Ensuring your nutrition is on point is a key part of staying fit and healthy. Even if you’re stuck at home, it’s important to make sure you keep eating properly and don’t let your standards slip. That’s why we’ve teamed up with personal trainer Aaron Dunn to help keep you in tip top condition while you’re staying active at home.
Macronutrients
Macronutrients are the foods that we need to eat in larger quantities in order to have a healthy, balanced diet. These include the likes of water, protein, fats and carbohydrates.
Stay Hydrated!
It may seem simple, but drinking enough water is pretty much the most important thing you can do in terms of your nutrition. Depending on how active you are, you should try and take in at least two-litres a day and probably more. If you’re more active, you should be looking at consuming between three and five litres every day.
Try and keep water with you at all times – especially when you’re exercising. If it’s there in front of you, you’re more likely to drink it! Now, what will happen if you don’t drink enough water? Well, you could suffer from headaches, a lack of concentration and even have difficulty shifting weight.
Carbohydrates are Vital for Energy
Sources of carbohydrates such as rice, bread and pasta are absolutely vital for proper nutrition. Essentially, they’re your energy source and both your body and brain needs them to perform at a high level. Now, they may have a bit of a bad name when it comes to weight gain, but it’s still important to carry on eating them.
Without them, or by not eating enough, you’re more likely to feel lethargic and not be able to perform at the level you want to. If, however, you feel like you have plenty of energy and want to experiment with reducing your carb intake, you can. Just don’t take it to extremes! As soon as you feel like your performance levels are dipping, start eating them again.
Don’t Forget your Protein!
Protein is often the forgotten macronutrient, but it’s a vital part of any balanced diet. Protein sources include meat and fish, as well as pulses such as beans and lentils. Whereas carbohydrates are the body’s fuel, protein helps to repair and grow muscle tissue.
So, if you’ve been running, cycling, doing classes hitting the weights hard, or doing loads of body weight exercises, that will have damaged your muscle tissue ever so slightly. You need to take on protein to help repair that damage and grow more muscles.
If you don’t, this could have a negative effect on that lean, toned, chiselled body you want to achieve. Try and make sure you eat protein-rich foods with every meal to help ensure you get enough
Fats aren’t Always bad
Now, bear with us here, we know what you’re thinking. You hear the word ‘fat’ and you immediately think ‘unhealthy’. That’s not the case. We all need fat for healthy nutrition. It helps us with normal hormone production, it keeps us insulated and it’s a way of storing energy. But, as with most things in life, it’s about eating the right sort and the right quantities. Frying everything in butter isn’t the answer, whereas eating some more avocados and fish that’s rich in omega-3 oil is.
Micronutrients
Micronutrients are a group of foods that the body needs to function properly, but it requires them in much smaller doses than macronutrients. These include things like vitamins and minerals. Different foods are great sources of different micro nutrients and making sure you consume enough of them is a really important part of ensuring you maintain a healthy diet.
Eat your Greens!
One of the best ways of ensuring your micronutrient intake stays on point is by eating plenty of veg. Peas, for instance are full of iron (as is spinach, kale and other green vegetables) which is essential for good nutrition. Meanwhile, carrots (yes, we know they’re not green) are a fantastic source of vitamin C. Pretty much whenever you eat you should try and make sure it contains fresh (or frozen) vegetables of some sort.
Take in More Fruit
Fruit is another really important source of micronutrients. Bananas, for example are full of potassium, while citrus fruits such as oranges and tangerines are also fantast for getting your daily Vitamin C intake up.