Macronutriants

Blondie14031973
Blondie14031973 Posts: 4 Member
edited December 2024 in Food and Nutrition
Hi,

I started weight training a few months ago. I was a regular gym gooer prior to deciding to take weight training to the next level. I just can't work out my ideal macronutrient percentages. I've used the tool on myfitnesspal and on other sites but they all differ hugely. Can anyone help? I'm a 43 yr old female. 5'5". 136lb. I want to gain lean muscle and lose body fat. I'm lifting heavy weights 3 times a week and doing HIIT twice weekly. Any guidance would be greatly appreciated. Thank you.

Replies

  • capaul42
    capaul42 Posts: 1,390 Member
    41, 5'5", 135lbs here. I go with a 40c, 30f, 30p breakdown and lift 4x a week. I also eat at maintenance currently. I aim to get a minimum of 100g protein daily and don't worry about my other macros all that much. The 100g works out to about 1g per lb of lean body weight, approximately (somewhere between 24-26% body fat).
  • MKEgal
    MKEgal Posts: 3,250 Member
    Here's a table which explains the healthy ranges, from the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition:
    http://ajcn.nutrition.org/content/88/1/1/T1.expansion.html

    carbs, 45 - 65% of calories (4 cal per gram)
    fat, 20 - 35% of calories (9 cal per gram)
    protein, 10 - 35% of calories (4 cal per gram)
  • Blondie14031973
    Blondie14031973 Posts: 4 Member
    Hi, thank you for the speedy response. Those percentages sound more like the numbers I had in my mind. I will see how I get on with it. Thanks again :)
  • psuLemon
    psuLemon Posts: 38,458 MFP Moderator
    Do you follow a structured lifting program? Also, where are your calories? Are they around maintenance or just below it? If you goal is to gain some muscle while losing fat, then that will large depend on your training program, nutrition, genetics, and how new you are to weight lifting.
  • Blondie14031973
    Blondie14031973 Posts: 4 Member
    I have a personal trainer now and have followed her programs for about r 6 weeks. Prior to that, I did some lifting for about 6 months but without professional guidance and I've always been a gym member for years prior to that. My calories are about 1800-2000. I've no idea if that's too much. I'm eating clean and high protein. A typical day is...Porridge for breakfast with seeds and a scoop of protein powder. lunch is chicken and veg and high protein yogurt. dinner is salmon and veg with bulgar wheat or lentils or other grain. Protein bar later on and snacks are apple banana and a protein shake after workout.
  • psuLemon
    psuLemon Posts: 38,458 MFP Moderator
    Based on your stats i would put you at 25% P, 25% F, 50% C. This would put you at 1g of pro and. 35g of F per lb of lbm (roughly, assumed 20% bf).. you can modify this based on preferred eating style, satiety and compliance. But i would drop below those fat and protein levels. So if anything decreae carbs and increase other.

    Does your personal trainers have you on a progressive lifting program based around compound lifts? Is it full body, split, etc?
  • Blondie14031973
    Blondie14031973 Posts: 4 Member
    Thank you again. Yes it's progressive. Its full body over the week. 2 programs of lifting and 2 HIIT. I do 3 days of lifting and 2 HIIT days. I will look at my diet and see how those stats work out for me. :)
  • pontious11349
    pontious11349 Posts: 105 Member
    You can do loads of reading but a pretty generic approximation of maintained calories is 14 x your body weight in lbs.

    The macro ratios in the above comments are good too but it just takes time to tweak and find what works for you.

    Good luck
  • pontious11349
    pontious11349 Posts: 105 Member
    Maintenance *^
  • psuLemon
    psuLemon Posts: 38,458 MFP Moderator
    pontious11349 wrote: »
    You can do loads of reading but a pretty generic approximation of maintained calories is 14 x your body weight in lbs.

    The macro ratios in the above comments are good too but it just takes time to tweak and find what works for you.

    Good luck

    That approximation would put me 600 calories under my actual maintenance. I would rather use a tdee calculator and track for 4 to 6 weeks and modify from there.
  • muffinsandcakes
    muffinsandcakes Posts: 333 Member
    MKEgal wrote: »
    Here's a table which explains the healthy ranges, from the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition:
    http://ajcn.nutrition.org/content/88/1/1/T1.expansion.html

    carbs, 45 - 65% of calories (4 cal per gram)
    fat, 20 - 35% of calories (9 cal per gram)
    protein, 10 - 35% of calories (4 cal per gram)

    How can we set those percentage on the per cent macro in mfp???
  • psuLemon
    psuLemon Posts: 38,458 MFP Moderator
    muffinsandcakes wrote: »
    MKEgal wrote: »
    Here's a table which explains the healthy ranges, from the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition:
    http://ajcn.nutrition.org/content/88/1/1/T1.expansion.html

    carbs, 45 - 65% of calories (4 cal per gram)
    fat, 20 - 35% of calories (9 cal per gram)
    protein, 10 - 35% of calories (4 cal per gram)

    How can we set those percentage on the per cent macro in mfp???

    Well you can't do the range, but you can do custom settings using: http://www.myfitnesspal.com/account/my_goals


    But macros should by figured out in grams and then converted to percentages.
This discussion has been closed.

Categories