Nutrition Is The Key To Good Health

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Nutrition planning is determining when, what and how much food an individual must consume to stay healthy. Eating meals and snacks every 2.5 to 3 hours is essential to a healthy metabolism. Foods are made up of energy units called Calories; calories come from proteins, fats and carbohydrates (these are called the macronutrients). 

Note: Always check with your medical practitioner for allergies or contraindications to certain foods or medications!

Calories

A calorie is how energy is measured in foods or how it is used for energy by the body. The calories referred to in diet and exercise are also called kilocalories (kcal). 

A pound of fat contains approximately 3500 calories (kcal) of energy. To lose a pound of fat in a week a person must either eat approximately 500 fewer calories or expend (exercise) an additional 500 (kcal) per day (while sparing muscle mass). This is 500 calories per day X 7 days = 3500 calories. This doesn't mean starving yourself, fat loss is accomplished through eating healthy foods that have a higher nutritional value with less empty calories (junk food)!

A person wanting to gain weight would have to eat more food (calories) than they expend.  This means if a person who requires 1800 calories a day to maintain their current weight, they would need to eat more than 1800 calories per day to be able to gain additional weight.  Conversely, the same person looking to lose weight would have to eat a little less than 1800 calories per day.

Once your coach has determined how many calories you need to gain, lose or maintain a particular ideal body weight, you also have to know the ratio of each macro-nutrient (proteins, fats and carbohydrates).  Learn more about that here.

To find your ideal body weight use the chart provided: Click here.