Your nutrition matters!
by Emma Sweeney
Five rules of performance nutrition:
2. Eat the proper ratios: the caloric ration should be 1 part fat, 2 parts protein and 3 parts carbohydrates.
3. Plan your meals properly: you should eat your meals according to what activity you are doing next.
4. How many calories should you eat?: if you want to burn fat then you should burn more calories than you eat. If you want to gain muscle then you should eat more calories than you burn.
5. Getting all the nutrients you need: it is impossible to get all the nutrients you need from food alone so it is important to eat vitamins and minerals as well.
Carbohydrates
Carbohydrates: your main energy source
The glycemic index is the degree at which a persons blood sugar increases after eating. For example baked potatoes have a high glycemic index, pancakes have a moderate glycemic index and a banana has a low glycemic index. You should eat foods that don't spike your glycemic index. You shpuld eat foods that give you a sustained ammount of energy. Fiber is an indigestable carbohydrate that aids in digestion.
Protein
Amino Acids
Whey vs. Casein
Casein is also a very good protein source but it has less nitrogen retention than whey.
Anabolism vs. Catabolism
Fats
Fats
Fat in the body is a source of storage and fuel, it is used as padding for organs and your skeleton, insulates nerve fibers and tissue to speed up nervous impulses, its part of the cell membranes and it is a starting material for many other molecules. Fat in the diet reduces the rate at which the stomach empties and it is a source of essential fatty acids. Cholesterol helps absorb and move fatty acids and it forms cell membranes for the making vitamin D on the skins surface. MCTs are fats that are consumed and digested quickly and used as an energy source. They are digested much faster than long-chain triglycerides.