Should I First Lose Fat, Then Gain Muscle

Should I First Lose Fat, Then Gain Muscle?

I've been asked this same question phrased in many different ways many times over the years. It's sort of like asking the old "which came first, the chicken or the egg" question.

The first fact that you need to accept as law is that you don't "turn fat into muscle." That is just simply not the body works. It doesn't say, "Oh look, let me make some muscle out of these fat cells."

Building muscle is WAY down the list of the body's priorities. As a matter of fact, building muscle isn't even ON the body's list of priorities. First the body provides the necessary energy for the body to continue to live. Then the body replaces dead or dying cells with healthy new ones in the bones, the skin, the liver, the stomach, etc. Then, if there is anything left over, the body very efficiently stores it as fat — FAT, not muscle.

You can lose fat AND gain muscle simultaneously. But you cannot convert fat to muscle. If you consume 500 fewer calories each day than your body would normally use and maintain the same level of activity, you'll lose about one pound in a week's time. If you increase the activity, you'll lose more. But none of that fat that you are losing is going to turn into muscle.

Muscle must be forced to grow. Muscle must be stressed and damaged to the point that small tears develop in it and it fails. Then the body goes go work repairing the damage by building more muscle.

If your objective is to lose weight AND build muscle, you must eat a calorie-restricted diet, engage in aerobic exercise (to burn fat) AND weight-training exercise (to build muscle).

BONUS : Title:
Should you use weights when you go to the gym?

Word Count:
316

Summary:
In any gym, you are going to find that the main features are two things: weights and weight machines.


Keywords:
gym, weights, treadmill


Article Body:
In any gym, you are going to find that the main features are two things: weights and weight machines. This is because weight training is such an important part of going to the gym: it is one of the most energy-burning kinds of exercise you can do, and it builds strength and muscle. If you go to the gym and don’t lift any weights, then you might as well have not gone at all.

The simplest way to weight train is to simply get the weights and lift them up, crouching down, picking up the weight, and then trying to lean back and unbend your knees to get back to a starting position. While this is simple, you can keep on making it more difficult forever simply by adding more weights to your pole – it is not difficult to make a weight that even the world’s strongest man couldn’t lift.

However, this kind of exercise tends to only exercise the same few muscles of your body over and over again. To make sure that you build muscles and get stronger all over, it is better to use weight machines.

Weight machines work in all sorts of different ways, but generally use either fluid or springs to create the illusion of weight, and then a system of wheels and pulleys to bring that weight to you. These materials create resistance without necessarily needing large weights, so you can set the difficulty of using the machine to artificially create weight level you want.

Each different weight machine is designed to train a different set of muscles in your body, which means that doing them all in a circuit will give you an all-over workout. Even if you find one machine particularly difficult, you shouldn’t leave it out, as doing this will create a weak point in your muscles that could be dangerous for you.