Tips for leaner muscles?

adipillo97

Hey guys! I recently got hired in a professional dance job. I’ve always been pretty active but now I’m trying to take my fitness a little bit more seriously and toying with protein powder and pre-work. I want to tone up more, but I want to avoid getting “bulky” for my job and get more long and lean dancer-like muscles. What kind of exercises should I be doing, and is there a certain kind of diet that would help too? Thankyou all for your advice and support!

AnvilHead

You can't make muscles any longer than they are - they have fixed origin/insertion points. It sounds like what you're looking to do is reduce body fat while maintaining your current weight, which is called "recomposition". There's a good thread about it here: https://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/10177803/recomposition-maintaining-weight-while-losing-fat/p1

Don't worry about getting "bulky" - that's not going to happen.

Motorsheen

AnvilHead wrote: »

You can't make muscles any longer than they are - they have fixed origin/insertion points. It sounds like what you're looking to do is reduce body fat while maintaining your current weight, which is called "recomposition". There's a good thread about it here: https://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/10177803/recomposition-maintaining-weight-while-losing-fat/p1

Don't worry about getting "bulky" - that's not going to happen.

this.

the idea of nice, long, lean muscles is usually applied to marketing, advertising or bro'science.

mom23mangos

If you want to look like a dancer, train like a dancer. Since you are already a professional dancer, that part seems to be covered. So it really sounds like you just want to slim down a bit? Make sure you are on point with your diet and weighing and measuring everything accurately. Once you lean out a bit, you will start to see those dancer muscles you already have.

HeidiMightyRawr

You can't change the length of your muscles and you're not going to get bulky by accident (people who want to build considerable size and bulk, train and eat for a long time specifically for this)

When you say leaner muscles, it sounds like you want more muscle definition? If this is the case, it's really just down to body fat % and the amount of muscle you have. You can lean out and your existing muscles will show more, or you could focus on building muscle/gaining weight with and they wouldn't show anymore, but then when you lose fat afterwards you'll have more muscle to show. It depends how much muscle you want, but reducing body fat is key to having the definition.

As has been mentioned, if you're now training like a dancer, I wouldn't worry too much about it. Your body will adapt to the exercise and you will end up looking like a dancer, as you are one.

deputy_randolph

If you want to be less "bulky," you need to be less fat.

Muscle is muscle...not lean or bulky muscle.

mom23mangos

https://bretcontreras.com/long-lean-muscles-oh-irony/