Video: Soccer Star Erika Tymrak Gets the Ball Rolling On Vegan Eating

Utah Royals Midfielder Went Vegan and Hasn’t ‘Looked Back Once’

For Immediate Release:
May 10, 2018

Contact:
Moira Colley 202-483-7382

Utah Royals midfielder Erika Tymrak has teamed up with PETA for a new video in which she reveals how going vegan helped her performance both on and off the field and shares her belief that “we can make a lot more peace in the world if everyone realized that animals are here with us and not for us.”

In the video, Tymrak discusses how she shopped cruelty-free for years, which ultimately inspired her to stop eating animal “products” as well—and how she hasn’t looked back since making the switch: “[M]entally I feel so much more free and happy and at peace.”

And she’s noticed a lot of positive changes since going vegan. “I always had these fatigue spouts, and I didn’t really know why I would get them,” she says. “But shortly after going vegan, they kind of disappeared. … I recover faster, I sleep better, and I feel like I’ve been able to put on muscle a lot easier.” She adds that the switch has had an effect on her skin as well: “I used to have really bad acne since I was probably 11 or 12, and I would say a couple months after cutting animal products out, my acne cleared up.”

The 26-year-old goes on to encourage everyone to follow their hearts and seek out resources to help them make the transition: “I asked a lot of questions when I was going vegan, and the mentors that were there for me helped me a lot,” she concludes. “I hope I can be a mentor for future vegans.”

PETA—whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to eat”—notes that in addition to the benefits that Tymrak enjoys, other advantages of going vegan include a decreased risk of suffering from heart disease, strokes, diabetes, cancer, and obesity compared with meat-eaters. And of course, every person who goes vegan spares more than 100 animals a year daily suffering and a terrifying death in today’s meat, egg, and dairy industries.

Tymrak joins a long list of athletes—including Amanda Beard, Le’Veon Bell, Tim Howard, Tyrann Mathieu, Alex Morgan, Candace Parker, Christen Press, Ryan Tannehill, and Hannah Teter—who’ve teamed up with PETA to promote kindness to animals.

For more information, please visit PETA.org.