Eating the Correct Ratio of Macronutrients

We have evolved through hundreds of thousands of years and have adapted to our environments and ways of life differently depending on our situations and surroundings, this has a profound affect when it comes to fat loss and I will explain more in upcoming posts.

Earth has many diverse habitats providing many different food sources, each providing their own set of macronutrient availability; we have all evolved slightly differently when it comes to our macronutrient needs because of this.

Other than the obvious physiological differences between us that are visible to the naked eye, there are fundamental differences that we can’t see when it comes to our food needs.

If your genes trace back through roots where an abundance of meat and game were available you may have higher protein and fat needs than someone who can trace their genes to an area where it was not so substantive, they may need less fat and protein and more carbohydrates.

The fact is that everyone is different when it comes to their macronutrient needs and it will take a while for you to get this right.

We need a start point for this, so with a client I use Protein to decide my first percentage. You should all have completed Test and Measurement so should know your daily protein requirement in Grams per day.

We need to work out what percentage of your TDEE is used by your daily Protein requirement. To find this we need to take the following steps.

Multiply your daily protein requirement (in grams) by 4kcal (the amount of kcals per gram of protein)
We then divide the answer by your TDEE
And multiply this by 100
This gives us your Protein percentage.

Example 150g protein per day 2500kcal a day

150 x 4 = 600kcal
600 / 2500 = 0.24
0.24 x 100 = 24%

I would source no less than 60% of your Calories from Carbohydrates so to find your Fat % it is quite easy

Step 1 add your carbohydrate percentage to your protein percentage
Step 2 calculate 100 – your result
For our example person it would be

60+24 = 84
100 – 84 = 16%

So our Daily Macronutrient Ratio would be 60% Carbohydrates 24% Protein and 16% Fat

This is just a starting point, unless you are exceptionally lucky you will need to fine tune this to get the best results however I will show you how to interpret your results to recognise where you need to change things.