Gaining Or Sparing Muscle While Burning Off Fat

Weight loss and losing weight are common terms that are often misused or misinterpreted. When clients come to me with the goal of weight loss their actual intent is to lose fat mass. I prefer the terms leaning out plan or leaning out diet as they are more accurate. In fact most people actually want to maintain or even gain muscle and bone density which of course is a significant part of your weight. This is even truer with my male clients. Now this is where things can get more difficult. To gain muscle mass you have to consume a surplus of calories (more than you burn) to feed the lean mass growth.  Yet, to lose fat mass you need to have a negative caloric intake. For instance a 500 calorie per day deficit would equate around a 1 pound fat mass loss per week. So which is it more or less calories to achieve your goals?

This is the reason behind bodybuilders having distinct growth and cutting periods in their cycle. They eat significantly more calories when they are in a growth period with lots of muscle stimulation for maximum protein synthesis to gain as much mass as they can. They then follow this period with another with variations in training and a caloric deficit to lose as much fat as they can usually before competitions. I am only using the calories in and out as an example; the world of body building is infinitely more complex than that. The point is that it is difficult to do both at the same time, lose fat and gain muscle.  For this article I am only covering natural weight loss and muscle building without the use of TRT or GLP-1 medications.

Newbies VS Enthusiasts

We all know our bodies are capable of dramatic adaptation. This is particularly true of exercise. Over a period of time we become more efficient, the body learns to do the same work output with less resources. For instance if a 150 lbs. person  started a walking routine of 1 mile daily they would burn about 100 calories. After about a year they would only burn about 90 calories for the same mile. Adaptation leads to efficiency.

Newbies are the easiest clients to get results for providing they follow the plan. A newbie is generally someone who has never been a consistent exerciser or for whom it’s been many years since they did. Because of this lack of efficiency their metabolism will waste more calories and the new stresses to the musculoskeletal system will significantly increase muscle mass growth to meet the challenge. I have had male clients lose 30lbs in 3 months while gaining 10lbs. of lean mass. The fat loss/muscle gain will diminish as they become more efficient.

Exercise enthusiasts (you know who you are) are consistent participants is one or more forms of exercise. Enthusiast’s bodies are already well adapted to their exercise stimulation and or diet. This increased efficiency makes further changes harder and harder to come by. It becomes significantly more difficult to both gain muscle and lose fat at the same time. In fact on average 25% of weight loss realized due to caloric restriction comes from lean body mass. So how does an enthusiast lean out while sparing muscle?  

Influencing Factors

1) Appropriate Exercise Stimulation – Resistance exercise sits on top of importance. To spare muscle mass and convince the body not to use muscle protein as a fuel source you must stress your muscles and overloading works best.  The stress from resistance exercise begins a process called cell signaling which is the catalyst to protein synthesis. You’re basically convincing your body to produce the proteins it needs to maintain or increase lean body mass to meet the physical demand. Higher intensity works better. Either heavier resistance or more work volume. Even moderate intensity has shown the ability to spare lean body mass.         

Aerobic exercise is also beneficial.  Using zone 2 cardio to burn more calories to aid fat loss makes a lot of sense.  The majority of calories utilized during zone 2 cardio (60-65% of max HR) come from fat stores. Zone 2 is also great for your cardiovascular system.  If you can, add some zone 4 a couple of times a week. Zone 4 actually builds muscle while improving VO2 max.  An example would be sprint training either on a track or a bicycle. Zone 4 would be around 85% of max heartrate. Aim for intervals of about 90 seconds each with equal time of recovery.  Work up to 6-8 intervals.

2) Nutrition – Proper eating starts with protein. To spare muscle mass and maybe even gain some you need to consume a significant amount of your calories from protein. Aim for 1-1.25 grams of protein per pound of body weight. Might sound like a lot, but less will lead to less protein synthesis and less muscle being spared or gained. I find it difficult to eat enough protein while keeping my calories in check so I use protein shakes and bars to fortify. Studies show that with adequate protein less than 10% of weight loss comes from lean body mass.

Adequate amounts of healthy fats and carbohydrates are also necessary to fuel your workouts and daily activities. Fruits, vegetables and grains are excellent sources of micro nutrients, vitamins and fiber.

Calorie counting should be as accurate as possible; I personally use a digital scale to weigh my foods and an app to track them. There are a couple of tests available to find out how many calories a day you need for maintenance. One is called an RMR test. It’s a breathe test that can tell how many calories you burn in a non-active state. You would then add NEAT (non-exercise activity thermogenesis) and exercise calories to get your daily requirement. An easier though not quite as precise alternative is to use a simple formula devised at Harvard. This method though more generalized is still pretty good. Essentially, for a person performing 30 minutes of daily activity, 15 calories per pound of body weight would be maintenance.  So, if you weigh 150lbs. your maintenance calorie count would be 2250 calories.

When deciding how many calories to cut you have to consider how many pounds of weight you wish to lose, a target date, and if are you willing to lose muscle mass to get leaner?  Faster weight loss means more loss of lean body mass. Remember 3500 calories equal a pound of weight. If you were to cut calories by 500/day you would in theory lose 1 pound per week. At this pace you would likely spare lean mass. 1 to 2 pounds per week is ideal. Just remember slower weight loss results in less lean body mass lost and more sustainable results.  Some people like to time their calories around activity, eating more calories on your most active days and less on the others.

3) Sleep – This is probably the biggest point of contention. With our busy lives we often are willing to forego some sleep.  You know the saying “I’ll sleep when I’m dead”. However, skipping or scrimping on sleep will be detrimental to your long term health and your results. During sleep your body releases larger doses of hormones like growth hormone and begins a process of repairing, remodeling and rebuilding. Wastes are also removed at a faster pace in your body and brain during sleep. This down time also allows for improvements in cognition, metabolism and destressing.  For best results you need about 8 hours of sleep a night. Some elite athletes get around 9 plus hours to be at their best.  

Supplements

Here are a few supplements to insure your body has the building blocks it needs to gain or retain lean body mass. These supplements are beneficial for many functions in the body such as bone health, immune function and mental clarity. Our purpose here is to insure optimal supply to optimize natural testosterone levels.  Taking extra amounts of these will not increase testosterone to super physiological levels. Being deficient could decrease your total and free testosterone.

1) Vitamin D – Actually a prohormone, many if not most people are deficient.  Raising vitamin D to a healthy level has shown to increase testosterone in studies. Recommend dose 2000-5000 IU.

2) Zinc - Low zinc levels may lead to lower testosterone. Zinc is also good for prostate health. 15-25mg.

3) Magnesium - Used by the body to regulate nerve and muscle function, blood sugar levels, blood pressure and testosterone production. 200-400mg.

4) Boron – This mineral increases utilization of vitamin D, magnesium and calcium. Also has exhibited in studies to increase testosterone and free testosterone by lowering Sex Hormone Binding Globulin. 6-12mg.

5) Tongkat Ali – This herbal product has been used for generations in Indonesia and Malaysia for many health purposes including fighting infection and increasing libido. Tongkat Ali has been shown in studies to increase testosterone and particularly raise free testosterone by unbinding it from SHBG. Tongkat can be used by men and women  to optimize your natural testosterone and estrogen levels. 200-400mg.

I recommend getting regular blood work done to include CBC, metabolic panel, lipid assay, and full sexual hormone tests. Add on a 25-Hydoxyvitamin D test.  If you are in a healthy zone this will give you a baseline to refer to going forward and if you are experiencing low T these tests will aid in finding the reason for deficiency.

Summary

You can lose fat while maintaining or even gaining muscle mass it just takes a little extra effort and planning. To summarize, do moderate to high intensity resistance training to stimulate protein synthesis. Compound and full body exercises work best. Perform zone 2 cardio to burn fat and add zone 4 occasionally to improve VO2 max and build muscle. Make sure to consume about 1-1.25 grams of high quality protein per pound of body weight. This would probably require supplementing with protein shakes and bars. Aim for 8 hours of sleep per night, this is when your hormonal cascade begins and your body goes in overdrive repairing and remodeling.  Supplement with key vitamins, minerals and herbs to insure testosterone levels are optimized. Get blood tests done regularly every 3-6 months to insure you are on the right path. Lose weight slowly, ideally 1-2 pounds per week to insure most of the weight loss is from fat mass.

 If you are on medications or being treated for a specific health reason always check with your doctor first before starting a new exercise regimen or new supplementation.

References:

Body Composition Changes in Weight Loss: Strategies and Supplementation for Maintaining Lean Body Mass, a Brief Review  https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC6315740/

Calorie counting made easy https://www.health.harvard.edu/staying-healthy/calorie-counting-made-easy#:~:text=To%20do%20so%2C%20you%20need,if%20you%20are%20moderately%20active.

Resistance Training Prevents Muscle Loss Induced by Caloric Restriction in Obese Elderly Individuals: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis https://www.mdpi.com/2072-6643/10/4/423#:~:text=The%20six%20RCTs%20included%20in,and%20BM%2C%20compared%20with%20CR.

The Interplay between Magnesium and Testosterone in Modulating Physical Function in Men https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3958794/

Nothing Boring About Boron https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4712861/

Here’s How Much Tongkat Ali Naturally Boosts Testosterone https://honehealth.com/edge/tongkat-ali-testosterone/?srsltid=AfmBOoqchn7I8bUsToz056vUeIV6VHvVGmZfqtD6JZmfJzfpoQ1S9oJI