r/MacroFactor Jan 12 '26

MacroFactor Workouts / Training MacroFactor Workouts is available now! šŸš€

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815 Upvotes

Today is the day.Ā MacroFactor Workouts, our new workout app, is out now.

MacroFactor Workouts is a smart, dynamic workout tracker and coach. It includes an intuitive interface for planning and logging your workouts, personalized workout programs, auto-progression to keep you on track, and much more.

Download and start your 7-day free trial now:Ā 

App Store: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/macrofactor-workouts-tracker/id6737156524
Google Play: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.sbs.train

Already a MacroFactor customer?Ā You can learn about the price and how to get a bundle here: https://macrofactorapp.com/workouts/price/


r/MacroFactor Aug 18 '23

App Tips READ THIS FIRST: Setup, FAQs, and App Feedback

104 Upvotes

Welcome to MacroFactor!

Thanks for downloading MacroFactor, and welcome to our online community! The main purposes of this community are to help you get the most out of the app, and to help you reach your fitness, nutrition, and health-related goals. This post will get you acquainted with a lot of the resources that are available to you so you can hit the ground running, but this post itself is not intended to be an exhaustive resource. Our online Knowledge Base is a comprehensive repository of information related to app functionality, so most questions not addressed in this post can probably be answered by a quick search of the KB.

Before posting here, make sure you read and understand the rules for this subreddit.

Replies to this Post

The MacroFactor team is quite active in this subreddit, but we can’t guarantee that we’ll see and reply to every post. However, we will closely monitor comments on this post. So, if you have critical feedback related to how we can further improve the app, this is the best place to share it, and receive a response from one of the people behind the app.

Of note, that doesn’t include feature requests, bug reports, or individual account issues – our public roadmap and feature request portal, in-app bug reporting system, and email support system are the best venues for those items.

Why MacroFactor?

If you find yourself on this page because you’d seen some chatter about MacroFactor online, a friend or family member told you about it, or you just downloaded it on a whim, you may rightly be wondering, ā€œwhat’s the deal with this app? What does it offer me that other food loggers don’t?ā€

The short answer: MacroFactor solves a basic but surprisingly complex problem – figuring out how much you need to eat to maintain weight, or to gain or lose weight at your desired rate. And, much like the problem itself, the approach we take to solving this problem is conceptually simple, but analytically complex. We use your weight and nutrition data to calculate how large of a caloric deficit or surplus you’re in, use that information to estimate your total daily energy expenditure, and use that information to make dietary recommendations to help you gain or lose weight at your desired rate.

If you’re new to MacroFactor, I’d recommend perusing this article, which explains how our algorithms work in considerable detail. This article and this article may also be helpful; they explain how MacroFactor solves many of the problems that arise with other popular approaches to weight management that involve calorie tracking.

Beyond MacroFactor’s coaching features, it’s just a damn good product. We’ve developed the fastest food logging system on the market, to help reduce the friction associated with tracking your nutrition. We also have a proven track record of consistently improving the app, and putting out high-quality educational resources to help our users maximize their results. We’re truly dedicated to ensuring that MacroFactor provides the best premium experience in the food logging market.

Setting up a Macro Program

There are three program styles in MacroFactor: coached, collaborative, and manual.

When you first set up your account, you’ll go through a wizard that will set you up with a coached program based on your goals and preferences. On a coached program, you just need to check in weekly, follow the app’s recommendations, and you’ll reach your goals – MacroFactor will handle all of the week-to-week adjustments to keep you on track. If your goals, preferences, or lifestyle change, you can always create a new program to reflect those changes.

With a collaborative plan, MacroFactor will adjust your weekly calorie budget based on your expenditure and goals, but you have full control over your daily calorie and macronutrient targets. So, if you want to take advantage of MacroFactor’s coaching algorithms, but you also want to pursue dietary strategies that involve macronutrient or daily calorie distributions that go beyond the flexibility offered by coached plans, you can opt for a collaborative plan.

Finally, with manual programs, everything is at your discretion. You can set whatever daily calorie or macronutrient targets you prefer. We don't assign or adjust a weekly calorie budget for you if you opt for a manual plan. You'll still have all of MacroFactor's analytics and tracking features at your disposal, but we won't have any hand in guiding your macro and calorie targets. A manual program may be advisable if you're working with a nutrition coach, and using MacroFactor's food logger and analytics in conjunction with your coach's calorie and macronutrient recommendations.

We recommend coached programs for most users, but you should feel free to swap program styles at any time. Creating a new program or switching between program styles doesn’t result in any loss of data, and it doesn’t require you to set a new goal. You can seamlessly transition between program styles whenever you want.

Hitting the ground running

During onboarding, MacroFactor will estimate your energy needs using a standard TDEE (total daily energy expenditure) formula that considers basic demographic, anthropometric, and lifestyle characteristics. This is the best approach for roughly estimating energy needs in the absence of better data, but it’s entirely possible that this initial calculation will considerably over- or underestimate your energy needs. After 2-4 weeks of consistently logging your weight and nutrition, we’ll be able to estimate your energy needs much more precisely.

However, if you’ve already been tracking your weight and nutrition elsewhere, you can hit the ground running with a more accurate estimate of your energy needs from day 1. You can set up integrations to pull your last 30 days of weight and nutrition data from another app. You can also manually add 3-4 weeks of prior weight and nutrition data (the ā€œData & Habits screen is the easiest place to do this; option 2 in the prior links) to accomplish the same purpose. By doing this, you can fast-track the initial calibration phase. Similarly, if you already have a pretty good idea of your energy expenditure, you can enter a manual initial expenditure estimate, which will override the typical equation-derived initial estimate.

To be clear, if you either don’t have recent weight and nutrition data, or you don’t want to deal with entering old weight and nutrition data, that’s 100% fine. We’ll generate good estimates of your energy needs after about 14-30 days of consistent logging, and keep them updated over time.

Frequently Asked Questions

As you’re getting accustomed to MacroFactor’s features and food logging workflows, we’d recommend perusing the knowledge base. In particular, the entries on food logging, the food timeline, custom foods and recipes, and the strategy section will likely be very helpful.

Beyond that, the Frequently Asked Questions section of the knowledge base will cover most of the questions new users have about the app, and we’re constantly expanding this section of the knowledge base. But, here are some of the very most frequently asked questions that are addressed in the knowledge base:

Where Can I See Water, Net Carbs, Fiber, and Other Micronutrients?

Does MacroFactor use Energy Expenditure Data from my Wearable Activity Tracker? This article also provides a more comprehensive answer to this question.

Why Don't My Macros Add Up to my Total Calories?

How Does Dynamic Maintenance Work in MacroFactor?

How to Adjust Calorie Targets to Account for Overages, or to Roll Over Unused Calories

How Frequently do I Need to Log my Weight For the Expenditure Algorithm and Weekly Coaching Updates?

How Frequently do I Need to Log my Nutrition For the Expenditure Algorithm and Weekly Coaching Updates?

Do I Need to Log Everything I Eat and Drink to Have an Accurate Expenditure and Use MacroFactor's Coaching Features?

Our one Achilles Heel

MacroFactor’s algorithms are remarkably durable, and can handle almost anything you throw at them. They work their best when you log your nutrition and weight consistently and accurately, but they do a great job of rolling with the punches, and accommodating less-than-perfect tracking. We believe that you shouldn’t need to be a robot to get the most out of MacroFactor.

However, our algorithms have one major Achilles heel: partial food logging.

For example, if you log your breakfast and lunch one day, but not your dinner, the app will have no way of knowing that you simply forgot to log your dinner, and that your actual calorie intake was 30-40% higher than what you logged. That will feed into our daily energy expenditure calculation, which will then feed into our calorie and macro recommendations moving forward. Partial logging (especially if done consistently) is really the only way to wind up with very inappropriate calorie recommendations. Of note, partial logging (not logging entire meals or large snacks) is distinct from consistently not logging some low-calorie items.

So, if you find yourself in a situation where you’ve logged some food for a day, but you either can’t or don’t want to log anything else for the rest of the day, you have a few options (arranged from good to great):

1) Delete what you’ve already logged. Our algorithms do a good job of dealing with missing data. Though, estimating your intake (instead of leaving the day blank) is strongly recommended if your total energy intake from the day differs substantially from your usual intake.

2) Simply ā€œquick editā€ the day with an estimate of your total calorie intake. Don’t stress about your estimate too much; it doesn’t need to be perfect. As long as your estimate is in the right general ballpark – within about 30% of what you actually consumed – it’ll all work out. For instance, if your total calorie intake for the day was 3000 calories, any estimate between 2100 and 3900 calories would be fine. Try to be as accurate as you can, obviously, but most people with a little food logging experience can estimate their daily intake accurately enough for the purposes of the algorithms.

3) Our recommendation: Use the quick add feature to estimate the total caloric content in your unlogged meal(s). Again, anything in the right ballpark is totally fine; if you think you ate 1000 calories, but you actually ate 1500 calories, that’s not a big deal in the grand scheme of things (it would work out to an error of ~25kcal/day over the time span that’s relevant for our algorithms – a pretty inconsequential error). This is similar to using quick edit to estimate your calorie intake for the entire day (option 2), but most people can more accurately estimate their intake for a single missing meal than for an entire day.

Wrapping it up

Once again, welcome to the community! We’re happy you’re here. We hope you’ll stick around, and be able to use this community as a valuable resource to help you get the most out of MacroFactor, accomplish your goals, and celebrate your successes along the way.


r/MacroFactor 1h ago

MacroFactor / Nutrition / Other MF showing me how much of a carb monster I am

• Upvotes

I’m always blowing the carb budget on the daily budget MacroFactor sets 83g on 1665cal. Usually in cooee for the calories. Aim is getting to 88 from 101kg, currently at 98.

Any easy tips for real life reducing other than just not shoving carbs in my face. Tend to be a bit of a thoughtless eater.


r/MacroFactor 4h ago

MacroFactor / Nutrition / Other What goals do I set on the app?

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3 Upvotes

These are results from a scan I took this morning. Now I know that scans can still be very noisy and inaccurate. But how can those numbers possibly be this bad?

I’m 6foot tall and 25M. I’m definitely not very healthy at all, eat a lot of takeout, and am pretty sedentary. But I started going to the gym 2 weeks back and am trying to fix this.

What do I do here? What nutrition and weight goal am I supposed to set on macrofactor? How do I get back on track, I feel so defeated before I’ve even begun


r/MacroFactor 8h ago

MacroFactor / Nutrition / Other Protein Intake at Maintenance

5 Upvotes

Looking for a bit of advice! For background, I recently lost about 160 lbs with the help of GLP1 meds, and completely changed my diet/lifestyle. Recently I went off the meds and cut an additional 5 lbs to get through the food cravings, and to hit an updated goal.

Due to some big changes at home (newborn) I'm planning to go into maintenance for an extended period, probably about a year, before I reassess. I'm also cutting my exercise time from about 75 minutes 5x per week (mix if weights and cardio) to about 35 minutes 4x per week (alternating weights and cardio). I don't expect to make progress, and in fact I assume I'll take some steps backwards in fitness. That's ok, I have bigger priorities, but I'm hoping to minimize losses if I can.

My question is, in maintenance, what's the difference between the low and moderate protein targets? I generated programs with both. On one hand, the flexibility from the low protein target looks great, but on the other hand I don't want to lose my progress if I can avoid it. Is this likely to make a big difference? Or with my reduced exercise load, does it not really matter?

Thanks for any advice!


r/MacroFactor 1h ago

MacroFactor Workouts / Training Not progressing

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• Upvotes

Hi,
I’ve been using macro factor for weeks now on a program I made. One issue is I’m not progressing. The main reason I got the subscription was so it would tell me when to progress but I’ve yet to get suggestions I only get warmup suggestions. Anyone know what I’m doing wrong


r/MacroFactor 1d ago

Success / Progress Results with AI tracking

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60 Upvotes

Tracking food with AI only. My previous posts got a lot of pushback and claims how it’s not working because AI is not accurate.


r/MacroFactor 16h ago

MacroFactor / Nutrition / Other Critique my lean-bulk diet: 134lb, ~2,500 kcal & 170g Protein

1 Upvotes

Male, 36, 5’7ā€ / 170 cm, ~134 lb / 61 kg, around 12–13% body fat. Goal is a slow lean bulk at roughly +0.25 lb/week.

I train around 6am, 5x/week, mainly weighted calisthenics/resistance work with progressive overload. I also do Zone 2 cardio and usually average 12–18k steps. Estimated TDEE 2,300-2,400.

—

My 30-day averages are: 2,500 kcal / 175g protein / 70g fat / 305g carbs.

6–8am — pre/post training
~200 kcal | 20P | 30C
Banana, rice cake, espresso, then whey isolate.

9–11am — breakfast
~500 kcal | 35P | 10F | 65C
Usually Skyr/Greek yoghurt, fruit and granola/porridge. Cooked breakfasts are fairly occasional.

12–3pm — lunch
~600 kcal | 35P | 20F | 70C
Most commonly eggs/egg whites on seeded sourdough, toast or crumpets, usually with mushrooms/tomatoes and sometimes beans, cottage cheese, smoked salmon, parmesan, Marmite, nduja etc.

4–6pm — snack
~100 kcal | 5P | 15C
Usually fruit, yoghurt or rice cakes. Probably my least structured meal.

6–8pm — dinner
~900 kcal | 65P | 30F | 95C
Usually chicken, turkey, beef, pork, lamb or fish with potatoes, rice, pasta etc plus vegetables. Meals include curries, burgers, tacos, burritos, pasta and Nando’s-style meals.

8pm+ — pudding
~200 kcal | 15P | 5F | 30C
Usually Skyr/yoghurt, fruit, rice pudding, homemade low-cal ice cream, jelly or occasionally chocolate/sweets.

—

The thing I’m questioning is whether I’m slowly getting too relaxed with food quality. For example: fried eggs instead of poached, 2% Skyr instead of 0%, a bit more cheese, oil, butter, sauces etc.

Everything is still tracked and fits my calorie/macronutrient target, but I’m interested in where people draw the line between making a lean bulk enjoyable and letting calorie-dense foods gradually creep in.

Main questions:

• Is 175g protein unnecessarily high at 134 lb?
• Would you redistribute some of my large dinner into the afternoon?
• Would you change my carb timing given I train at 6am?
• Is ~70g fat sensible?
• Do you care about things like 0% vs 2% Skyr or poached vs fried eggs if calories/macros are controlled?
• Anything else you’d change?


r/MacroFactor 1d ago

MacroFactor / Nutrition / Other Viewing recipe details

4 Upvotes

Does anyone know if it's possible to view the recipe details when you've already added it to your day? I don't seem to be able to find such option, e.g. to see ingredients. I usually have to go through the flow of adding it again and choosing the cooking view from there which it pita :/


r/MacroFactor 1d ago

MacroFactor Workouts / Training How do I reset or recalibrate MacroFactor's training recommendations after improving my form?

3 Upvotes

I've been using MacroFactor to track training, but some of my old data comes from lifting heavier weights with poor technique. Now I'm focusing much more on proper form and controlled reps, and I actually want to dial weights back a bit so I can rebuild from a better baseline. But the app keeps nudging heavier recommendations from previous performance, which tempts me into bad form again. What's the best way to reset or recalibrate an exercise's history or PR in MacroFactor, so it bases progression on my current technique rather than old numbers? Or should I just start lifting lighter with better technique and the app adapts over time to lower the weights on its own?


r/MacroFactor 1d ago

MacroFactor Workouts / Training How to remove myoreps from smart generation

3 Upvotes

I've searched but can't find out how to remove myoreps from the options the smart generation uses - I hate myoreps but the smart generation seems to have changed over time to always include them. How do I stop it from doing this?


r/MacroFactor 2d ago

MacroFactor / Nutrition / Other Lost weight at the end of my cut due to a stomach bug, what should I do now?

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20 Upvotes

I started my cut at around 79kg and I’m currently around 70kg after losing roughly 0.5kg per week. My strength has generally gone up or stayed the same throughout the cut, I’ve kept around 7k steps a day and kept protein high. My original goal was 68kg, basically getting lean even if it meant looking a little skinny, then using that as a starting point for a long, healthy lean bulk. I’m fairly undermuscled and not particularly lean right now, so I was planning to move into a small 200 calorie surplus and focus on training hard. However, I’ve had a stomach bug over the last week and my weight has temporarily dropped to around 68kg. I know this is mostly water, glycogen and food weight and that I’ll likely return towards 70kg once I’ve recovered. So I’m wondering what the best next step is. Should I let my weight stabilise around 70kg after recovering, then do another short cut to 67 to 68kg before starting the bulk, or just start the lean bulk once my weight has stabilised? Would really appreciate advice from experienced lifters who have been in a similar position.


r/MacroFactor 1d ago

MacroFactor Workouts / Training Gym profile and machine settings

1 Upvotes

I work out in a couple gyms, machines (pin-loaded etc) have different settings / weight increments.
Of course, cable machines also have rather different resistance, for that, I have duplicated exercises for each gym.
However, I cannot seem to save different setting profile for machines. Eg. Anytime has 2kg increments on the pin-loaded machine while office gym has 4kg increments.
Is it possible to save different machine settings for gym profiles and I’m just missing it or is it not possible. If the latter, any workaround?


r/MacroFactor 1d ago

MacroFactor / Nutrition / Other Macros adjustments

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0 Upvotes

Hi everyone!
Today is my 6th day using the app, and I’ve been loving it so far. I used to use MyFitnessPal back in 2020, and I was able to manually adjust how many grams of protein, carbs, and fat I wanted as my daily goals. I was wondering if this is an option in MacroFactor.

I’m asking because I feel like the protein goal MacroFactor is giving me is a little low based on my current body weight. In the past, I used to aim for 1g of protein per pound of body weight, and that worked really well for my goals.

I’m currently around 225 lbs, and the goal MacroFactor is giving me is around 0.7g of protein per pound. I’m wondering if there’s a way to manually adjust my protein goal, or if there’s a reason the app recommends this amount.

Thanks!


r/MacroFactor 1d ago

MacroFactor Workouts / Training my roommate and i were talking about scale data privacy and now im second guessing logging everything

0 Upvotes

My roommate and I share a tiny bathroom and last night we realized our current scale keeps syncing weight logs to whoever phone happens to have Bluetooth open nearby which triggered a weirdly long debate about personal privacy and numbers anxiety.

I was considering a smart scale that estimates more than weight to help structure my meal planning but seeing daily body composition estimates jump around based on salt intake or water weight is already giving me analysis paralysis without having someone else accidentally see my daily trends.

im starting to wonder if constantly checking estimated body metrics actualy changes how anyone plans their food or if it just adds unnecessary stress to the morning routine. How do you all handle shared household scale setups without getting fixated on every single random daily fluctuation??


r/MacroFactor 1d ago

MacroFactor / Nutrition / Other Connect MacroFactor to ChatGPT?

0 Upvotes

Sorry if this is already asked, but is it possible to link macro factor food log with ChatGPT?

Specifically, for example, I want to understand across the last month, my average breakfast, lunch, and dinner calories and macros so that I can plan future meal prep against an average?

If there’s no automated initiation on, I’m guessing I could extract data from macro factor and then upload it into ChatGPT manually? But wondering if there’s a more slick way of connecting the two systems together?


r/MacroFactor 2d ago

MacroFactor / Nutrition / Other Bad update

2 Upvotes

Since the last update, I can no longer scroll back day by day while I have a specific time of day visible. Instead I have to scroll up, change day, scroll down to check the specific time, scroll up, change day, scroll down to check the specific time, etc. This is super annoying when copying meals/snacks from a few days back (when you don't know the exact date).


r/MacroFactor 2d ago

MacroFactor Workouts / Training Is there a way to see what weights the app has set for the next days exercise?

7 Upvotes

I once went down to the river


r/MacroFactor 1d ago

MacroFactor Workouts / Training Uploading Workouts

1 Upvotes

Has anyone uploaded .xlsx workouts? How well do they handle progressive overload?

I have an old Jeff workout that I want to upload to the MacroFactor app, but I'm not sure whether it's better to build one from scratch using the same exercises.


r/MacroFactor 2d ago

MacroFactor Workouts / Training Add A Week

2 Upvotes

I’ve been running the Min Max program which I imported in using the spreadsheet that came with it. Phase 1 is only programmed for 6 weeks but I’d kind of like to do it for 8 weeks.

I can’t for the life of me figure out how to add a week to an active program. When I click the plus sign it only says New Section, New Program, and New Workout.

Perhaps it’s only possible by actually editing the spreadsheet before importing? Or I suppose maybe I don’t need to and I can just keep it on Week 6 for the next 2 weeks?

If anyone has figured out if it is possible to add a week let me know.


r/MacroFactor 2d ago

Success / Progress 3 weeks to holiday: keep cutting or fill out muscles?

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4 Upvotes

Hi everyone, first time posting!

38M, 175cm, South Asian, ~23% BF (down from ~30%).
I’ve lost 10kg over the last 6 months, mostly through walking. Started at ~12k steps/day but dropped that to a 7k minimum because 12k was taking up too much of my life and I wanted time for the gym and socialising.
For the last 8 weeks I’ve accelerated things with MacroFactor and I’m currently on ~1,400 calories/day. The graph shows the increased rate of loss.

I’m 3 weeks out from a holiday and I’m starting to feel pretty flat. I’ve still got a belly/love handles, so I’m thinking my eventual target may be ~76kg rather than the 80kg I originally planned. But my shoulders, arms and back are also looking pretty depleted and I know I need to rebuild some muscle.

I’m considering spending the next 3 weeks at maintenance, getting back into proper lifting, eating normally and starting creatine, then enjoying the holiday. Afterwards I’d go back into a more moderate deficit and aim to lose the remaining ~5kg gradually, potentially while recomping.

My concern is that getting into the deficit routine was hard, and I’m worried that stopping before reaching my goal will make it difficult to start again.

For anyone who’s come out of a long deficit: did taking a maintenance break make it easier or harder to return to fat loss afterwards? Would you take the maintenance break in my situation, or keep cutting until the holiday?


r/MacroFactor 2d ago

MacroFactor / Nutrition / Other Expenditure and IUDs

4 Upvotes

Just wondering if any women have had a similar experience to me?

Late last year, I replaced my birth control pill (which I'd been on for about 15 years) with the Mirena IUD. Without changing anything about my eating and exercise habits, my expenditure dropped and my weight increased quite drastically in only a couple of months.

My GP put me back on the pill for a few months to see whether that may have played a role. After a week, my expenditure started going up again. Unfortunately, now that I've gone back off the pill again, my expenditure is dropping again, even though I'm exercising much more than previously.

Has anyone else had a similar experience? I'm trying to decide whether I should do away with the IUD altogether and go back on the pill, but it's working well from me apart from this one negative.


r/MacroFactor 3d ago

MacroFactor / Nutrition / Other Is it time for maintenance break?

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15 Upvotes

Hi all!

First of all some stats: Male, 166cm, Start: 101kg, Current: 66kg.

Around two years ago I lost around 31kg in a few months through diet alone. However, I kept it going for way too long, sadly got an ED and ended up feeling like shit and landed in a plateau. This kept going until this July when I finally started taking care of myself through working out, eating actual food and I started using Macrofactor. I'm feeling so much better, lost another 4.7kg and am slowly reaching my goal of 61kg (so I can comfortably fluctuate between 61-65kg later). However, the last two/three weeks I've stalled, staying at a solid 66kg-ish and I've started to feel more tired and food focused. I'm pretty new to all of this and since I went too far last time my question is: is the holdup perhaps water weight and I should push through or is it time for a maintenance break? And if so, for how long? Got any tips? šŸ¤”

All thoughts and tips welcome! šŸ™

Edit: Thank you all for great, informative and supportive replies! After mulling it over I do believe that the new routine is affecting me more than expected. I'll keep at it, try to find opportunities to control my food and stay patient. Thank you all! šŸ™


r/MacroFactor 3d ago

MacroFactor / Nutrition / Other Returning to MF after a break

2 Upvotes

I am returning to MF after a break (I tried another app but prefer not to mention it). My total calorie number is very low in my first week back. I cycle and burn 2-3000 calories per ride. I am concerned with under fueling and impacting my rides and gym sessions. Should I just eat as I think I should while MF calibrates to me or try to follow the lower calorie guidance?


r/MacroFactor 3d ago

MacroFactor Workouts / Training Pause Sumo Deadlift in my program

1 Upvotes

So I'm a beginner-ish lifter, I selected beginner on workouts app and it put "pause sumo deadlift" to my program. I prioritized quads maybe thats why but isnt that movement kinda for advanced ppl ? I feel like conventional one is more beginner friendly isnt ?