Photo: Nenad Stojkovic via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 2.0, cropped.
A study supported by the US beef industry has found that a vegan diet builds muscle just as well as one containing meat. The research was backed by the Beef Checkoff programme, overseen by the National Cattlemen's Beef Board, yet muscle protein synthesis during nine days of weight training came out the same whether young adults ate vegan or omnivorous meals. Spreading protein evenly across the day made no difference either.
Professor Nicholas Burd and Andrew Askow at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign randomised 40 healthy, active 20 to 40-year-olds to vegan or omnivorous diets with matched protein of 1.1-1.2g per kg of body weight, publishing in Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise. About 70% of the omnivores' protein came from beef, pork, chicken, dairy and eggs. Every meal was provided, participants trained their whole body three times, and heavy water plus muscle biopsies measured how much new muscle protein they built.
Burd said in the Illinois release that if anyone asks him about the best food for muscle building, he'll tell them:
It's the kind you put in your mouth after exercise. As long as you're getting sufficient high-quality protein from your food, then it really doesn't make a difference.
Earlier single-meal studies suggested animal protein had the edge, but over a whole diet the gap disappears.
It adds to a 2023 trial showing a vegan diet builds muscle just as well as meat, last year's finding that pea protein builds muscle just as well as whey in older men, and the 2017 research showing plant protein was better for building muscle.
The "weak vegan" stereotype is dead and buried.