Full transcript of the episode here:
Hey everyone.
Welcome back to another episode of the field triathlete. I’m your host, Andrea. Today we are on part three of our macronutrient series. We’re talking all about fats today. So if you missed it, check out the previous two episodes, and this is all about carbohydrates and protein, but today we’re talking about fats.
I think sometimes they get overlooked a little bit because when we think about nutrition for endurance athletes, we talk a lot about carbohydrates being our fuel source. We talk a lot about protein being important for recovery, but where do fats fit in? So that’s what we’re going to talk about today.
What exactly are fats and what they do in the body? What are good food sources of fats to get in our diet. How much do we need per day? When should we be consuming fats? So before we get into the episode today, I did just want to talk a little bit about the fueled for endurance academy.
So I talked about this a couple of weeks ago. This is my new group coaching program, and course, and, we just started our first week, this week. So it was all about kind of how to meet your daily fueling needs.
And we’re seeing people start to make some changes and work on working on their nutrition habits.
So have you heard about the course, but maybe it wasn’t the right time to join. Then what I would suggest is going into the show notes and joining the wait list, then you’ll just hear about when the course is going to be opening again in the next couple of months. If you want to get on the wait list to make sure that you can join the next round or just learn more about it. Then be sure to check that out in the show notes.
So today’s episode healthy fats. What are they? So fats are a component of our diets.
There are nutrient that we can get in certain types of foods, and they’re really essential in the diet. I’ve used in the past couple episodes, this idea of a car analogy and fats are kind of like the oil in the car. We need to get regular oil changes to keep our car running smoothly. , just the same that we need fats in our diets. It has many different, important roles within the body. So for one, it makes up the structure of our cell membranes, and helps them function properly. It’s, essential for our body to absorb fat-soluble vitamins.
So vitamin A, D, E and K. One example is if you are someone who takes a vitamin D supplement, you want to make sure that you’re taking that vitamin D supplement with food if it’s in the pill form. Fats can also be used as fuel.
So fats are typically used as fuel during lower intensity, steady state, slow exercise. They take longer to Oxidized and to be used as fuel. So that’s why it’s best for lower intensity. Our body is better at using carbs more quickly so it’s, that’s more of a more effective fuel source during high-intensity exercise.
So when you start getting into VO two max of say 65, 70% or more, your body’s relying more on carbohydrates for fuel. You don’t need as much oxygen to burn that for fuel. So this is where sometimes following a very high, fat, low carb diet can impact your performance if you want to be training at higher intensities.
So just keeping that in mind, it’s best to have a mixture of carbohydrates and fats within your diet.
We need oxygen to be able to burn fat for fuel. And when you’re at higher intensities, there’s less oxygen uptake.
You’re breathing harder. So there’s less oxygen uptake. So there’s less ability for our body to use fat for fuel at as quickly as needed at higher intensities. So then our body’s relying more on carbohydrates at that time, that’s kind of the main.
There’s three different types of fats in the diet, unsaturated, saturated, and trans fats. These mainly have to do with the chemical structure of the fat. We want to really limit having trans fats in our diet. This really has been shown to be unhealthy for heart health, but we want to have a mixture of saturated and unsaturated fats. Primarily we’re looking at consuming more of our fat intake from unsaturated fats. All of the unsaturated fats we have also again, different types of fats, there’s mono and polyunsaturated. And we also have something within that category of essential fatty acids. So essential fatty acids are omega-3 fatty acids. And these are things that we want to focus on getting in our diet. So I like to kind of more, so think of it as a set of having avoid this, eat this.
What’s just kind of focusing more on getting these unsaturated fats within our diet. And again, there can still be room for saturated fats. And what is the reason for choosing one over the other? Mainly see that with unsaturated fats this is beneficial for your heart health, your cholesterol levels.
And also they can be anti-inflammatory, especially omega-3 fatty acids, anti inflammatory. So in the role of a triathlete, this is really important for helping with muscle or muscle recovery or recovery from exercise.
So what kind of foods fall into these categories? Unsaturated fats, a lot of different plant fats and fats from fish.
So we have things that are unsaturated, quote, unquote, healthy fats, being avocado, nuts and seeds, so almonds, walnuts, chia seeds, flax seeds, olive oil, avocado oil. Soy also has some unsaturated fats in there.
So soybeans and tofu and then fish, fish is especially those fatty fish are really abundant source of omega-3 fatty acids. Salmon, mackerel, anchovies, sardines, and trout are your highest sources of omega three.
If you do consume, these fish that I mentioned being your highest sources of omega-3, if you can have them two to three times a week, so about the portion of your Palm then you will be meeting your omega-3 needs. However, if you’re someone who does not consume fish, then you may want to look into having an omega-3 supplement to help you, you get enough in your diet.
There are plant sources of omega three. There’s chia seeds, flax seeds, hemp seeds, and walnuts are kind of your main sources of omega-3 as well as seaweed. So you can look to aim for these on a regular basis in your, in your diet as well, to help you get omega threes if you are someone who is vegan or plant-based.
And again, just depending on the amount they’re assuming and what your needs are, you may need to also look at an omega three supplement.
Saturated fats are found dairy products. . It’s going to be in some meats. So especially you see meat that has marbling. This is saturated fat, they’re smaller amounts in leaner meats, like chicken or Turkey butter, lard, coconut oil.
Some of these more unhealthy fats are things that are very like deep fried pastries, baked goods. These are where if you’re consuming a lot of these types of fats, then you may be over-consuming fats or the unhealthy types, but focusing on these plant-based fats, focusing on fish, consuming whole foods through the diet can be a way to help balance your fat intake.
So there’s kind of this myth that if you eat fat, this can turn into fat. Or if you eat too much fat, this can cause weight gain, not necessarily the case.
I think that thought comes from the fact that fats are more calorie dense. So, for example, every one gram of carb or protein that you eat has four calories, but every one gram of fat has nine calories. So that’s why you may look at something like nuts or avocado and think this looks like it’s a lot of calories, but maybe it’s just more higher in fat than something like fruit or a piece of chicken.
So with that in mind how much fat do we need in a day to make sure we’re hitting our minimum needs?
So there’s a couple of ways you can figure this out. Fats should make up about 25 to 35% of your overall calories. So how would you figure that out? Well, let’s say you need 3000 calories in a day, so we take 3000 and what’s 25% of 3000. That’s our minimum amounts of fat.
So you would take 3000, multiply that by 0.25. Representing 25%, which gives you 750. So this means 750 calories of your overall diet would come from fat. And we know that one gram of fat is equal to nine calories. So we divide that by nine and that gives us 83. So at a minimum of about 83 grams of fat. The other way, Simple starting point to figure out how much grams of fat you need in your day would be at least about one gram per kilogram of your body weight.
So again, like I said, this is just an approximation. If you look at having this amount, does it fit within 25 to 35% of your overall calories. So if you’re someone who is 75 kilograms, that is one gram per kilogram of body weight, so about 75 grams of fat per day.
How do we then space that out? When should you actually be eating fats? So let’s think about when we don’t want to be eating fat. We don’t want to be eating fat, too close to exercise. If you’ve listened to pre-workout podcast or if you listened to the carb podcast, we talk about how carbohydrates are great to have pre-training, they quickly digest and they’re a good fuel source of fast fuel source. Whereas fats take longer to digest.
So if you eat a high fat food or a high fat snack, or meal within that hour before training or close to training, depending on your tolerance. Then you might have some stomach issues. So fat takes long to digest. So it’s eaten close to your training it may not be fully digest. It, it may still be kind of in your stomach.
We’re still trying to break it down and move it along our digestive tract. So if you have a high fat meal, then try to go run or swim. It just feels like something’s heavy in your stomach and you’re more likely to have runners trots or some GI issue. So things like pain, gas, bloating, or diarrhea, or urgency to use the washroom.
So we do want to limit fats too close to before training mainly for that reason. And you also want to limit fats during training. So even though fat can be used as a fuel source, we have abundant amounts of fat in our body. We can store fat within our body. Our body can mobilize those stores to be able to use as fuel.
You don’t necessarily need to consume additional fats during training to be used as fuel. Carbohydrates we do because we can only store so much carbohydrates within our body. So we have limited glycogen stores and then we have. Only so much that’s going to be within our blood sugar levels.
Fats do take longer to digest so It’s not going to be a fast fuel source. And again for those possible stomach GI issues, we do want to limit fats during.
So it’s not going to be right before training or during, but it can be at those meals outside of it. So a meal three to four hours during training, you can go ahead and have some fats. At your breakfast, lunches and dinner or snacks again, away from training. You don’t necessarily need to have a lot of fats after training, focus on at least hitting your carbs and protein goals.
And there may be some fat in there just depending on the types of foods that you choose, which is okay.
So, as we touched on earlier, fats are more calorie dense than carbs and protein. And this is not necessarily a bad thing. It can be a good thing, especially if you’re someone who has high calorie needs, but maybe you don’t have a great appetite on some days, choosing nutrient dense options that are higher in fat can be a way to help meet your calorie goals.
So adding nuts, nut butters, avocado, to meals or to snacks can be a good way to get your calories up when needed.
So, what about if you’re someone who’s looking to manage your weight? We know from the protein episodes, we don’t want to cut back on protein. If we’re in a state where we’re trying to manage weight because we want to maintain our muscle mass, this helps us keep feeling full.
And then we also don’t want to drastically cut back on carbohydrates too much, especially if we are training so for looking at maintaining that performance. You may look at, am I consuming, maybe extra fats, am I consuming more than the minimum amount that I need, or am I consuming a lot more than one gram per kilogram of body weight? Maybe it’s a matter of looking at trimming some of the extra fats that you’re consuming in your diet, but again, we’re not going too low where it’s less than 25% of our overall calorie needs.
So that wraps up today’s episode all about fats and our three-part macronutrient series, carbohydrates, proteins, and fats.
So again, make sure you listen back, if you want to hear more about those other macronutrients. If you are someone who is, you know, maybe you listened to this podcast and the amounts of fats that you may need in your diet, and you think. Wow. I may be consuming a lot more fats compared to carbohydrates or protein.
Then you may want to check out my pre and post-workout nutrition guide. You can download that in the show notes and this talks about how to include high carb foods before training and then also protein rich foods after training. So if you just want to learn a little bit more about kind of those carbohydrates and protein and how to incorporate them pre and post-workout, then you can go ahead and check that out. But thanks so much for tuning into today’s episode.
I will see you next week!