Sports Nutrition Guide - Part 2 Daily Meals and Snacks

Sports Nutrition Information - Macronutrients

So, now you know how to figure out how much daily calories you need, and what portion of your total calories should come from proteins, carbohydrates, and fats from previous part - now let's quickly figure out what the heck are proteins, carbs, and fats - or macronutrients.

Proteins

Protein is an essential nutrients, since your body can't make its own, so you have to get it from the foods you eat everyday. Almost anyone half serious about bodybuilding will know that proteins are an essential nutrient that you must get enough everyday to support new muscle growth, and you can get proteins from foods such as all types of meats, nuts, dairy products, vegetables, supplements and more.

A protein is made up of a number of amino acids. There are 20 or so different amino acids that make up a protein - 8 of them are essential (meaning your body can't make them), and the rest are non-essential, meaning your body can make them from the other essential aminos.

Ever hear the term "peptides" and wonder what the heck they are in protein terminology? It's really simple. Link a few aminos together, and that makes a peptide, and link a bunch of peptides together, you have a protein!

Carbohydrates

Everyone seems to hate carbs these days - thanks to Atkin's, low carb diet craze, and the media - everyone's jumping on the bandwagon of following low carb diets. Which is rather ridiculous if you ask me. Your body is made to operated on and burn carbs as the main fuel. On an Atkin's diet, you eat almost no carbs, and as much fats and proteins as you want...

*shakes my head*

That's just silly! Sure it does work to burn fat etc etc etc... but at what health risks?!? We have a great deal of articles debunking the low carb diet craze authored by other fitness gurus, just see these:

• 7 Reasons Why Low Carb Diets are Wrong
• Exercise and Low Carb Diets Don't Mix
• The Truth about Low Carb Diets

Fats

The sound of the word "fats" scares many people, but in all honesty, not all fats are "bad", and fats play an essential role in our regular diet, and in keeping a balanced nutrition plan. There are different types of fats, and not all fats are bad for you.

Saturated fat (bad fat)

Fatty acids are made up of chains of carbon atoms, and when the carbon atoms have no free bonds to link with other atoms, the fat is saturated.

Fat fact - saturated fats are the 'BAD' type of fat. The body has a tough time process saturated fats, and stores it as fat. Saturated fats raise cholesterol levels, which increases the chance of heart attacks. Reduce saturated fats in your diet is the first fat solution towards a healthier diet.

Saturated fat mainly come from meat sources, but some are found in vegetable products: i.e. palm and coconut oil.

Polyunsaturated fat (good fats)

Usually liquid at room temperature, polyunsaturated fat comes in two types: omega 6 and omega 3. Omega 6 type comes mainly from vegetables, and omega 3 come from oily fish. Polyunsaturated fat actually help reduce the level of cholesterol! So a small consumption is important for good health.

Monounsaturated fat (good fats)

This type of fat mainly comes from veggies. For example, they can be found in olive oil and almond oil. Monounsaturated fat is also thought to help reduce cholesterol levels.

Daily Nutrition Intake - Sports Nutrition Planning

Below are 2 sample daily food intake records during my 6 week period. It includes detail records of everything eaten during the day, and also includes the protein, carbs, and fat content of each item eaten. Finally, at the end is the total protein, carbohydrates, and fat consumed, and also total daily calories count.

Note: below schedules are NOT made up out of thin air. They are actual food amounts I consumed during those days. They were randomly selected from my food intake journal during those 6 weeks (42 days). So, in other words, there are 40 others days of food intake journal like this not posted on here, that would be a little too much. ;-)

Sample Daily Meal and Nutrition Intake

* Soy milk - I use soy milk for my shakes instead of regular milk, is because I'm lactose intolerant. Using soy milk avoids upset stomachs for me. However, regular 1% milk with cereal seems to cause no problems for my stomach.

Sample Daily Meal and Nutrition Intake

As you know from part 1, my aim was to consume 270g protein, 270g carbs, and 60g of fat daily for a total caloric intake of 2700. This is based on a 40-40-20 diet.

Obviously, its impossible to get the exact amount of proteins, carbs, and fats each day, but overall, I was pretty close to my target. Some days, I might have a slightly higher protein intake, and other days, I might have a slightly higher carb or fat in take. But Overall, the daily values are quite close to what I aim for.

>> Continue to part 3 - the glycemic index and foods

>> Click for Optimum Nutrition 100% Whey 5lb
>> Click here for Prolab Creatine, or Micronized Creatine
>> Click here for Optimum L-Glutamine
>> Click here for 100% Egg Protein
>> Click here for Pro Complex
>> Click here for 100% Natural Whey Protein