Kane Richardson, who went vegan in 2016 after watching documentaries about the meat and dairy industries, also revealed what he likes to eat.
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Australian cricketer Kane Richardson has opened up about going vegan in a frank interview with the BBC.
The top sportsman cut out animal products in 2016 after watching vegan documentaries on the meat and dairy industries.
While some people wondered whether this would affect his performance on the field, he says it was not something he worried about.
Kane told the BBC: “I never really thought about if it would impact my cricket because I didn’t care to be honest.
“It’s my job but there’s bigger things out there in life. I thought ‘I’ll make do – if my body changes, I’ll figure it out’. For me it wasn’t a performance thing.”
Kane Richardson on vegan food
The fast bowler, who is representing Australia in the T20 World Cup at the moment, also revealed that he’s been the subject of mockery since ditching meat and dairy, saying other cricketers would ask if he was ‘going to start eating the grass’ if he got hungry.
“Some people do still think that’s how the diet is, so it is funny when you can explain it to them and say no, there’s a whole lot more that’s available now, and it’s probably getting easier every day,” he added.
Sharing his plant-based food habits, Kane revealed that he likes to eat legumes and tofu, noting that he ‘eats a lot’.
The 31-year-old, who went vegetarian in 2014, also noted that he should have done so sooner, as he never enjoyed eating meat, and always preferred tofu.
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‘Not a big thing’
Speaking in more detail about his decision to go vegan, Kane told Great Vegan Athletes that seeing a documentary about veganism, paired with driving past a farm sparked the change in his and his wife’s lifestyle.
He explained: “We drove past a farm or something and there were some lambs and my partner was like, ‘They actually remind me of our dog’.”
From that day on, he said, they stopped eating lamb, adding that ‘once you make a justification of one thing, it’s like we probably shouldn’t eat beef either, and then it’s pork, fish, chicken’.
He continued: “I remember being at Bangalore and I was vegetarian. I think it was a day off and I watched a documentary on Netflix – I think it’s called Conspiracy.
“My wife watched it and she showed it to me. I got through the tour and then got home and she said, ‘We’re going vegan’. It wasn’t that big a thing.”
Kane Richardson isn’t the only hugely successful vegan sportsperson. Here are 11 vegan athletes you didn’t know ate a plant-based diet.
Featured image credit: Chris Hyde/Stringer via Getty Images
