Does muscle really make your metabolism run faster?

SPNLuver83

Ok this may sound like a stupid question to some, but there are so many fitness *facts* that are really myths I just wanted to clear this one up in my head.

Speaking from personal experience, now that I have more muscle in me I feel much hungrier, ESPECIALLY after I decided to up my calories. It's like now that I am eating more, I am hungrier more often. Now is this the effect of having a faster metabolism due to better health and muscle gain/fat loss? And is it similar in the way that a younger person can seemingly eat what they want and burn it off quickly due to "having a faster metabolism"?

LesterBlackstone

Muscle is more metabolically active than fat, but not by much.

http://weightology.net/?author=1&paged=13

belinus

"All the components in the body require various levels of energy to be maintained. Body fat requires much less energy than lean muscle, as lean muscle is much more metabolically active. Muscle is much more metabolically active, and therefore requires more energy expenditure to remain in homeostasis. If comparing two individuals, with all variables being equal, the person with more lean muscle mass will have a higher basal metabolic rate, and therefore, a lower metabolic age in comparison to those with the identical chronological age."

That's from Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metabolic_age)

MattTheWaterRat

Your muscles want to store glycogen, as does your fat. Your limiting the amount of glycogen coming in, because you're dieting. Your muscles are taking up all the blood sugar (glycogen is blood sugar), and your fat is getting the short end of it.

If your caloric deficit is too high, hormones will be released to keep that fat on you and you will be burning muscle and bone as energy. You'll also get headaches and your breath will smell. That's why it's recommended to lose a pound per week. Anything more might trigger those kind of hormonal responses.

Oops, I just saw that you were upping your caloric intake. Nevermind.

Sarauk2sf

"All the components in the body require various levels of energy to be maintained. Body fat requires much less energy than lean muscle, as lean muscle is much more metabolically active. Muscle is much more metabolically active, and therefore requires more energy expenditure to remain in homeostasis. If comparing two individuals, with all variables being equal, the person with more lean muscle mass will have a higher basal metabolic rate, and therefore, a lower metabolic age in comparison to those with the identical chronological age."

That's from Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metabolic_age)

This article does not indicate by how much and cites no sources that can be looked at to find out by how much muscle impacts BMR (and confuses the issue by the 'metabolic age' concept).

The amount that your metabolism is increased by per day is pretty small, especially for a female who cannot pack on much muscle (without assistance) in the first place.

LesterBlackstone

To put things in perspective:

Adipose tissue burns around 2cal/lb/day
Skeletal muscle burns around 6cal/lb/day

So if you lost 10lbs of fat and gained 10lbs of muscle, the difference would be equivalent to a single chocolate chip cookie.

Whoopee!

hesn92

I believe it lol. I started lifting weights a few weeks ago and eating a couple hundred calories over maintenance on average and I'm STILL losing weight (albeit slowly)

lilpoindexter

I exercise in the morning, and one day I had lots of energy so I went crazy and excercised back, biceps, triceps, quads, hamstrings and glutes, and then did 30 minutes of cardio, I was ridiculously hungry the whole day, I ate my lunch by 10am, and at lunch my stomach was growling really loud, so I went to a mexican food joint, and just bought a big pile of meat and ate it, and I was still hungry until dinner...That usually doesn't happen anymore as my exercise routine and diet have stabilized quite a bit.

trelm249

To put things in perspective:

Adipose tissue burns around 2cal/lb/day
Skeletal muscle burns around 6cal/lb/day

To the OP. The short answer is yes. The difference is purported to be as conservative as cited earlier to as much as 3 times that depending on which study you find to look at. I err on the conservative side as well.

While that may not seem that big a deal, it adds up quickly when aggregated over the course of a year. Compound that with the expenditure required for the exercise to gain the muscle and/or keep it as we age, it gets significant.

Patriots4Life

Yes it does.

SPNLuver83

If its not really by all that much, then why do I feel so much hungrier? And why is it, after upping my net calories from 1200 to 1550 do I feel like 1550 isn't enough when at 1200 I felt satisfied? It's so very confusing and quite frankly driving me nuts lol.

Sarauk2sf

If its not really by all that much, then why do I feel so much hungrier? And why is it, after upping my net calories from 1200 to 1550 do I feel like 1550 isn't enough when at 1200 I felt satisfied? It's so very confusing and quite frankly driving me nuts lol.

Hunger feelings is often due to hormonal changes. Ghrelin and Leptin are the 'hunger signals' that talk to your brain. On a 'diet' they can get a little screwy, so on the 1200 calories they were probably not working properly (this is why some people on VLCD do not actually get hungry). Also, just because muscle does not increase your metabolism by much, it does not mean that the actual workouts themselves are not using up more than your intake has increased. Your intake of 1,550 is still pretty low (not saying whether its too low or not) and so it could just be your body telling you that you need to eat more (although, as noted in my first sentence, your body often lies!).