If you want to reduce fat first to optimize your body composition, you'll also need to strength train and boost your protein intake to limit muscle loss. Losing fat and gaining muscle are not mutually incompatible, and both are essential for long-term weight loss and long-term health and fitness.
The question which is better for losing fat or building muscle depends on what you're looking to achieve. If you want to lose fat then you need to make sure that you're focusing on reducing calories intake while strengthening your muscles. This will allow you to lose fat without losing muscle tissue.
If you want to build muscle instead then you need to make sure that you're eating enough nutritious food that is high in protein and calcium. You should be aiming to eat six to eight small meals a day to maximize your metabolism and give it all the fuel it needs to function at its best.
It's important to remember that if you want to lose fat then you should be limiting yourself to low-fat foods, whereas if you want to build muscle then you should be having more high-fat foods so you can gain muscle mass. So for example if you were trying to lose fat you would eat vegetables and fruits rather than chips and cookies, whereas if you wanted to build muscle then you might have a bowl of ice cream once a week and some meat dishes several times a week.
Building muscle while losing weight, on the other hand, accomplishes the reverse, revving up your metabolism and making it simpler to meet and sustain your fat-loss objectives. Muscle also improves your strength, lowers your chance of injury, and can enhance your general health. There is, in fact, no more efficient way to burn calories than by building strong muscles.
The reason why building muscle helps you lose weight is because muscle is more metabolically active than fat, and so burning it uses up more energy. Fat, on the other hand, isn't used up when it's burned, instead it releases stored energy (in the form of heat) when you contract muscles containing a lot of it. This process, known as thermogenesis, or body heat production, is what makes muscles burn calories even when you're not doing any activity that would require energy. So by building muscle you are actually helping yourself to lose weight by reducing your overall body fat content.
Muscle burns more calories per gram than does fat, so if you build up your muscle mass you will be able to lose more weight faster. However, it should be noted that if you focus only on building muscle without paying attention to how much you are eating, you may end up experiencing some other problems with your diet plan. For example, you could end up starving yourself so you can eat less food, which is not only dangerous for your physical health but also leads to reduced muscle growth.
"You may lose muscle mass if you don't exercise to maintain or grow your musculature while attempting to lose weight," she added. It is not necessary to lose weight before beginning strength training if you want to gain muscles. However, it can be helpful to be in a negative energy balance (i.e., using more energy than you consume) when starting an exercise program.
The primary purpose of losing weight is to reduce your risk of developing health problems such as diabetes and heart disease. Doing so could also help you live longer. The American College of Sports Medicine recommends that adults try to lose 1-2% of their body weight each month. Of this amount, about half should come from diet changes and the other half from physical activity.
Muscle burns more calories than fat does, so building up your muscle mass can have many benefits including reducing your appetite because you feel full after eating less and decreasing your risk of developing diseases such as osteoporosis and diabetes. Muscle is also more metabolically active tissue than fat is, meaning it uses more energy even when not performing any physical activities. This is why having more muscle mass than fat mass is beneficial.
However, not everyone needs to lose weight first before starting strength training. If you are already in good shape and just wanting to build up your muscles, then you do not need to lose anything first.
Protein is an essential ingredient that can aid in muscle building and fat loss. Moderate quantities, according to a sports nutritionist, are optimum for fitness goals. Eating more than this may cause you to gain weight.
Protein helps the body build and maintain muscles, and it may be needed to help remove waste products from your body. The amount of protein you need depends on your age, gender, height, weight, activity level, diet, and other factors. Most adults require 0.8 grams of protein per kilo of body weight to meet basic needs. This means that if you weigh 70 kg (154 pounds), you will need 70 kg x 0.8 = 56 g of protein daily.
People who are physically active may need more protein than those who are not as active. As well, athletes who are trying to build muscle may need more protein than others. Average requirements range from 0.6 g/kg to 0.8 g/kg of body weight per day.
Proteins are made up of smaller molecules called amino acids. Each type of protein contains an equal number of these small molecules. There are twenty common proteins found in food that we cannot make ourselves so they must come from outside our bodies.