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I recall making the point that athleticism and endurance performance were not wholly synonyms when the original post mas made. The qualifier of "at least in endurance sports" is appreciated. I would probably concede, not actively harmful, controlling for macro nutrient composition and micro-nutrient availability.
Its interesting you cite a gravel cyclist in your discussion. I see marathon distance running as one of the sports where it is the least sub-optimal. Cycling nutrition was a area where there was surprisingly little systematic study. It seems like not that long ago World Tour teams were only doing like 60 g/hour of carbs, while 120 g/hour is normal now. Given that, it does seem possible that the state of the art will change. That being said, Dylan Johnson is certainly cutting against the grain of what the World Tour teams apparently think is optimal. Honey is a common binder and carb source for rice cakes for Pro teams. I think most teams also allow riders milk with their coffee, even during the Tour. Whey is an extremely common ingredient in post-race recovery drinks, you see it featured in essentially every Tour nutrition interview where they disclose whats in the drink.
Looking at the very top level of gravel riding, arguably the Monuments like the Tour of Flanders, Paris–Roubaix, and Strade Bianche were the top level of gravel before gravel was a category. Based on the UCI Gravel World Championships it seems like the classics riders are still at least one level above those in the UCI Gravel World Series. All this to say Pogi and Cancellara are clearly levels above Dylan Johnson (who is very very good). I'm very sure I've seen video or photos of them drinking either flat whites or cappuccinos. I think I even recall a video of Cancellara eating fish back in the Leopard-Trek days, and one where Pogačar has beef in his fridge. It doesn't seem likely that adopting a vegan diet is the key to optimal gravel riding performance. Not necessarily actively very harmful, but I'm actually a bit surprised Johnson claims it's for performance reasons.
I think he has said that it's mainly for recovery and weight management reasons. It's very difficult to gain weight when you are primarily eating high volumes of vegetables. Tour riders probably have much more effective ways of maintaining and losing weight with precision that semi-pro athletes like Dylan Johnson don't have access to (mainly thinking a team of nutritionists). In terms of recovery, the same is probably true, although that does suggest that there aren't any particularly big advantages to maintaining a strict vegan diet. The healthiest cohorts in pretty much any dietary meta-analysis aren't vegetarians or vegans, but pescatarians or people who follow the mediterranean diet, which contains some amount of eat. This suggests both that some amount of meat is healthy for you, and also probably that most of the recovery/reduced inflammation gains come from cutting down on meat consumption, not eliminating it. I doubt that most riders have a very meat heavy-diet (they need lots of carbs for performance reasons, and meat has almost 0 carbs), so Dylan's alpha by being more strictly plant-based is likely quite low.
In terms of my own performance, I'm starting to think that it's time to think about locking down a source of eggs from local chickens that I know are treated-well and thinking about introducing fish low in the food chain (like Sardines or anchovies) that I don't feel ethically conflicted about and seeing if that makes any difference. For now though certainly going to keep eating oysters.
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