Macros

      2 Comments on Macros

So, I weighed myself this week.

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On the bright side, I guess the good news is that I have “stemmed the flow” in that I did not gain. Unfortunately, I didn’t lose either, and that’s frustrating.  I mentioned last week that my plan was to limit my carb intake. I did try, and although I was over every day, it was actually by a lot less than usual. 

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That bar chart shows my actual-to-goal carb intake for each day.  LOL, sad that those “negative” numbers are actually an improvement. 😉  I love big carbs and I cannot lie.

My macro percentages, which were suggested to me by My Fitness Pal, break down this way: 40% carbs, 35% protein, and 25% fat. That means that I’m supposed to take however many calories I have available to me each day (which can change daily based on the number of calories I burned with my run) and distribute those calories across carbs, protein, and fat according to that formula. But here’s the thing: what I found was that in trying to keep within the allotted grams of carbs I was allowed per day, I wasn’t meeting my calorie goal most days. 

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I hit my carb quota before I had eaten all my calories. You can see I had several days where there was quite a calorie deficit. Hmmm. I don’t think that was really the idea. 

While I was pondering this, an acquaintance of mine posted on Facebook about her ultra marathon training. She mentioned that she was drinking a protein shake at midnight after a 10 PM run, because she needed to get in her macros for the day. Curious, I asked her what her target macro breakdown was, and I volunteered my 40/35/25 target.  She immediately commented that my carb target seemed too low for as much as I run, and she  directed me to this site:

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I then spent the next couple of days reviewing this site, and some of the links the author had to macro counting sites. It was pretty interesting! I went to this site specifically and used the macro calculator:

https://healthyeater.com/flexible-dieting-calculator

It was a little tricky, because it’s hard to gauge your activity level by the generic descriptions that they use. (That’s always a problem for me, on just about every site.). Based on the calorie count, it seem like I fell more into the “light exercise” range, but I’ll be damned if I feel like I am a “light” exerciser when I run 5 days a week! So, instead, even though my initial inclination was to put myself as “very active,” I took the middle ground and chose “moderate.”  It was interesting to see how my macros broke down based on that categorization:

Macros

Surprisingly, it wants me to eat more carbs and less protein. And I can assure you, that does not break my heart. 😉 

So, this week, I’ve decided to give it a try, but with the caveat: I’m going to try to actually eat all the protein it tells me to eat. This is a real problem I have: never getting close to the protein goal. There is so much research out there that says that protein builds muscle and does actually help burn fat, so I figure it’s worth a tRy. Plus, my husband, who loves loves loves to read up on bodybuilding and muscles and stuff, is constantly harping on me to eat more protein.

So far, though, even with lowering my protein target down to 25%, it has not been easy. My husband is a big fan of the “muscle milk” and protein shake options, so I tried that on Tuesday. Here’s what it looked like in the cup:

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Not overly appetizing. Although, I think everything looks better in a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles cup, don’t you?

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And the verdict: oh, hell, no! 😛 I choked down about half of it before I remembered my steadfast rule: if I don’t like the taste of something, I refuse to waste the calories on it. So I dumped the rest and haven’t had any since.  I’ve been sticking to a daily egg as a snack during the day, and I’ve been eating a lot more chicken breast. Don’t get me wrong, I actually love chicken breast, and ground beef and steak, but I just don’t want to overdo it to the point where I get sick of it all. But I’m trying!  We’ll see how it goes next week. 

And finally…here’s a few pictures from the fair last week.  You may wonder how my pictures fared.  Please don’t ask. :/  It’s the first year I’ve been totally shut out for my pictures. *sob*  Don’t get me started on how crappy the judging was.  Except…I can’t really say that, because someone else in the family fared a lot better than I did…

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A first and a second place, including a first in the very competitive “scenic” category.  Great job, JJ!  He was so happy. 🙂  On the bright side, my strawberry jam took 3rd and my salsa took 2nd, both in high-entry categories.  My salsa has never won anything, so I was pretty geeked about that.

Here’s our family shot on the midway.

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Dude, those clouds look fake, but I assure you, they are real!

And a shot of the swing ride (Jamie and his friends are up there–can you see them??  LOL!).

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And finally, I had the chance to watch the horse show for quite a while.  I used to show horses when I was younger, so this is always enjoyable for me, although it was tough on Saturday because a) it was hot, b) there was no shade, and c) I had raced 6 miles earlier in the day and was tired.  This type of showing was very different from what I used to do, but it was still lots of fun to watch.  I can’t remember what the name of this class was called, but basically, the horse goes in, stops, then gallops to a set of cones, go around the cones (without touching them) and then gallops back to stand in the chalk-outline box.  The winner is the horse who does it fastest without making a mistake.  It was rather exciting!

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And how cool is the painting on that horse? 🙂

Thanks for reading!

2 thoughts on “Macros

  1. Meg B

    YAY for someone telling you to eat more carbs! My husband is the same way, forever harping on me to make sure I get enough protein meh. I absolutely abhor any and all whey protein shakes, etc. I gag just smelling it. I am on the look out for vegan protein shakes in hopes I can fix that reaction lol.

    Reply
  2. McRuth

    From one runner to another…I think you’ll be happier with 50% carbs. Protein is really important, yes, but you need the carbs, too.
    Thanks for the post and the links – it sent me down quite the macro/carb cycling rabbit hole on Monday. Wowza.

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