderson, director of the Yale gymnasium, says: “Mr. Fletcher has taken these movements with an ease that is unlooked for. He gives evidence of no soreness or lameness, and the large groups of muscles respond the second day without evidence of distress after or during the endurance test, that is, the long run. The heart is fast, but regular. It comes back to its normal beat quicker than the hearts of other men of his weight and age.” “The case is unusual, and I am surprised that Mr. Fletcher can do the work of trained athletes and not give marked evidences of overexertion. My conclusion, given in condensed form, is this: Mr. Fletcher performs this work with greater ease and with fewer noticeable bad results than any man of his age and condition I have ever worked with.” Mr. Fletcher did this on a simple diet of breakfast food, milk, and maple sugar. That he was not a “somatic freak of abnormal muscle development” is shown from the fact that some other men who lived on a simple diet and Fletcherized, thus practicing his system, took the same tests, and surpassed Mr. Fletcher’s record “in just so far as they had a natural advantage over him in youth or physical training.” MUSCULAR STRENGTH AND ENDURANCE
Professor Chittenden’s experiments with a detachment of twenty soldiers, with eight university athletes, and with certain other individuals, and on himself, have corroborated the evidence just presented, and show that with the decrease of flesh foods, and changing from high protein to low protein basis, there comes a surprising increase of muscular strength and endurance. In the Life Boat of May, 1914, Dr. David Paulson, in speaking of diet and what has been learned concerning the effects of it, mentions some of Dr. Hindhede’s work in this direction. Dr. Hindhede, who is now director of the Danish government laboratory for nutrition researches, began investigating the fleshless diet by experimenting on himself. For one month, he lived on bread, butter, potatoes, sugar, and fruit almost entirely—a diet that is “notably deficient in protein.” Instead of becoming weakened, or infirm in any way, he experienced excellent health. He now began experimenting in earnest along these new lines, and the results are very interesting. Hindhede reports the case of a young man named Madsen, who not only was a vegetarian, but also left out coffee, tea, liquor, and tobacco. Finally he was drafted into the military service. He ate nothing of the regular menu that did not meet his approval. I quote the following from the surgeon-major’s report of his case: “His diet was almost incredibly simple, consisting of bread, water, cacao butter, potatoes, and rarely a little milk. He was a particularly useful man, an arduous worker, and possessed of greater powers of endurance than most people. He thrived amazingly. During the whole eighteen months, he was never on the sick list, and never sought medical assistance.” LIKE THE ALCOHOL ILLUSION
The experiments of these investigators and others—Combe, of Lausanne, Metchnikoff and Lissier, of Paris, Herter and others in the United States—all seem to prove, as Professor Fisher states it, “that the fancied strength from meat is, like the fancied strength from alcohol, an illusion. The beef and ale of England are largely sources of weakness, not strength.” This statement corroborates the one made in the book Ministry of Healing, under the discussion of flesh as food: “It is a mistake to suppose that muscular strength depends on the use of animal food. The needs of the system can be better supplied, and more605vigorous health can be enjoyed, without its use. The grains, with fruits, nuts, and vegetables, contain all the nutritive properties necessary to make good blood. These elements are not so well or so fully supplied by a flesh diet. Had the use of flesh been essential to health and strength, animal food would have been included in the diet appointed man in the beginning.” Every year, the truthfulness of these statements is demonstrated more fully. Thousands of persons who have made such a change in diet as suggested, have proved to their own satisfaction what science has demonstrated by the experiments I have mentioned. An old saying declares that we are getting wiser but weaker. It is our privilege to become wiser and stronger—a very necessary matter for us “upon whom the ends of the world are come.”