By A. Tracy Bier








Feb. 7, 2006

If you see a young man dressed in bold colored NASCAR clothes shopping for produce, it’s likely to be Jerrod Sessler. When the Seattle-based racing enthusiast travels in the NASCAR circuit, he keeps to a mostly raw diet by stocking up on vegetables in local stores.

Fast cars are one of Jerrod’s loves and he drives a late model stock car on the professional NASCAR and ASA (American Speed Association) regional circuits.

As much as he loves autos and racing, Jerrod is also passionate about his family and nutrition and diet.

“A major reason I can chase my dream of racing and also be a dad and husband is because of my vegan raw food diet …and, yes, I do mostly raw foods while I’m on the race circuit”, he says. The mid-30s man who beams with good health is close to 100% raw.

The sport of race car driving is as American as apple pie and accordingly, the standard fare at most tracks is hamburgers--which Jerrod says he never eats.

While he admits it can be difficult maintaining a raw food diet when he’s racing, nothing compares to the challenge he faced six years ago. In 2000 Jerrod’s doctors delivered the gut-wrenching news that he had stage IV melanoma.

“They told me that I had about a five percent chance of living 10 years," Jerrod says. They told him his treatment options were chemotherapy, radiation, interferon or simple ‘monitoring’. "They said that these treatments or combinations of them would improve my odds up to 15 percent or so,” Jerrod said.

Doctors also warned him that the chemical treatments and radiation made it unlikely that he and his wife would be able to have children.

Following a period of intense research, discernment, and prayer, Jerrod and his young wife Nikki decided against traditional treatments and opted for radically changing Sessler’s diet.

It took them weeks and month to do an “exteme makeover” of their diet to revamp their habits and their pantry. The result was what they still follow today: a strict vegan diet, mostly raw foods that haven’t been processed, with no dairy or meat.

Their positive and courageous vision for using food as medicine in life and death circumstances was due to the young couples’ deep religious faith, as well as support from family and friends.

Today all Sessler family members are healthy and thriving, including three new additions to the family; two boys and a girl whose ages range from eight months to four years old.

Jerrod is thrilled to have defeated his cancer and happy to continue racing cars, a lifelong passion that started at age four when he announced that he wanted to be a race car driver. He raced go-karts as a boy and raced stock cars professionally in l998.

When he heads to the track, he acknowledges it takes a little extra planning to maintain a healthy diet--how to transport healthy fresh foods from home, keep it at the track, and find healthful meals and snacks in a new city or town.

Jerrod talks about the social aspect of being selective about his food choices in business and other settings where steak and french fries are standard fare. How others react to his vigilance over eating healthfully sometimes troubles him. No matter how discreet he is about his food choices, things happen, he says. “I was at a dinner meeting when the guy next to me pushed away a huge T-bone steak after only one bite. Then he said ‘How can I sit here and eat this while you eat all that healthy food?' ”

Sometimes at the race track Sessler will attend a drivers’ meeting with a red pepper or some healthy food in hand. People are puzzled by it and find it unsettling. He says it can be helpful for your competition to be mystified by what you do.

Jerrod expects his mostly-regional racing competition to go national in the near future and require even more traveling. In addition to racing cars, he has his own company HomeTask.com and he and his wife formed, and Hope4Health, a nonprofit foundation to support their ongoing work teaching about health and nutrition.

It’s likely that Jerrod Sessler will keep his racing career revved up as he continues to maintain an impressive high-energy pace of juggling family, business and health. How inspiring for us, to know we can cheer on a NASCAR driver who is fueled by fruits and vegetables, not hamburgers and French fries.

Jerrod Sessler’s Tips For Keeping a Raw Vegan Diet At The Race Track:

• Before you leave town, review your eating schedule and anticipate your needs.

• Note dining out times and take the time to make arrangements to order vegetarian meals. Make up your own vegan meal request cards for banquets.

• Invest in a soft-sided cooler or even a child’s lunch box that will fit into a wider brief case. Consider cooler for the hotel room.

• Ask the hotel staff about grocery stories and find those that have good organic sections.

• For emergencies, keep raw vegan snack bars on hand and a cooler full of fresh produce.

• Don’t give into pressure from others who don't understand your lifestyle.

Note: A. Tracy Bier lives in Seattle, WA where she's a freelance writer and public relations consultant. Her favorite things to write about are private and public nonprofit concerns that strive to upgrade and improve the condition of our thinking, education, health, and the world we live in.