Sport How much protein and fat do I need?

[reinalinda]

Hi, I'm Reina, 26, new here with a question. If it helps, I'm 5'9" and weigh 126. I am doing 90 minutes of cardio/weight lifting a day along with 3 HIIT sessions a week. How much protein and fat do I need daily? Thanks!

 

[dswithers]

There are many ways to approach this. First you need to determine what macronutrient level you want to shoot for. Most people go for something like 30/30/40 (fat/protein/carbs) depending on what your goal is. Then detrermine your daily maintenance calorie level and use the macronutrient ratio to determine the amount of each you need. So if you determine that your daily maintenance calorie level is 2000 then you would need to get 600 calories of fat and protein and 800 calories of carbs per day.

You could also go at it from the grams of protien per pound of body weight angle. If you assume an extremely active person like you needs 1 gram of protien per pound of body weight then you can convert that to calories and assume that is 30% of your food intake and calculate how many calories you need to make 30% fat and 40% carbs:
1 gram of carbohydrate = 4 calories
1 gram of protein = 4 calories
1 gram of fat = 9 calories
So 126 grams of protien is 504 calories, then your total calories for the day would be 1680 and you would need 504 calories of fat and 672 calories of carbs.