In your nutrition plan, care must be applied to where your fat intake is coming from. You should always maintain a modest percentage of fat in your diet. Fat intake of around 15% of total calories works well for most athletes who train intensely. If your fat intake drops below 10% you may be doing more harm than good. OK...so we can have some fat...now we can head off to the nearest grease burger emporium and devour a double cheeseburger, which (in some cases) carries upwards of sixty grams of saturated fat, without a problem right? Not so fast. Think about that for a second... sixty grams of fat at nine calories per gram. That is over FIVE-HUNDRED calories from fat alone and we haven't even thrown in the fries and milkshake! Not to mention your other meals that day. To make matters worse, the fats you typically run into in the fast food establishments are saturated (bad) fat. Read on.

Which types of fat we take in must be given consideration and this is where essential fats come in. Some excellent sources of these essential fats are fish, olive-oil, nuts, canola oil, and peanut butter. Stick with fats labelled as "polyunsaturated" or "monounsaturated" when reading the labels and avoid "saturated" fats or anything marked "hydrogenated". Saturated fats can be found in fast foods like french fries, the fat in meat, and non-skim dairy products. So for a healthy body and strong muscles, don't be too quick to throw away that fishing rod or outgrow those occasional peanut butter sandwiches.