Does losing fat make you look more or less muscular?

jxspxr
jxspxr Posts: 150
in Health and Weight Loss
Hi,

I have a question: does losing weight make a guy look more or less muscular?

Let me introduce myself so I could describe my situation. I am a guy of 26 years old and I lost quite some weight now - I moved from BMI 30.0 to BMI 25.9, and I plan to go to BMI 22.5-23.0 - I think I can go much further.

See, I am lucky to have a naturally muscled body, which for a while was covered beneath a layer of fat. Because of that layer, I looked a lot bigger - and perhaps more muscular. That layer has shrunk significantly, but there still is 10-15kg to lose.

Now I wonder what your opinion is on the question I ask above?

So far I am leaning to saying that I mostly look more muscular, because muscles are getting more defined. But at the same time my body gets smaller, so in the area of my biceps I may look a bit less muscular - though also there they muscle is more defined.

Thanks!

Regards,
Jasper

Replies

  • refinedredbird
    refinedredbird Posts: 208 Member
    if you are not strength training, eating enough calories, and consuming enough protein you can lose your lean muscle along with fat during your weight loss. If you are doing these things correctly and not losing your lean muscle, then yes, lowering your body fat percentage will help in defining your muscles because they are no longer covered with layers of fat.
  • jxspxr
    jxspxr Posts: 150
    Thanks for your reply! I think I am eating properly, though I am not (yet) doing strength exercise, just running, mountain biking and a bit of swimming.

    This is not a problem to me, I do accept a small reduction in muscle mass - I plan to rebuild these muscles when I am done losing weight. I read that recovering muscle mass that was once then building completely new muscle mass. I don't know if that's true, but even if it isn't I accept some loss for now and that I have to work to get it back.

    I never did much strength training, I am lucky enough that my body has a natural tendency to create a good amount of muscles. I do want to do this, but not now, because I don't want to make too many lifestyle changes in a short amount of time - I already changed so much. Also, I don't know much about building muscle, but what I do know is that it's quite a challenge to build muscle while losing fat, since both put different requirements on what you should eat and how much.

    Or to say it in a more suiting manner: losing weight already puts enough on my plate, to build muscles would put too much on that same plate ;).

    So, I'll take it easy and just focus on this goal.

    How do you do this? Is keeping and building muscles important for you as a girl? I ask this question because it's stereotypical for men to worry about this, but I think this may be a prejudice - muscles are useful for anyone. Though many men (including me, by the way I say many to avoid gender generalisation) really want to be strong. I am not the macho type of guy (on the inside at least), but I like strength because it enables me to get things done and, very important, to be able handle tough situations.

    Do you recognise these sentiments? And do you think many other girls want to be strong? I guess not, but I may be wrong.
  • RGv2
    RGv2 Posts: 5,789 Member
    If you are strength training, while eating at a caloric deficit you are maintain the muscle mass you already have. Why would you want to lose muscle mass to go through ALL of the work to try to build it back up?

    If you maintain muscle mass while losing weight (fat) you will become more defined. It's not that your muscles are changing (growing) it's you are losing the fat that was once covering them so they become more visible.
  • SamanthaClarexo
    SamanthaClarexo Posts: 353 Member
    If you are strength training, while eating at a caloric deficit you are maintain the muscle mass you already have. Why would you want to lose muscle mass to go through ALL of the work to try to build it back up?

    If you maintain muscle mass while losing weight (fat) you will become more defined. It's not that your muscles are changing (growing) it's you are losing the fat that was once covering them so they become more visible.

    This.
  • BarackMeLikeAHurricane
    BarackMeLikeAHurricane Posts: 3,400 Member
    Yes, losing fat gives you a more muscular look. That's why bodybuilders try to get as lean as possible before getting on stage.

    For example, check out Lee Priest. He looks like a fat sack of *kitten* on the left (bulking). As he loses weight, he looks much more muscular. He doesn't even look like the same person.

    80888d680214259e4c339ac39745e5f2_zps9c8c5427.jpg

    Obviously this is an extreme example, but it illustrates my point.

    Now onto you. Don't go by BMI, what's your height weight and body fat %?

Categories