know your MACROs

Where to start?

All credit for simplifying this concept goes to Ted Naiman MD & William Shewfelt and their book the “P:E Diet” - see a link to a downloadable copy of their book below.

So what to eat and how much?

The majority of clients I work with tend to under-eat protein and over-eat carbs and fat. This leads to weight gain and poor body composition.

If you are at your happy weight and body composition, beach-ready and excited with how things are, then great! Perhaps all you need to do is eat real food until you are full and carry on as you are…….

As this does not describe most people we need to go a bit deeper.

Macros & Calories

Macronutrients - There are only 3: protein, fat and carbohydrates (carbs) - also known as "MACROS"

Micronutrients - There are loads of these, vitamins and minerals - we address these elsewhere.

Calories - We don't need to worry about these if we understand a bit about the macros.

Fact: calorie counting alone does not work well!

Fact: MACROS matter.

To achieve a healthy body weight and composition, ie enough muscle to see us fit and healthy into our 70s, 80s and 90s with a minimum amount of toxic visceral fat that doesn't give us diabetes, heart disease and cancer by 50, we need to think about our balance of Protein to Energy Ratio*

*Ted Naiman & William Shewfelt’s “Over / Under” calculation pg 194 of the **P:E Diet** book. Buy the downloadable PDF for $20 - 398 pages of nutritional wisdom.

So for someone who is aiming for 80 kg (approx 160 lbs) as their healthy or lean body weight then they need to aim for 160 g of protein per day and no more than 160 g of Fat and Net Carbs combined.

Fact: calorie counting does not work.

Fact: knowing your macros does.

This does not mean you have to weigh all your food forever but it does mean that at some point you do need to invest some time into knowing how much protein, fat and carbs are in the food you are eating.

Tools:

1. Download the Cronometer App to your phone. For bodymapping members please send me a message from the Health & Data Tracker if you want free access to Cronometer Gold as part of your membership.

2. bodymapping members connect the Cronometer App to your health and data tracker

4. Explain to anyone who lives with you that you need their support over these five days and promise them that this won't go on forever!

5. Set aside five days where you weigh and track everything that passes your lips.

If you have had a recent bodymapping core markers blood test and want me to add a MACRO prescription to your 6-month review, that is bespoke to you please add your current weight to your Health & Data tracker dashboard, send me a message and I will update your last coaching note with a MACRO prescription.

6. After these five days, you will be a much wiser person and understand how your current food intake matches the above guide.

7. Adjust what you eat accordingly.

If you’re not already a member please join here and start your better health journey today!

A word about PROTEIN

It is likely that your protein target is much higher than what you are used to. Probably by as much as double. If so, please understand this is a target, you don't have to hit this target on the first day or even in the first week. Rather, you should work towards it over the next few weeks. Build up to it.

A word about FAT & CARBS

Your fat and carbs macros can be interchanged to some degree as they are both 'energy'. If you add your grams of carbs + your grams of fat they should be the same or less than your total grams of protein.

This does help give you some flexibility around what you eat. Some people like to eat more carbs on the days that they are more active - if you are doing this, drop the fat by the amount you increase the carbs.

Remember:

if you want to lose and burn body fat you will need to eat less dietary fat.
if you know you are more insulin resistant, you will need to keep the carbs down.

Finally......PROTEIN IS KING........FOCUS ON HITTING YOUR PROTEIN TARGET, but it's ok to work up to it slowly.