It is a puzzling question……what is good nutrition? There seems to be a lot of different answers out there at the moment. Does good nutrition mean eating fewer sugary desserts? Or does it mean eating more fruits and vegetables, eating less meat and/or fewer carbs, less dairy, less grains, no gluten? Or is it eating a “balanced diet”?
Since I started my Precision Nutrition course we have covered a lot of mind blowing stuff and none more so than the answer to this question! This term I want to establish exactly this…What is good nutrition?
Well, there are five important points that cover the definition of good nutrition….
1. Good nutrition has the correct energy balance (energy in/energy out).
2. Good nutrition focuses on nutrient dense food.
3. Good nutrition gets results
4. Good nutrition is sustainable in the long term
I would like to cover number five today. I was blown away by this and wanted to share it with you straight away. This is really important to us, particularly this year, our year of “the bucket list” with our mission of fulfilling individual goals.
Number 5 on the list of good nutrition is all about where our focus lies!
5. Good nutrition focuses on health, performance and body composition.
You see, a lot of us tend to focus solely on body composition (losing fat/gaining muscle). Is good nutrition all about looking good naked and having a flat stomach? Well, no! These strong motivators can easily lure us into the world of crash diets, unneeded supplements and unrealistic diet plans. Rather than focusing solely on the visual outcome of body composition we should be focusing on our health and performance as well.
For example, starving yourself on an extreme diet plan may improve your body composition in the short term but what is it doing for your health and performance? Fad/crash diets may leave you feeling weak, affect your immunity and leave you too tired to workout at a high intensity.
On the other side of the equation you maybe focusing entirely on performance. You’re training for a half marathon and then come home eat a pie, a can of coke and a block of chocolate! And that’s going to affect your health and body composition as well as your performance.
The diagram below shows that we need to link together all three components to achieve the goal of good nutrition. HEALTH, PERFORMANCE and BODY COMPOSITION.
Focusing strictly on any one of the goals above to the exclusion of others can lead to problems. Good nutrition should improve the way you look, feel and perform!
If we fuel our bodies correctly it makes us feel better and in turn makes us perform better which then leads us to look better.
Ask yourself, did my food intake this week lead to good health and better performance?
We will cover all five points of good nutrition in detail this term which will give us the skills to maintain a balanced and healthy lifestyle for the long term.