muscle loss and calorie deficits
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Total agreement that all of that 203# of LBM is certainly not muscle. Just trying to wrap my brain around what actually would be a good goal weight in the end while evicting the fat and keeping as much muscle in place. Also agree that some of that LBM will also go as well, but want to have some strategy in place to not have the loss be coming from more muscle than necessary.
I do maintain, however, that BMI is pretty much a faulty litmus test. To hit the "healthy" BMI range I'd have to get under 199"s at my height. The rowing picture in my photos is from college over 25 years ago. I was probably in the 11-13% bf range at that juncture (perhaps even less) and my weight was in the 205-215 range. According to BMI I was fat.
I certainly got fat in the years afterwards, though. Finally working to change that. Planning to adjust goals and expectations multiple times as I continue onward to a better place.
Thanks for all of the feedback y'all. Very helpful.
I agree, BMI is basically BS. However, for a little anecdote for you - I'm roughly your size (or was). 6'3", over 300lbs to start. I remember thinking the same thing "I have to be under 200 just to hit the 'healthy' range?". I figured it would never happen because my LBM was so high (at least, I thought so). Well here I am 2.5 years later, I now weigh 203lbs and I'm still flabby, probably mid-upper teens bf%. I would still need to lose 15-20lbs to reach 10% bodyfat, which puts me mid 180s. Turns out, I'm not as big as I expected!
Keep in mind, I also follow an intense lifting regime and eat 200g of protein every day. I've done my best to maintain muscle mass but I'm sure I've still lost some, along with lots of water and whatever else.
My best advice is to just do the rights things (good macros, reasonable deficit, lots of lifting) and re-evaluate your goals as you go. I've dropped my goal weight considerably along the way. I think it happens to everyone.
This is an interesting observation, thanks for sharing!
I know last year when I got down to 188 lbs I thought I'd look a lot more defined than I did. I think that for my current build I'd have to realistically get down into the low 170's to get serious definition, which is still a far cry from the 202 lbs I'm at currently. Probably another 30 lbs to lose on top of the 9 lbs I already lost.
I agree with your thought about BMI, that while it is not entirely accurate, it's still somewhat of a gauge. I used to think I had a lot of LBM because I worked out for years, but I sometimes wonder if I even have 150 lbs LBM on my 202 lb frame right now.
The main takeaway from this is that you definitely have to re-evaluate your goals as you progress along. You won't really know what your ultimate goal is until you see your progress at various stages along the way. 185 lbs may sound good at 210 lbs, but when you get to 185 lbs you may still have some flab left on your body, you might reassess and determine that 175 lbs is where you really want to be at that point. Or maybe 185 lbs would be just right. But it seems based on the responses here from others who have lost significant weight that you really just have to adjust your goals as you progress because one static number is not necessarily all there is to weight loss.0 -
Quoting myself from just a few posts back- afraid this is getting lost in the sea of text...What is your take on this article?
http://www.gssiweb.org/Article/sse-59-fat-metabolism-during-exercise-new-concepts
It cites a lot more recent studies (very long list of references), but from my layman's reading (eyes glazed over well before the end) it seems inconclusive as far as establishing a rate. Would like to hear what others get out of it.
Are you looking for comments on the article? The key points seem to be pretty non-controversial - get your exertion level up, and you start metabolizing from the "Fat Battery", and the Fat Battery doesn't provide as high a rate of energy as the Carb Battery.
It also suggests exercising in a fasted state will more directly drain the Fat Battery, and that is consistent with advice offered by a large cross section of reputable trainers.
This line cracked me up..."Approximately 100 kcal of energy are expended per mile of walking, so most people have sufficient stores of triglyceride energy to walk 500-1,000 miles."
EDIT: Given the recent infatuation amongst certain types of fad diets (notably the "primal" crowd) with sprinting/interval training, it was also interesting to see the article make it pretty clear that it is endurance athletes that are actually the Awesome Sauce of fat burners.
EDIT #2: Thanks for bumping this link - that is actually a pretty terrific read!0 -
Yes, I was looking for comments as a lot of it went over my head. I got the gist of it, but wasn't sure if maybe it was being more specific than I thought if I understood some of the more detailed bits. I also wasn't sure it really said that the 31.4 number was wrong, yet it was very significant to me that no mention of it was made when the article was a well researched piece on exactly that subject.
BTW, on the BMI topic - I posted that other link to a British article about the height to girth ratio earlier. This afternoon I had to take one of my kids to the dentist and while waiting I was looking at a Men's Health (November 2013) that had a short article on the same thing. It was an article about knowing various numbers to stay healthy.0 -
Quoting myself from just a few posts back- afraid this is getting lost in the sea of text...What is your take on this article?
http://www.gssiweb.org/Article/sse-59-fat-metabolism-during-exercise-new-concepts
It cites a lot more recent studies (very long list of references), but from my layman's reading (eyes glazed over well before the end) it seems inconclusive as far as establishing a rate. Would like to hear what others get out of it.
Bumping to make sure I read...0 -
Total agreement that all of that 203# of LBM is certainly not muscle. Just trying to wrap my brain around what actually would be a good goal weight in the end while evicting the fat and keeping as much muscle in place. Also agree that some of that LBM will also go as well, but want to have some strategy in place to not have the loss be coming from more muscle than necessary.
I do maintain, however, that BMI is pretty much a faulty litmus test. To hit the "healthy" BMI range I'd have to get under 199"s at my height. The rowing picture in my photos is from college over 25 years ago. I was probably in the 11-13% bf range at that juncture (perhaps even less) and my weight was in the 205-215 range. According to BMI I was fat.
I certainly got fat in the years afterwards, though. Finally working to change that. Planning to adjust goals and expectations multiple times as I continue onward to a better place.
Thanks for all of the feedback y'all. Very helpful.
I agree, BMI is basically BS. However, for a little anecdote for you - I'm roughly your size (or was). 6'3", over 300lbs to start. I remember thinking the same thing "I have to be under 200 just to hit the 'healthy' range?". I figured it would never happen because my LBM was so high (at least, I thought so). Well here I am 2.5 years later, I now weigh 203lbs and I'm still flabby, probably mid-upper teens bf%. I would still need to lose 15-20lbs to reach 10% bodyfat, which puts me mid 180s. Turns out, I'm not as big as I expected!
Keep in mind, I also follow an intense lifting regime and eat 200g of protein every day. I've done my best to maintain muscle mass but I'm sure I've still lost some, along with lots of water and whatever else.
My best advice is to just do the rights things (good macros, reasonable deficit, lots of lifting) and re-evaluate your goals as you go. I've dropped my goal weight considerably along the way. I think it happens to everyone.
Appreciate this insight from someone with similar stats and starting point who is much further along with the process. Definitely agree that there will be many points along the way to evaluate cand re- evaluate the goals.
Thanks for sharing.0 -
This line cracked me up..."Approximately 100 kcal of energy are expended per mile of walking, so most people have sufficient stores of triglyceride energy to walk 500-1,000 miles."
Would the FitBit mechanism even make it that long?0 -
Total agreement that all of that 203# of LBM is certainly not muscle. Just trying to wrap my brain around what actually would be a good goal weight in the end while evicting the fat and keeping as much muscle in place. Also agree that some of that LBM will also go as well, but want to have some strategy in place to not have the loss be coming from more muscle than necessary.
I do maintain, however, that BMI is pretty much a faulty litmus test. To hit the "healthy" BMI range I'd have to get under 199"s at my height. The rowing picture in my photos is from college over 25 years ago. I was probably in the 11-13% bf range at that juncture (perhaps even less) and my weight was in the 205-215 range. According to BMI I was fat.
I certainly got fat in the years afterwards, though. Finally working to change that. Planning to adjust goals and expectations multiple times as I continue onward to a better place.
Thanks for all of the feedback y'all. Very helpful.
I agree, BMI is basically BS. However, for a little anecdote for you - I'm roughly your size (or was). 6'3", over 300lbs to start. I remember thinking the same thing "I have to be under 200 just to hit the 'healthy' range?". I figured it would never happen because my LBM was so high (at least, I thought so). Well here I am 2.5 years later, I now weigh 203lbs and I'm still flabby, probably mid-upper teens bf%. I would still need to lose 15-20lbs to reach 10% bodyfat, which puts me mid 180s. Turns out, I'm not as big as I expected!
Keep in mind, I also follow an intense lifting regime and eat 200g of protein every day. I've done my best to maintain muscle mass but I'm sure I've still lost some, along with lots of water and whatever else.
My best advice is to just do the rights things (good macros, reasonable deficit, lots of lifting) and re-evaluate your goals as you go. I've dropped my goal weight considerably along the way. I think it happens to everyone.
Appreciate this insight from someone with similar stats and starting point who is much further along with the process. Definitely agree that there will be many points along the way to evaluate cand re- evaluate the goals.
Thanks for sharing.
Sure, and best of luck! It's a long road but it's worth it
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It matters because fat can only be "burned" (converted and used) at a rate of roughly 31.4 calories per pound per day, so even if you are doing other things right if the deficit can't be serviced fast enough using fat then the body has to use other things.
I'm oversimplifying here, I know... but I need something more tangible to help me understand...
Say I have 30lbs of fat. 30lbs * 31.4 calories per day = 942 calories. That means that my fat mass can account (make up for?) a maximum deficit of 942 calories.
Again, oversimplified I'm sure, but for the sake of conversation/understanding...
Sigh.
That equation and those numbers are incorrect. They are a model, a poor model at that, based on data from starvation experiments in the 50s.
But, you can consider that there are primary two things going on in terms of fat/LBM loss (if we ignore some of the other energy processes). Energy being brought out from fat storages and energy brought from protein use - consider fat conversion to be rate limited earlier on, as you increase the deficit more energy is drawn from LBM, partially due to metabolic signaling that shunts protein synthesis and turn over. Ooops, you just do not allow for energy to be available for protein synthesis and use.
I don't follow... it seems like you're making the same point I made, more or less. I just used numbers because I understand them better (more tangible to me, if you will).
Energy being brought out from fat stores - it's real, it does happen, but it's limited. So as the deficit gets bigger, there comes a point where fat stores cannot make up the difference, so energy is drawn from LBM.
As a minor point/thing to add that you're probably aware of but I'll mention it anyways --- the theoretical limit doesn't mean that stored energy will come exclusively from fat when you're under the limit, it just proposes that a limit exists and it tries to quantify it. One can stay under this theoretical limit and not draw stored energy exclusively from fat.
Yes, absolutely. I'm well aware that this is an over simplified and purely theoretical way to "understand" a bigger concept. This is a necessary first step for me before I can sufficiently get lost in the details and influences in individual situations.
Ok, sorry I wasn't clear but I didn't want to go into the details of modeling.
The original 31.4 calculation comes from a study by Alpert calculated by Lyle.
However, it's been transformed and is being incorrectly used.
First off, it isn't the maximum from fat stores, it is the level at which energy is being *primarily* being taken at a rate which is *primarly* fat-free mass sparing for *moderate* exercise individuals during a *starvation* diet. (notice all the stars, these matter).
However - FFM is being used even at rates below (see the graph of that study) and it is specific to the lab conditions explored - male, non-obese, starvation diets, low activity.
If you want to replicate those conditions - yes, a greater than 940 calorie deficit (in your example) migh tresult in significant greater loss of FFM, on average but it isn't the maximum.
The reason I say this is that when you look at more recent models - particularly the Hall model (ref below) - it's clear that Fat/Protein Oxidation is affected by by total macronutrient availability and physical activity levels. Thse are two major issues - the more active you are the less protein oxidation occurs. Ignoring dietary partitioning is a significant failure of using that model.
TL;DR: While this seems like diving into details - the short version is: don't consider that 31.4 to be correct as it is highly affected by exercise, diet and body composition
see here for the base calcluations:
http://baye.com/calculating-the-daily-calorie-deficit-for-maximum-fat-loss/
the Hall model
http://ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15615615 if you want to see the details of FatOx see the appendix or go to his website and download the model and software (timesuck...)0 -
At sleep or at rest or low level moving, outside of having eaten and insulin being high, you'll burn almost total fat for the low level energy needs. Except glucose to the brain, taken from blood sugar and liver replaced as needed.
If you think about your RMR, if you really accomplished a lazy day with no eating, you could have that much of a burn be almost all fat supplied. So 1500-1800 or whatever, though I've seen the comments that about 400 cal daily is the glucose used for the blood sugar level for the brain use.
So that leaves 1100-1400 for the fat to supply. If that conceptual theory study that came up with 31.4 based on other studies is true, that would mean you'd need upwards of 45 lbs of fat mass I guess for the body to be comfortable using fat stores before it stopped for some reason.
That would mean 28% fat for a 160 lb person.
The RER (respiratory exchange ratio) shows the split of fat vs carb consumption for energy, and that is seldom down at the 0.7 required for fat being the only energy source. Overnight fasted subjects had an RER of 0.93 in https://www.biomedcentral.com/1756-0500/6/382 pointing to dominant carbohydrate fuelling of rest. In http://ajcn.nutrition.org/content/59/1/28.full.pdf the RER is over 0.8 pointing to a more balanced carb / fat mix slightly in favour of fat but still burning plenty of carbohydrate.
I believe the RER reflects the recent diet so high carb eaters will be cycling glycogen stores and using carbs whereas low carb people will be using predominantly fats. My resting RER is below 0.75
http://www.ploscompbiol.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pcbi.1000960 is an interesting look at the maths of marathon running. Big muscle glycogen capacity and very high aerobic capacity in order to maximise fat use (running at lower % VO2max) seem to be key. An example calculates the fat burn of a marathon runner at 400 cals/hr (40% of 1000).0 -
What is your take on this article?
http://www.gssiweb.org/Article/sse-59-fat-metabolism-during-exercise-new-concepts
It cites a lot more recent studies (very long list of references), but from my layman's reading (eyes glazed over well before the end) it seems inconclusive as far as establishing a rate. Would like to hear what others get out of it.
This was interesting - "Intramuscular triglyceride accounts for 2,000-3,000 kcal of stored energy, making it a larger source of potential energy than muscle glycogen, which can contribute only about 1,500 kcal" - a different rate limit may apply to the use of that during exercise rather than fat from adipose tissue getting mobilised into the bloodstream to supply the muscles.0 -
Quoting myself from just a few posts back- afraid this is getting lost in the sea of text...What is your take on this article?
http://www.gssiweb.org/Article/sse-59-fat-metabolism-during-exercise-new-concepts
It cites a lot more recent studies (very long list of references), but from my layman's reading (eyes glazed over well before the end) it seems inconclusive as far as establishing a rate. Would like to hear what others get out of it.
What that article states clearly (or not so clearly ...) is that energy from fats has different modalities based on the amount of exercise one carries out. Energy from adipose tissue is not as significant as carb stores or lipids use from stores within muscle.
Which was one of the points I was making from the Hall article - exercise activity levels influence use of fat storage (if you use the lipids in your muscles, I'm going to assume that there is some long term rebalancing that occurs from other available sources - either adipose tissue or dietary lipids).
While it seems that it argues for either fasted excerise due to insulin response post-carb ingestion or low carb diet - the source articles it takes are short term effects - in reality, substrate partitioning pre exercise has been shown to have little value in a "big picture" analysis for most people. It might make sense in extreme athletes or people with medical conditions like PCOS. You'll notice that the same study that shows a increase in fat oxidation with low carb availability also showed a significant decrease in performance.
Anyway, its an interesting article - it almost goes as far as explaining the "afterburn" effect of fasted exercise... Almost.0 -
All I know is that in the last 10 years of being a stay at home mum and no exercise and over eating, i lost alot of muscle, gained loads of fat and gained in total 7 stone! since January I've eaten 1200calories a day, mainly protein, trained 14hrs a week for a few months but had to cut back to 7hrs a week due to shin splints etc, I've lost over 4 1/2 stone so far and gained a lot of muscle! I've been told on here in the past I had this amount of muscle, it was just hidden!! Not true at all! The fact I'm female, was only eating 1200 cals proves u can gain muscle or at least maintain muscle on a calorie deficit if u have enough body fat. When I was UK size 10 before having children, my legs were never as muscular as this so it wasn't hidden by fat before someone says that lol! I think if u are slim with not much body Fat and u eat at a calorie deficit and dont train u will lose muscle mass, but if u have body fat and train on a calorie deficit u won't lose any muscle mass and can even gain some dependant on how much training u do.0
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All I know is that in the last 10 years of being a stay at home mum and no exercise and over eating, i lost alot of muscle, gained loads of fat and gained in total 7 stone! since January I've eaten 1200calories a day, mainly protein, trained 14hrs a week for a few months but had to cut back to 7hrs a week due to shin splints etc, I've lost over 4 1/2 stone so far and gained a lot of muscle! I've been told on here in the past I had this amount of muscle, it was just hidden!! Not true at all! The fact I'm female, was only eating 1200 cals proves u can gain muscle or at least maintain muscle on a calorie deficit if u have enough body fat. When I was UK size 10 before having children, my legs were never as muscular as this so it wasn't hidden by fat before someone says that lol! I think if u are slim with not much body Fat and u eat at a calorie deficit and dont train u will lose muscle mass, but if u have body fat and train on a calorie deficit u won't lose any muscle mass and can even gain some dependant on how much training u do.
Keep in mind that a lot of that leg muscle could likely have been built up during the time that you were in a caloric excess and put onthat 7 stone of weight and that only now that you are back into losing weight that this (not actually so new) muscle is now only being revealed for the first time.
I know from my own progress that I sure as hell built a ton of leg muscle while carrying around 350 #'s just getting around on a daily basis0 -
No as I wasn't active so my legs never moved much. Doing many many squats and lunges built up my leg muscles since January. My legs weren't hugely fat anyway, I carried my weight around my middle so I would have noticed muscle in my legs.0
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That makes sense, if you have a ton of fat on your body it'll burn through that first since there is so much available. But if you're leaner and have more LBM than fat, it'll burn some LBM unless you watch your diet and exercise properly, and even then it is probably not entirely preventable at a certain bodyfat% being lean, etc.
Good discussion on here!0 -
In to read later0
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In to read later0
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Tagging to follow, love the info guys!0
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