Shannan’s Journey

Back in 2004, I trained a young lady who just couldn’t seem to get the whole diet thing down. After two years of working with me, she vowed to finally buckle down and stick to her diet — for the fifteenth time.

By Wet Wolf

The next day, she waddles into the gym with five different sheets in her hands. Each one was a different eating pattern that I’d given her over the past two years.

“So, when do I have the salmon?” she asks as she hands me the first sheet.

“Now, when do I take the flax oil caps?” handing me a second.

“And what about the protein shake?” poking another eating pattern in my face.

Confused and tormented, I stood there, finally realizing why this little urchin’s bodyweight had more ups and downs than any rollercoaster at Six Flags, Busch Gardens, and Disney World combined.

And I’m not talking about a moderate five or ten pound jump here. I’m talking about twenty to thirty pound swings that had her tippin’ the scale like a heavyweight prize fighter.

“Well, which eating pattern are you following?” I replied.

Glassy-eyed, she fumbled for words.

“You need to pick just one of the programs to follow, not all five.”

And so the rollercoaster ride continued.

Unless someone’s following a pre-contest diet, they don’t need to be counting grams of protein, carbohydrates, or fat and, least of all, calories.

I get dozens of girls a day asking me to critique their eating numbers. And I tell all of them the exact same thing:

Make smart choices.

If you read “Food Addictions: The Last Stand,” I give very simple instructions on how easy it is to simply eat smart. If anything, the food choices you make are more important than the amount of food you eat.

Even if you stick to standard portion sizes, you’re still going to lose fat and keep a steady stream of nutrients feeding your muscles. Quite honestly, it’s hard to go wrong when you eat from the approved foods list in that article.

Do you really think that if your diet is 50% protein instead of 40% it’ll result in your demise?

Do you really think that the culprit of your 25% body fat is eating an apple at 8 pm instead of 3 pm?

Look here, blueberry! The next 140-pound, 26% body fat femme fatale who tells me that she feels awful, or that the brain can’t function without 100 grams of carbohydrates per day, is just asking for a big bowl of mashed potatoes stuffed down her throat.

There’s no reason a female can’t function just fine on less than 100 grams of carbohydrates per day on a general, healthy diet as long as all the other factors are in place.

First of all, it’s usually smart if a low carbohydrate day is utilized on a day where there’s no weight training. Second of all, if you don’t raise your protein and fat intake on days that you really drop the carbohydrates, then you’re going to feel like you’re doing time at concentration camp.

Really, though, this should be common sense. If you’re going to drop your carbs faster than the stock market last Monday, then you’re going to need to let the protein and fats pick up the slack a little.

One Step Further: Pairing Up Macronutrients

Just for you ladies, I’m going to take things one step further and give out a general template on how I assign macronutrient pairings for different females.

In the “Food Addictions: The Last Stand” article, I didn’t mention anything about the order of pairing up macros. The most important thing was that you just made the right choices. But now I’ll introduce different macronutrient combinations that are better suited for the many unique types of females that frequent Figure Athlete.

First, let’s take a look at what a standard placement looks like for those eating six meals per day:

Protein + carbs
Protein + fat
Protein + carbs
Protein + fat
Protein + carbs (post-workout shake)
Protein + carbs

Don’t worry; it’s fine to have carbohydrates that late in the day. You won’t blow up like the Goodyear blimp. Carbohydrates should be placed around the weight training session regardless of where it falls in the day.

Now, let’s assign some macronutrient pairings for different body types.

Macro Pairings for the Fat Girl with Muscle

First up, we have the fat girl with muscle. This includes any female who’s close to 30% body fat with a solid foundation of muscle beneath the padding.

I’ve found that females like this respond very well to low carbohydrate plans like the following:

Protein + carbs
Protein + fat
Protein + fat
Protein + fat
Protein + fat
Protein + fat

The key to making it work is to add in a leafy salad or vegetable source at every protein and fat meal.

Obviously, on weight lifting days, a carbohydrate meal could be placed post-workout.

Macro Pairings for the Skinny-Fat Girl

Next on the run down, we have the skinny-fat girl. This type of girl is very common. She doesn’t have much experience weight lifting and views cardio as the cornerstone of her training. She’s thin in appearance, but carries a moderate to high body fat. She has no appreciable muscle or myogenic tone to speak of.

For the skinny-fat girl, she’ll do well on a very balanced macronutrient pairing eating pattern:

Protein + carbs
Protein + fats
Protein + carbs
Protein + fat
Protein + carbs
Protien + fat

Some may be wondering (and a little worried) about meals that contain protein, carbohydrates, and fats. And that’s actually a very valid concern. In the case when you might eat some almonds as a fat source along with your protein, it’d be okay even though there are trace amounts of carbs in the almonds. A good rule of thumb is to keep trace macros (those not emphasized in the meal pairing) under five grams per meal.

Another good example is having one egg yolk mixed in with egg whites and some oats. The one yolk would contain trace fats, but it’d still be okay to have within the protein and carb pairing.

Macro Pairings for the Skinny-Lean Girl

Last on the list is the skinny-lean girl. She might be moderately lean, or she might be ripped. Either way, she has a difficult time gaining any type of weight.

Heck, this girl could drop three pounds just by walking from her car into the gym.

She needs a constant flow of anabolic nutrients into her system to steer off the catabolic affects of her metabolism.

Something along the lines of:

Protein + carbs + fat
Protein + carbs
Protein + fat
Protein + carbs + fat
Protein + carbs
Protein + fat

Plan Your Carbs, Maximize Your Roughage

If you’re a skinny-fat girl who limits your carbohydrates on occasion, then prioritize your first meal as the most carbohydrate-rich meal. The second most important meal would be your post-workout meal.

So, if your daily carbohydrate intake only called for 50 grams of carbs, then have 25 grams with your breakfast and 25 grams with your post-workout meal.

Also, make sure every single protein and fat meal is very rich in leafy, fibrous vegetables. Many vegetables are thermogenic, meaning they can actually speed up your metabolism. Other foods, such as celery, are actually negative-calorie foods in that they require more energy to digest than they contain.

Unless you eat more carrots than Bugs Bunny, the insulin response of leafy, fibrous vegetables is practically non-existent.

Lastly, when adding a thick roughage of leafy, multi-colored thermogenic foods on top of a fat and a protein meal, the satiety factor can be very profound.

Why the Body Type Classifications?

The reason I put my personal stamp on the body types was because you can change your body type, but you can’t change your somatotype!

If a skinny-fat girl gains a lot of muscle and a lot of fat, then she’s no longer a skinny-fat girl, but rather a fat girl with muscle. Make sense?

Whether or not an endomorph who’s a fat girl with muscle gets ripped, she’ll still be an endomorph.

In my humble pie opinion, I didn’t want to base the subject’s current condition on such finite factors such as bone structure. Unlike muscle and fat mass, the overall dimensions of a person’s bone structure don’t change.

Feed Me Your Feedback

Now that you girls have a better understanding of how things stack up in the macronutrient game, I want to hear about your better energy levels, improved recovery, and faster fat loss.

This entry was posted on Monday, March 23rd, 2009 at 10:35 am and is filed under Training. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.