Skinny Fat

neat0
neat0 Posts: 16
in Fitness and Exercise
I'm skinny fat!
My BMI is average but I've ate so much junk in my life I must have a high percentage body fat, as you can see in my side photo I'm getting 'podge' in my stomach area, which I'm assuming is visceral fat. I'm starting to try and eat healthier, run again, and I've just started the 30 day shred...but i was wondering if anyone else has had a similar issue? Any hints and tips on how to reduce my body fat but not necessarily my overall weight. Any recommended programs to follow? Anything I should be avoiding doing? Or do I simply need to to go down the same route as if I was trying to shed some lbs?

Also, I'd really appreciate some MFP friends so I can see your posts and stuff and hopefully keep my motivation up!

Replies

  • AnvilHead
    AnvilHead Posts: 18,343 Member
    Lift weights and keep your protein intake high (around 1g protein per pound of lean body mass, or around .75g per pound of bodyweight). If you're not trying to lose weight, eat at close to or slightly over maintenance calories.

    A lot of women here seem to like NROLFW (New Rules of Lifting for Women). Stronglifts and Starting Strength (google them) are very popular also.
  • draculaspointer
    draculaspointer Posts: 106 Member
    Run... and eat healthy. But mainly, run. And some lifting helps too.
  • kalynn06
    kalynn06 Posts: 368 Member
    The only thing that has really helped my BF% is lifting heavier weights and eating at a deficit but a small one. I also tend to be skinny fat, and, like some others people in the same situation, I tend to have a pretty fast metabolism that I, if left to my own devices, manage to out eat.

    When I ate at a larger calorie deficit and focused more on intense cardio with lighter weights, I dropped weight rapidly, but my BF% remained pretty much unchanged. To see a visible and measurable difference in body fat, I had to eat more and pick up heavier things. The weight loss is much slower, but the visible results are much better.
  • AnvilHead
    AnvilHead Posts: 18,343 Member
    When I ate at a larger calorie deficit and focused more on intense cardio with lighter weights, I dropped weight rapidly, but my BF% remained pretty much unchanged. To see a visible and measurable difference in body fat, I had to eat more and pick up heavier things. The weight loss is much slower, but the visible results are much better.
    Exactly. Your results are corroborated by this study:

    http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10204826

    Note that the subjects doing cardio only lost more body weight overall, but a significant amount of it was lean body mass (that's muscle). The subjects performing weight training lost no lean body mass. The weight training subjects also showed an increase in RMR (Resting Metabolic Rate), while the cardio subjects showed a decreased RMR.

    Translation: If you want to lose weight faster, but have a more significant portion of it come from your lean body mass (i.e., head towards "skinny fat"), do lots of cardio. If you want to lose weight more gradually but keep your muscle around, pick heavy things up and put them back down (and eat plenty of protein, as I said previously).

    As has been said before: Losing weight makes you look good in clothes; losing fat makes you look good naked!

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