Vegans as a nation is a dream come true
Vegan athlete Umang Singh about his journey
Hi! Please introduce yourself, why and when did you go vegan?
Being passionate about fitness I completed my Plantbased Nutrition Certification from eCornell NY, also pursuing Sports Nutrition Certification from ISSAI and recently launched my fitness program “YODA FITPLAN, OUTWORK ALL”.
I turned into a vegan and started going to gym to transform myself from the process of an unhealthy lifestyle to a healthier one and in particular to shed weight from 103 kgs to 68kgs and then move towards gaining lean mass and strength of 82 kg body weight ,eventually leading into a passionate weightlifter.
I had been working out since then but had a long gap of 3 years and couldn’t hit gym and gained weight due to unforseen circumstances and then in July 2019 , I again decided to get back into my best shape of life till now.
How do you use social media to promote veganism and what do you post?
I mostly post about plant-based diet, lifestyle an fitness. I share the facts about plant-based nutrition, cruelty behind dairy, poultry and meat industry. I make sure to talk about how it deteriorates our health.
I’ve my podcast show “Let’s talk fitness” where I invite people to share their views and experience about “how veganism helped them to heal physically and mentally”.
What’s your vegan guilty pleasure & what do you like to eat?
My everyday dessert is dark chocolate with peanut butter. My favourite meals are cooked broccoli, lentils, kidney beans, tofu, chickpeas, dried fruits (peanut, almond, walnut), green smoothies (mixture of oats, flax seed, supergreens and vegan protein), oat pancake with peanut butter.
What would be your advice to those on their way to become vegans?
As I always say, one should know their “WHY” & “HOW” and it will happen automatically. Everyone who’s on the road to become vegan, take your time and keep transitioning gradually, don’t do it overnight. Try to understand the basics of nutrition and body science especially if you have been a meat eater all your life.
What is the best/the most difficult about being a vegan?
One drastic change which happened in my life as an individual is I became very calm and loosened my temper. I used to be very hot headed earlier.
I’ve been having only positive experiences being vegan until now.
I believe, everyone supports you if you’re really serious about something and that’s what happened with me but yeah there are few incidents that keep happening inside the gym.
Most of the time inside the gym when I powerlift , the gym goers ask me about my diet plan including proteins source and almost everyone is surprised to know that I do not consume any animal products. So when I introduce veganism to them, they get defensive about dairy, meat etc. But seeing me is the living proof that one can get jacked on a plant-based diet and lifestyle.
In your opinion, how would the world change if vegans were a nation and had their own currency?
Ha-ha this is an amazing question! I must say it’ll be a dream come true.
What are your hopes for the future of your work and veganism in general?
I’ve a strong vision about growing my Instagram & YouTube channels and simultaneously working of my fitness program “YODA FIT PLAN”. It’s also a common myth that being healthy is elite and expensive, so one of my goals is to make sure all the products are affordable to anyone.
Especially after COVID19 , people are aalready moving towards plantbased diet, so I think there will be a huge growth of vegans all over the globe.
