Amazing vegan-friendly recipes to try Game Changers Looking at a plant-based diet

Natalie Wixon

Over the past couple of months, whenever someone has asked me if I have seen ‘that documentary’, I answer ‘Game Changers’ before they can finish, because I know exactly what documentary they are talking about.

Game Changers begins with James Wilks, Martial Arts Professional and Combatives Instructor, who suffered from a serious injury in both his knees. To speed up his recovery, he begins researching ways that he could heal his injuries better. He finds research on the remains of Roman Gladiators, in which the bones are found to have high levels of strontium, something typically associated with those following a vegetarian diet. It is then suspected that these top-level fighters were in fact, eating plant-based diets, in order to be the strongest and fittest they could possibly be, and to allow for optimal recovery. To me, it is a well-rounded documentary, looking at a variety of different effects eating a plant-based diet has on the body. I also liked the fact that there was great diversity across the athletes included on the programme. You had different body types, different genders, different ethnicities and contrasting disciplines from ultra-marathoners and Olympic power-lifters, to boxing heavyweight champions and NFL players. I am pleased with how the documentary has opened people’s minds to the idea of eating less animal products. I commend the documentary for making people question the tired belief that protein only comes from eating meat, and that eating a vegan diet would mean not having proper nutrition, when the opposite is true. There was a great message from actor/producer, governor and former bodybuilder himself, Arnold Schwarzenegger, who dispelled the myth of men only being ‘manly’ if they ate meat. He instead highlighted how it was all simply a marketing ploy. Schwarzenegger added that he too, used to buy into the same idea. After being vegetarian for 15 years now, I have absolutely no doubt that I get enough protein for my body to function correctly, at its best. Actually, five months ago I took a body composition analysis by InBody, medical-grade technology, and the results showed that I needed 9.1-11.1kg of protein in my body to build muscle, and I scored 10.4kg. Therefore, showing me that I was getting plenty of protein for my body, from my vegetarian diet. I do realise that Game Changers could be considered biased because of the links to vegan food companies through its investors. But, I think that it would be hard to generate funding to create a documentary like this, and I thought that the links critics found to investors were actually weak. Many say that the documentary is not science-backed enough, but to me what is important about this documentary, is that it is getting people thinking about going vegan because it is better for our long-term health, the animals and the environment. David Attenborough said that 17-year-old Greta Thunberg has achieved what no other climate change activists have - getting people to actually listen and pay attention. I feel that Game Changers has achieved this in a similar way with the subject of veganism, because now I find that people are changing their views and becoming open to the idea of eating plant-based foods. I think that this film has been successful in reaching a wider audience to think about eating a plant-based diet because it has not been forcing its views on others, and therefore I believe it will pave the way for similar documentaries to follow in its footsteps. I also felt that when the documentary began, James was being sceptical about how a plant-based diet could possibly provide enough protein for athletes to recover from intense exercise, yet we saw a transformation of how he changed his mind after the extensive research he did while trying to heal from his injuries. I firmly support that eating more plants is the way forward.