Nutrition Hack Wednesday: Why You Need Macros in Your Life!

✳️Once you hit a certain point, you can pretty much know what and how much food you are consuming within a certain range.  

For instance, a professional golfer 🏌️‍♀️can hit a shot with a club and probably within 5-10 yards tell you how far he hit the ball.  An architect could most likely look at a room and judge the square feet of that room pretty accurately. And a professional gamer 🎮 could probably guess within 1-2 energy drunks 😈, how many they have consumed within a 24 hour period.  HAHA!

I joke 🃏 because I used to be a hardcore gamer (at least I think) so, I know energy 😵 drinks can be consumed at a crazy, rapid rate without even thinking about the consequences.


Briefly, macros refer to the 3️⃣ main macronutrients being carbohydrates, fats, and proteins.  Each has a certain caloric value represented per gram.  For instance, 1g of fats = 9️⃣calories, 1g of carbohydrates = 4️⃣ calories, and 1g of protein is also = 4️⃣ calories.

So, if you eat a 🍔 burger with 30g of fat, 40g of protein and 25g of carbs, all you have to do is multiply those number by the associated caloric value per gram and boom! you have the total calorie number.  

Although, we’ve discussed before, all calories are not the same and 10g of sugar 🍦 (carb) does not affect the body the same weight 10g of sweet 🥔 potato.

Macro counting can seem like a daunting task 😳 at first but the benefits ✅ are huge for those wanting to lose weight, gain muscle mass, train for a competition, or increase optimal performance.  Hitting your total caloric intake for the day is great 👍 but if the ratios of Carbs to Protein to Fats is all ❌ jacked up, you may not be seeing the results you want, if any at all.

If you’re an everyday person who doesn’t really care about macros 🤷‍♀️ then I would still suggest counting your nutrient intake for at least 3️⃣0️⃣ days.  This would allow you to actually see what and how much of each nutrient is in a food item and if you are abundant or deficient in any area.

I just recently ❗️started tracking my own again to see how good I was only my total intake and to be honest, I was pretty spot on.  This is 1 part pure luck, but also, from years of experience counting my macros and weighing food day after day.  This process becomes a habit 🐾 just like anything else and really doesn’t take a lot of time.


With the advances of most tracking apps, all you really have to do is snap 📷 a photo of the food item eaten or added to the menu and enter the quantity.  Since I just started back tracking, I wanted to see what apps were out there and which ones had improved.  Search engines, app store, and some more revealed different results.  I downloaded and even bought 🙄 a few of the apps just to see how easily they integrated with different features.

Long story short, MyFitnessPal is still one of the best and easiest to use.  🔥 Did I mention the basic features are all FREE!  This is all I need and it works perfectly.  The only benefit for me, would be to pay so it does math for me.  The free version 🚫 won’t say you have 40g of carbs left.  

Instead, the app just shows you how many you’ve consumed (80g) and what your total for the day is (120g).  So you just have to know 120-80 = 40g left for the day.

I also, subscribed to Avatar Nutrition to see what a computer based macro coach was really like.  The price is $9.99/month and asks you to weigh-in and take simple measurements to adjust your macros accordingly.  

This seems like a cool 😎 concept and they use IIFYM style of “flexible dieting” to get your where you want to be.  The downside for me is they don’t have a “low carb” setting and I can’t adjust my ratios where I’d like them.

I decided to pay and subscribe with the program because you obtain access to the
Facebook group where you can chat with tons of other people and the founders directly.  To me, that’s worth the $10 alone.  Downside though, they only integrate with 1 specific macro counting app and it costs $2.99 to download. 

So, I downloaded it and became instantly frustrated with the process because it took so long to log food plus, the macro nutrients were off.  🏃Quickly, I went back to the App Store and downloaded MyFitnessPal again, logged my macros, and was right at home pretty easily.


All-in-all I don’t think most people need to weigh food for the rest of their lives.  I will, however, stress the importance of macro counting if you are trying to optimize your performance, lose/gain weight, or anything else on this spectrum.  You need to tailor specific ratios based on what you are trying to get out of your body and specifically, your body type.   Even if you’re not on one of these paths, it’s still a great idea to track for at least 30 days so you know

  1. How many calories you are actually ingesting
  2. Where you are abundant or deficient in macros/micro nutrients
  3. What ratios work best for your individual body type

Remember the one-size-fits-all approach isn’t the way to go.  Try a specific diet out, see your ratios first hand, and find one that works for you.  I would suggest:

  1. Seeing your doctor before trying anything out especially if you had or have any conditions.  Plus doing some blood work to see how the dietary changes really do affect you after 30 days.
  2. Looking for a Dietary Coach if you need help.

I truly hope this article helps.  Do you have a better way to track macros?  Do you even bother with it?


Happy Training 🙂




Burning Fat: Ketosis, and Fasting. (Part 2/4, Click Here)

Over the last few months I’ve been diving hard into the subject matter of diet and obesity rates.  I am intrigued to figure out exactly how America and the world, for that matter, have become so overweight and obese over the last 100 years.  My goal here is to make you hungry for answers just as I am.  I want to present you facts about ketosis and fasting and let you make your own decision based on what science says.

Continue reading “Burning Fat: Ketosis, and Fasting. (Part 2/4, Click Here)”