We built TrakMac because too many nutrition tools rely on outdated assumptions and one-size-fits-all formulas. Real bodies are more nuanced than that. Real life is too. Our goal was to create something more personalized, more realistic, and ultimately more useful for the people trying to build healthier lives.
For most of my adult life, doctors would look at the charts and say, “Technically you fall into the obese category … but that doesn’t seem right looking at you.” The standard demographic formulas (height, weight, age, sex, plug into Mifflin-St Jeor) quietly insisted I should be eating 1,800 calories a day and walking more.
I wasn't obese. I was big, muscular, and active. I could clean & press more than most of the people categorizing me. The numbers didn't fit because the numbers were never built for someone like me in the first place. BMI was designed in 1832 as a population-level statistic, not a personal nutrition tool. Every app on the App Store still uses it like it's gospel.
That always bothered me. Not just for myself, but for every “big guy.” Every runner, hybrid athlete, GLP-1 patient, post-partum mom, and former college athlete I’ve met who got nutrition advice that seemed “a little off.” All because the algorithm couldn't see them clearly. The tools sand everyone down to the same shape, then tell you you're wrong for not fitting it.
The tools sand everyone down to the same shape, then tell you you're wrong for not fitting it.
TrakMac is the opposite. It asks what you actually do: your fitness level, your mile time, whether you can hold a plank or knock out pull-ups, what your training looks like in a normal week. From those answers it builds your macro targets. Your body type comes out of how you move, not how you look on a chart. It's the answer to a question I spent fifteen years trying to get a straight answer to: what should I actually eat?
I'm the second set of eyes on TrakMac, and most of the time, the louder voice in the room about whether something feels right for a real human.
I entered into the world of fitness later in life. Unlike many of my peers in the space, I was not a former D1 athlete. On the contrary I’d never previously been an athlete of any kind. Learning the connection between my body and my training was all new territory and one that felt a bit overwhelming.
As I grew more confident with how to fuel my own body it became more apparent that others around me struggled to do the same.
Whether it was changing metabolic needs in midlife, a young mom living on little sleep and left over chicken nuggies or a lifter whose calorie target wouldn't cover one good training day.
Where John tests the math, I run it against the humans I actually know. If a target feels punishing to a real woman who's training hard, it's wrong. If the advice would put a friend in a worse spot than where she started, it's wrong. The app has to work for most everyone, regardless of where they are in their journey.
Building TrakMac was personal for both of us. The version of the app that exists today is the version we both wished had existed when we needed it.
The app has to work for most everyone, regardless of where they are in their journey.
The frustrating part of getting categorized wrong isn't the labels. It's that every downstream tool (calories, protein targets, training recommendations, meal plans) inherits the bad assumption. We knew that firsthand.
So we built TrakMac around fixing it at the root. Instead of a body type derived from height and weight, your TrakMac Type is derived from fitness signals: what you can lift, how fast you can run, how many muscle-ups you've got (if any), what your weekly training actually looks like. That body type drives your macro targets. Your macro targets drive you toward the right fuel, specific to you.
It's a small idea with a big consequence: the people who've been miscategorized their whole lives finally get math that fits them.
TrakMac is built by a husband and wife team in Los Angeles, CA. It's just the two of us. A small studio, a personal grievance with how nutrition apps work, and the conviction that there are millions of people to whom the math just doesn't fit. So we started building an app that would get you 80% of the way to putting you on the path towards better habits, and a healthier, stronger lifestyle.
Founder
Founder of What We Do Collective. A creative, builder, tech enthusiast, diy-er, athlete, Varsity Soccer coach, and father. Spent fifteen years confused about nutrition advice, on a mission to build smarter habits that lead to feeling better. Decided to build something he wished had existed.
Co-Founder
A working mom of two who found fitness in midlife, building a stronger version of herself. TrakMac is one small way to positively impact and empower the lives of the people around her.
TrakMac is live on the App Store. If the math has never quite fit you either, or you hate math in general, you'll feel at home.
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