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Sep 21 2013

Guide to creating a nutritional plan

There are tons of different diets out there and while most of them will result in weight-loss when properly executed, many of them actually make losing weight harder than it needs to be. I have literally read thousands of studies and tried various diets to find the best one. My conclusion at this point is that there is no such thing as a “best diet”. There’s only a “best diet for you”. What I mean is that many diets are efficient at causing weight loss, but picking the best one is something only you can do based on your lifestyle and goals. Possibly the best diet for you hasn’t been written down yet. That’s why I recommend trying things for yourself and always looking at the underlying principles of a diet rather than blindly following its rules. With this in mind, you should note that everything you’re about to read are meant as guidelines only, based on my personal experience. You will want to experiment to see what works for you.

Since the only good diet is a diet you will stick to, it needs to be tailored to your body, lifestyle and preferences. Many people seem to try new diets for a few weeks, perhaps they’ll lose a few pounds and then they return to their old habits. Why? Usually because the new diets require a lot of time and effort to adhere to because they’re not tuned specifically to your needs. For a diet to work, it should be simple, convenient and personalized to your gender, age, body type, metabolism, work schedule, workout schedule, goals, preferences and last but not least, your sense of taste. You should enjoy eating the foods you select to be part of your diet. Otherwise, unless you’re extremely disciplined, you probably won’t stick to your diet in the long run. When I say long run, I mean years or even decades, not a few weeks or months.

Steps to creating a nutritional plan

  1. Defining how many calories you require based on your basal metabolic rate and activity level.
  2. Selecting a diet methodology and defining your distribution of macro-nutrients: protein, carbohydrates and fat.
  3. Finding foods and recipes suited for your schedule and personal taste to reach your daily caloric and nutritional goals.
  4. Scheduling meals and workouts based on your schedule to achieve optimal nutrient uptake and hormonal response.
  5. Deal with cravings and maintain a healthy social life by allowing cheat meals periodically.
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Sep 21 2013

How many calories should I eat daily?

The first step in determining a meal plan is to define how many calories one needs daily to stay at the same weight, excluding physical activity. This number is also known as your basal metabolic rate (BMR) and depends on your gender, age, weight, muscle mass and metabolism. Since the latter is very hard to determine yet not the most significant factor except for people with hormonal issues, it’s possible to get a good idea of how many colories you require with just the first factors which can easily be measured. I’m considering developing an intricate daily calorie requirements calculator since I couldn’t find any that take all factors into account but for the time being, the BMR calculator offered by BodyBuilding.com will need to do.

Here are my results:

Your bodyweight is 85 kilograms.

Step 1 – BMR Based On Weight

For Men: 1 x 85 Kg x 24 = 2040

Step 2 – BMR With Bodyfat Percentage Calculation

Taking your bodyfat percentage into account, your adjusted BMR is 2040 calories per day. This is equal to 85 calories per hour.

Step 3 – Total Daily Calories Burned

Adding in your activity level, we times your BMR by 1.65. This means that your approximate total calories burned each day is 3366.

Step 4 – Macronutrient Breakdown In YOUR Diet

Now that we know how many total calories need to be consumed each day, where do the calories come from? Based on your BMR, Activity Level and Athletic Category you need:

Protein Grams: 168 Grams Per Day.
Protein Calories: 672 Protein Calories Per Day.

Fat Grams: 56 Grams Per Day.
Fat Calories: 505 Protein Calories Per Day.

Carbohydrate Grams: 547 Grams Per Day.
Carbohydrate Calories: 2189 Carb Calories Per Day.

As I mentioned, these results should be taken with a grain of salt since they group together pretty wide ranges of body fat percentages with the minimum being 10%, they do not take into account specific diets and there are only six choices for activity levels which are not defined very clearly. Still, it’s one of the best calculators currently available and the results should at least give you a ballpark figure of how many calories to consume in a given day. If you are trying to gain muscle (bulking) then I would suggest adding between 250 and 500 calories daily depending on how easily you gain muscle without also getting fatter. If you are trying to get leaner (cutting) you should subtract 300 to 600 calories depending on how well you retain muscle when cutting fat.

A better calorie calculator might be the one offered by Free Dieting. They have three formulas to choose from including Mifflin-St Jeor, Katch-McArdle and Harris-Benedict. The Mifflin-St Jeor formula has been chosen as the most accurate by the American Dietetic Association for the average person. However, for leaner bodybuilders or athletes who know their body-fat percentage, the Katch-McArdle formula is more appropriate since it takes fat-free mass into account. Finally the Harris-Benedict formula is very well known, but tends to be skewed towards obese and young people.

According to their calculator using the Katch-McArdle formula with an estimated 10% body-fat, my maintenance is at 2986 calories per day provided I exercise at least 5 times per week. My basal metabolic rate – not taking any exercise into account – is at 2042 calories. In other words, if I want to lose weight at this level of activity, I should eat between 2,400 and 2,700 calories. To gain weight on the other hand, I should eat between 3,250 and 3,500 calories daily.

The next step would be to determine the macro-nutrient ratios of your diet to achieve the total amount of calories you plan to consume.

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