Macronutrients: How to calculate yours to lose body fat.

I thought about writing I wrote a super long, science-y, in depth post about what each macronutrient does in your body, why you need each, and how to calculate it (with math). Then I highlighted it, deleted it, and decided to condense it to make it easier to understand and less time consuming on your part.

(believe me, this is the shorter version, I swear.)

Here goes!

If you're eating your daily recommended calorie intake but you're still not losing weight, you need to check out your macronutrient ratios. If your macro levels are out of whack, your body won't burn fat the way it should. Eating too much in any category causes similar fat gain.

What is a macronutrient?

The nutrients that come from food. Everything (besides alcohol) breaks down into one of these three categories: Carbohydrates, Fats, and Proteins.

Every day, you need each one of these things in your diet. Muy importante. This explains why.

The Recommended Daily Allowances are as follows:
Carbohydrates: 45%-65%
Proteins: 10-35%
Fats: 20-35%

RDA's are good guidelines for a well-balanced diet, but researchers don't know exactly everything there is to know about these ratios yet. For example, we now know that if you're trying to build muscle mass you need to drastically increase your protein intake, often over the "35% limit " that is "recommended".

The RDA's are recommended, not necessarily the golden rule. You should never ever ever eliminate a macronutrient from your diet, it's unhealthy, bad for your metabolism, and dangerous. You can, however, change these numbers a little. Don't stray too far from the RDA's! (The Atkins Diet, which catches a ton of heat nowadays, only allowed 10% carbs -- Not good!)

The best ratio I've found to be effective for regular exercisers is 40% Carbs, 30% protein, 30% fat. This builds lean muscle, sparks fat loss, and fuels your body with safe macronutrient ranges. This is a popular and recognized percentage range.

How to calculate YOUR macro grams!

Percentages can be confusing and "eyeballing it" like ChooseMyPlate.gov suggests isn't incredibly accurate, so lucky for us (I will save you the math equation) there are calculators to convert your chosen macronutrient percentages into grams.

Calculator can be found here.

All you need to do is:
-- Plug in your daily calories (If you don't know how to find that number, start here.)
--Add your custom calorie number and change the percentages on the Macronutrient Calculator. (Ask your trainer/doctor/nutritionist for what ratio might work best for you, or try the 40%/30%/30% ratio if you're a regular exerciser)
--On the right side, it gives you how many grams of each macronutrient you'll need per day. Write these numbers down.

Here is an example:

Not done yet!

Use this information coupled with the MyFitnessPal app (Free, available in the app store if you have a smart phone) to log everything you put into your mouth.*

*Literally, everything. Buy a kitchen scale if you have to. Pay it forward and just do it. I know it's annoying to have to log everything, but if you do it for a few weeks and planning your meals around your calorie and macronutrient levels will become a whooooole lot easier. You'll learn what your favorite foods provide you with, and it'll become second nature for you to accurately estimate a day's calorie and macronutrient intake.

On Fitness pal, tap "Daily" instead of summary to keep track of your macronutrient intakes as you log them.

Pay attention to your totals, not the FitnessPal pre-set "goal". This is based off of different percentages. They're safe percentages, but not personalized to you and your goals, so keep your Fats, Carbs, and Proteins within your pre-determined ranges that you found from the macronutrient calculator.

As another rule (as if you need any more, right?) Keep your sugar intake under 25 grams per day.

What to eat.

COMPLEX carbohydrates (click to read more about complex carbs)
HEALTHY fats, and
LEAN proteins.

Trying to get your macronutrient requirements from unhealthy foods like burgers, chips, cupcakes, and fried food is going to put you wayyyy over your calorie limit, thus causing weight gain.

I swear to you, with these two things, you can't go wrong. All it takes is some pain-in-the-ass effort for a few weeks and then it'll start making a little more sense and you wont have to use MyFitnessPal anymore.

Good luck guys!!!