The Executive Wellness MBA: Nutrition 101 - "These Macros Ain't in Excel"

The biggest mystery in the field of health and fitness is nutrition.  Everybody has an opinion about what to eat, when to eat it, and what can kill you if you eat too much of it. At the heart of the confusion is a basic lack of understanding or what makes up "nutrition". "Nutrition" is not "food". "Nutrition" is, of course, made up of three components: Macronutrients, micronutrients, and supplements.  And if you have read ANY publication that is "fitness" oriented, you will likely have seen these three components covered in exactly the reverse order as I have listed them. Supplements take of the lion's share of ad space. Why? Because most of us C-suite types have always just assumed that we need supplements to achieve our goals. Just blame Arnold for that. And we think of "real food" only in the context of where it fails, not where it succeeds. Never is this more true than when you are on the road or have a busy schedule that makes you inclined to take shortcuts. 

In order to level set us on "nutrition", let's start with Macronutrients (The "Macros"), the majority of which you get from "real food". There are three macros:

• Protein (PRO): There are 4 calories per gram of protein. 
• Carbohydrate (CHO): There are 4 calories per gram of carbs.
• Fat (FFA - "free fatty acids): There are 9 calories per gram of fat. 

 Armed with this information, you can assess the total energy content of any meal or snack. Most nutrition labels don't make the math work exactly, because they are rounding up or down to get to whole numbers when in comes to content of PRO, CHO and FFA. But check this label and try it for yourself.

So the next time you're in the hotel "canteen" and eyeballing that trail mix as a "healthy snack" you can drop it like a hot rock, right?

Now that we are level set on how what you eat affects your calorie counts we can move on to how to allocate these macronutrients, which will be in Class #2. I know you're saying to yourself, "Just give me a diet plan!". But let me ask you this, would you starting making widgets without knowing the value chain and the cost of each component?  Nope. Remember, your wellness is an investment, and you need to know all the costs - and hidden fees - before you invest. Stay healthy, my friends.