Fat or muscle - which is heavier in the human body? Muscle mass.

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Many athletes and people far from it are wondering what is harder: muscle or fat. A sufficient amount of controversial information exists in this regard.

Fat or weightlifter?

You can often see a common example in comparing fat and muscle: a well-fed person can weigh 100 kg and not look very beautiful, and a bodybuilder who also weighs 100 kg, but has a low percentage of fat, nevertheless looks quite aesthetically pleasing. Same weight but different shape. In the first case, the person will seem much larger in size than the second, but in the meantime they have the same weight, so what is the mystery?

Having understood the question "Which is heavier: muscle or fat in a person", everyone can clearly understand what actions he needs to take, depending on his goal of building a figure. After all, only having certain knowledge in a certain business can you competently approach the solution of the problem.

Fat or muscle - which is heavier?

Having understood this topic, you can clearly understand why there are such cardinal differences in weight and appearance. When considering the question "heavier muscle or fat?" from the point of view of cellular structure, it can be clearly answered that muscles are heavier, since their cells have a higher density compared to fat cells.

Muscle cells contain protein and water, while fat cells contain only fat, or lipids. You do not need to have special knowledge in the field of body structure to understand that protein with water, they are muscles, will be much denser in composition than fat.

Functions of body fat

Fat is not a useless phenomenon, its critical level is a threat to health, so you need to responsibly approach the process of losing weight. Layers of fat protect the internal organs and create an additional source of heat in cold weather, which explains the decrease in metabolism in winter period as the body tries to conserve fat stores.

Having learned the answer to the question "fat or muscle - which is heavier", many are trying by all means to get rid of fat, which exceeds in volume, but it should be understood that there is a limit beyond which it is not advisable to go.

The lowest fat threshold for a woman is 12%, then problems can begin with both appearance, as well as feminine. Men, on the other hand, can feel great at 5% body fat.

However, a high percentage of fat is harmful to the body, as the likelihood of developing diabetes, energy decreases, metabolism slows down, lethargy sets in.

Why doesn't the weight change?

Due to the difference in weight between muscle and fat, when losing weight, weight can stand still. In the process of sports activity, both fat is burned and muscle mass is built up. Due to the fact that the proportion of body fat may be lower than the proportion of muscle, a stagnant effect of weight change can be created. In other words, two processes occurred simultaneously - fat went away and muscles increased.

Based on this, it is not necessary to give great importance numbers on the scales. Visually, you can see changes, a decrease in volumes in certain areas, but remain at the same weight.

Many believe that if you engage in gym, the figure will in any case become athletic, whether they initially have fat or muscle. Which is harder - burning lipids or building lean mass?

You need to understand that fat does not pass into muscle. Intense loads, of course, reduce in a sense fat layer, however, a good result can be achieved only by restricting carbohydrates.

Heavy bones?

A full person has a large proportion of fat in the body, while the proportion of muscle and bone tissue changes slightly. It is impractical to believe that weight can increase due to bone growth, since even a 10% change in the proportion of bone tissue leads to only 1-1.5 kg.

You can achieve a sharp increase in weight, subject to the presence of physical activity and proper nutrition because muscle is heavier than fat and bone. Because of this, the athlete will have a large muscle mass and weight, respectively. Although, according to the classification of acceptable parameters and weight, he will belong to the overweight group, while having a low percentage of fat reserves.

Today there is a so-called bioimpedance analysis, which allows you to calculate the percentage of muscle and in the body. Based on this, we can conclude whether a person needs to lose weight or gain weight.

When wondering if fat or muscle is heavier, there are many factors to consider that influence weight gain.

In some cases, for example, in premenstrual syndrome in women or with heart disease, weight may increase due to fluid retention in the body. In this case, you must consult a doctor. But still, almost everyone is associated with excess fat.

Understanding the question "Which is heavier: muscle or fat?", It is important to pay attention not only to weight, but also to the distribution of fat in parts of the body. So, a woman, even with excess weight, can look harmoniously built, which is due to uniform distribution fat deposits throughout the body.

The ratio of the volumes of the hips and waist, taken as the norm, for women is 0.7, for men - 1.

Figure Types

There are two female types - "pear" and male - "apple".

People belonging to the first type have a concentration of fat on the buttocks and in the lower abdomen.

Those who belong to the second type have deposits, usually in the upper body. These people are prone to obesity, diabetes, ischemia, and atherosclerosis.

You need to be aware that weight does not play a big role, it is much more important what this weight consists of. The same weight of fat and muscle will look different. How? many will ask. So, for example, 1 kg of muscle takes up a volume 2 times smaller than 1 kg of fat.

To replace fat with muscle, you need to eat protein and give up harmful products, then you will no longer worry about the question of what is heavier - muscle or fat in a person.

Reading about the training of bodybuilding stars, I always felt that they did not finish something. And it's not even about the banal "chemistry". It cannot be that a person who has dedicated gaining muscle mass ten years of his life the best halls yes, with the best coaches, there would be no chips, lotions or even secrets, if you want. I don't know them all, and I can't know them all, but I saw through some of their little tricks. About non-standard training techniques, and how to increase the return on exercise when gaining muscle mass and will be discussed today.

It is possible to build huge muscles, it is much more difficult to make your body proportional, balanced and aesthetic. If you compare photos of athletes in the 90s and today's professional bodybuilders, then something else will catch your eye, in addition to the bloated stomachs of modern stars. This is an awesome quality of working out all muscle groups, coupled with a stunning relief. Yes, of course, also a serious muscle mass. But as the results of major competitions have recently shown, proportional and aesthetic athletes win more and more often.

"Kid" Lee Labrada | Small muscle mass coupled with great shape

For me, an example of an incredibly beautiful physique was and remains Lee Labrada, the legendary bodybuilder of the 90s. With his height of 168 cm, weight of 84-88 kg and arms with a volume of 48 cm, he managed for many years to be among the top ten bodybuilders on the planet. Labrada competed at the Olympia seven times, constantly breathing down the back of his head with a more massive athlete. He became the fourth, third, second, but never the first ... The world was simply not yet ready for the standards of muscle mass proposed by the phenomenal "Kid" Labrada.

But it’s not for nothing that I talk about this athlete for so long. Realizing that a huge muscle mass does not shine for him, Labrada developed his own bodybuilding philosophy. And his vision of the iron sport had a very strong influence on me.

I call this gym training strategy the tricky word Synergism. This is when the sum of the parts is greater than the whole. And let you not be confused by the inherent illogicality of this term, they say, how can this be? But I assure you, this happens, in subatomic physics, for example, or in bodybuilding.

Principle gaining muscle mass performed by a brilliant bodybuilder was to make each of his individual muscle groups ideal. Lee Labrada was not chasing muscle mass, but quality. He tried to make the judges, who for the time being did not notice him in the line of huge bodybuilders, freeze with delight, comparing his chest, back or arms with the massive, but worse developed parts of the bodies of his monstrous colleagues. Not being able to hit with muscle mass, Labrada blew everyone with his aestheticism, multiplied by the excellent quality of the muscles.

Naturally, his training program in the gym was also strikingly different from the training scheme of his more massive colleagues. But Labrada had something else - he was never stagnant. From year to year, from competition to competition, he constantly progressed. And I think that's also the merit of his gym training program.

In order to make his muscles balanced, proportional, ideal in shape and visually larger than they really were, Labrada constantly made changes to the performance of the most ordinary, classic exercises. He worked his muscles at unthinkable angles and angles, forcing the body to constantly grow and improve its shape. All gained muscle mass in the old fashioned way, and he was looking for new trajectories of movement, options for grip and foot placement. But let's talk about everything in order:

Little secrets of gaining muscle mass | Changing grip width

In any training program in the gym that describes the technique for performing various exercises, from bench presses to shrugs, grip width is a constant value. If you pull up, the grip must be wide. But what if you change the grip and grab the barbell or the handle of the simulator in a different way? Will there be a difference? Of course, it will, I will say more - by changing the width of the grip, the load can be directed to a completely different place, forcing the muscle to work in an unusual mode. For example:

  • Bench press. If you grab the bar with a wide grip, most of the load will go to the outer part of the chest. And if the grip is changed to medium (intermediate between normal and narrow), the middle of the chest will receive a very strong load.

  • Pull-ups. Simply changing the grip from wide to medium will drastically lengthen the trajectory of movement and shift the load to the bottom of the lats. I was amazed at how my back changed when I started doing medium grip pull-ups. The latissimus dorsi muscles have become much more pronounced precisely at the point of attachment at the waist.
  • Horizontal block pull. Most of us use a narrow parallel grip for this exercise. But as soon as you hang a conventional handle for vertical traction instead of it, the load on your back will become completely different. I usually do a couple of sets first, holding my arms wide. This is how I feel the outer part of my lats. Then I change the grip to narrow and do 2-3 more sets, trying to get my elbows as far behind the body as possible. In this case, the middle of the back receives a large load.
  • Bending the arms with a barbell. Let the physiologists shout at the top of their voices that changing the grip width does nothing for the biceps. They say that its form is genetically laid down, and we cannot influence it, but ... Making any changes to the usual technique of doing exercises becomes stress for our muscles, which can cause muscle growth.
  • Dumbbell raise with supination. In fact, you can change the grip with any options for lifting dumbbells for biceps, but I get the strongest impressions from supination. To do this, I take the dumbbell not in the middle, as usual, but as close as possible to the inner edge. And when I wrap the brush, the load on the biceps, because of this little trick, increases significantly.

This is far from complete list exercises that can be transformed beyond recognition and increase their impact. I try to change my grip every workout in the gym. This allows me to load my muscles differently each time and deftly dodge stagnation in gaining muscle mass.

Changing the load angle

This is another feature that I spied on professional bodybuilders who generously post videos of their workouts in the gym on the Internet. I was very surprised to see with what fiction they perform the usual classical exercises, constantly changing the angles of attack on the working muscle.

  • Bench press. Classic variant This exercise involves a bench angle of 45°. I still see incline benches in gyms, the angle of which is not adjustable in principle. Most of the exercise at this angle goes straight to the front delt. To some extent, the load vector can be shifted to the upper chest if the bar is replaced with dumbbells, but the bench angle will have to be reduced to 30 °. Although I feel the greatest stretching of the top of the chest with an even more moderate slope of the bench. Which I also change with every approach. Why not additional stress for my muscles?
  • Leg press in the simulator. I have noticed for a long time that most of the visitors in the gym do not know at all that the angle of the bench press platform can be changed. And how might this affect set of muscle mass of the legs? It turns out that quadriceps are very sensitive to changes in the angle of the load. It is worth tilting the platform to an angle of 30 ° and the load will shift to the lower thigh. And if, on the contrary, increase the angle to 45 °, the work will start top part, both front and rear surface quadriceps.

  • Lifting dumbbells for biceps on an incline bench. I once noticed that the lower I lower the back of the bench while doing this exercise, the more my biceps are stretched. What angle should be there, according to the precepts of the King of Peas, 45 °? And I often do dumbbell curls while lying on a fully horizontal bench. And believe me, from such a non-standard reading of a regular exercise, my biceps are stretched simply unbelievably.

  • Bench press in the simulator for the shoulders. Perhaps somewhere there are simulators for the deltoid muscles, which allow you to press strictly vertically upwards and direct the load precisely to the middle delta. But I haven't seen them on the Internet. But in the halls, I often meet shoulder simulators, where the movement is performed while sitting on an inclined bench. Muscle mass deltas from such presses are really rushing. But only not in width, but in thickness, because the main load is taken on not by the middle delta, but by the front, the largest and strongest. And the shoulders, instead of becoming wide, move forward, visually becoming narrower. it won't work that way. Having seen how the great Charles Glass does it, I began to sit on the contrary, facing the simulator, and with my back to the audience. Thus, the load on the front delta decreased, and increased on the middle and rear.

The idea of ​​such a bench press is very simple, but extremely effective. After all, it’s not for nothing that bodybuilding stars pay Charles Glass $300 for every hour they train with him in the gym.

As in the previous case, the list of exercises described is only a small fraction of the possible variations that allow you to look at well-known movements through the prism of changing the load angle.

Little secrets of gaining muscle mass |Changing the position of the feet

But in this case, you can make your legs grow by loading the quadriceps, adductor, hamstrings and calf in a different way at each workout in the gym. I think it is this trick that allows modern bodybuilding and fitness stars to not just pump up big feet, but at the same time make them incredibly balanced and elaborate. The whole secret is to constantly change the position of the legs and turn the feet.

  • Barbell Squat. In my opinion, no the best exercise for the legs than the barbell squat. But even it can be thoroughly modified by simply changing the width of the legs. The wide-stance squat even has its own name - plie. This variation of the squat puts a lot of pressure on the inside of the thigh, which is why it is so popular with women who do plie every workout in the gym. Narrow stance, on the contrary, is extremely popular with men, as it loads the outer bundle of the quadriceps, creating the so-called "riding breeches". But if you go further and to change the width of the legs, further expand the feet, the load will shift to the patella. However, such non-standard options squats, I advise you to perform in the Smith machine. There you can forget about maintaining balance and fully concentrate on the segment of the thigh muscles being worked out.

  • Leg straightening on the machine. Because of my long legs, the adductor muscle of the thigh, called the "droplet", did not want to grow for a long time. But I was able to find the key to this stubborn muscle by simply turning my feet as far outward as possible. And already at the start of the movement, only turning my deployed legs under the roller, I feel a strong tension in the patella region of the thigh. And the process of extension from the usual exercise for the quadriceps turned into a purposeful work to increase the muscle mass of my adductors.
  • Lying leg curl. There are not many exercises for building hamstrings, and almost all of them consist of bending the legs, standing, sitting, lying down. It would seem that the same standard movement, how can it be diversified? But, in my opinion, the construction of this muscle is in many ways reminiscent of pumping the biceps of the arms. And, as in the case of hands, even a minor innovation gives a very strong return. Performing bending of the legs lying down, I change the position of the feet in each approach. I move my legs together, turn my feet outward or vice versa, turning inward. And believe me, the biceps of the thighs are very sensitive to such changes, responding to the growth of muscle mass and a noticeable improvement in shape.

  • Toe raises. Nobody likes to train calf muscles. And this is understandable - these muscles grow very poorly, they respond reluctantly to the load and the range of exercises for their development is very scarce. But, as is the case with other "stubborn" muscles, such as the neck and abs, without proportionally developed calves, a balanced physique will have to be forgotten. And in order to somehow diversify the training process for the development of the calves and at least shock them a little, I try to change the position of the feet in each approach (parallel, inward, outward). Sometimes I change the angle of the turn during the exercise itself, doing 10 repetitions first one way, then another. This allows you to introduce novelty into familiar exercises and makes the muscles respond to an unusual load.

If you bring together most of the variations of the exercises I described in one table, you get the following picture:

muscle group

Regular exercise

Its modification

Effect

Breast Bench press with regular grip Medium Grip Barbell Press Increasing the load on the middle of the chest
Wide Grip Barbell Press Increased load on the outer parts of the chest
Back Wide grip pull-ups Medium grip pull-ups

Increasing the load on the bottom of the widest and improving their shape

Legs Barbell squat, feet shoulder width apart Wide stance barbell squat Increased load on the inner thigh
Narrow stance barbell squat Increased load on the outer surface of the thigh. Creation of "riding breeches"
Shoulders Incline bench press Bench press in the simulator, turning his back to the hall Increasing the load on the middle and rear delta
Biceps Incline dumbbell raise Lifting dumbbells lying on a horizontal bench Lengthening the trajectory of movement and increasing stretching of the biceps
Raising dumbbells with supination with a regular grip Lifting dumbbells with supination grip shifted down Increased peak load on the biceps during supination

In conclusion, I suggest watching a video where the same tireless inventor Charles Glass shares his tricks in using the hack squat machine.

I hope these tricks will allow you to make your own. workout in the gym more effective and gain some more muscle mass, exactly where it is needed most. May the force be with you. And mass, of course.

Human capabilities are still unknown, but we already know that they are huge.
What is strength and muscle mass, how are these parameters related ... Why not very big athletes can show great strength ... So, we continue the conversation about increasing strength and muscle mass.
I recommend (especially for beginners) to first read the first article on this topic:

As well as familiarity with the basics and terminology:

STRENGTH AND SIZE OF MUSCLE
On the one hand, strength is directly related to muscle size, and this is logical. On the other hand, different training programs are used to increase maximum strength and muscle mass. Surely you have seen not very healthy guys who lift quite large weights.
For example, in powerlifting, a master of sports in the category up to 82.5 kg, performs squats and deadlifts for one repetition, with weights of 220-240 kg, and a bench press of about 150 kg.
A weightlifter athlete, in the weight category up to 69 kg., fulfilling the standard of the master of sports, must lift 110-120 kg in the snatch and 135-145 kg in the clean and jerk, and this is all from the floor, on outstretched arms above his head!
And this is only the standard of the master of sports, and world-class athletes lift much more.
So what are they lifting?
Muscle volume and strength are certainly related indicators, but they are not the same thing.
Let's figure out what increases strength and muscle mass and how these parameters are related ...

STRENGTH
Factors affecting the strength that a muscle can develop.
1. Muscle size - the number of contractile units (myofibrils) in muscle cells.
This parameter directly links the strength and mass of the muscle, by increasing the number of contractile elements, we increase the strength. So in this case, size matters
2. Central nervous system (CNS) - control of muscle contraction.
This includes the strength and frequency of nerve impulses, intermuscular and intramuscular coordination of contractions, some restrictions in the nervous system and tendons. In addition, the state of the peripheral nervous system is also important - the nerve endings that fit the muscles.
In order not to delve into this complex topic, for simplicity, we will call these parameters the CNS factor, or the control factor.
This factor influencing strength is not related to muscle mass. Here, size doesn't matter.
You have motors (muscles), but their work depends on commands from the central nervous system, which means that you can develop muscle strength without increasing its volume. Moreover, the development of strength due to CNS factors has a much greater potential than due to an increase in the diameter of the muscle. That's why a bigger muscle can't always develop a bigger strength.

Maximum strength can be increased by increasing muscle mass and by training the nervous system.
Of course, the larger the muscle, the greater its power potential, but the question is how open it is.
exercising nervous system, you increase the efficiency of the amount of muscle that you have, you teach your body to squeeze more out of your engines. We can say that this is the efficiency of the muscle - what force the muscle can give out of each centimeter of its diameter.

MUSCLE MASS(diameter of the muscle)
Factors affecting the increase in muscle mass:
1. The number of contractile units in muscle fibers and the number of fibers themselves.
These parameters directly affect the strength.
2. The amount of nutrients and energy substances stored in the muscle (glycogen, ATP, CRF, muscle proteins), the number of capillaries and intracellular organs.
An increase in muscle volume due to these parameters does not affect the growth of strength, but significantly increases strength endurance. This means that you can increase the size of the muscles, almost without increasing their maximum strength.

6-12 reps with 70-80% of max strength.
Increase in muscle mass:

2. By increasing inventory nutrients and development of the energy supply system.
Strength increase:
1. By increasing the number of contractile units.
2. Through the development of coordination.

4-6 reps with 75-90% of max strength.
Increase in muscle mass:
1. By increasing the number of contractile units
Strength increase:
1. By increasing the number of contractile units
2. Due to the training of CNS factors

1-3 reps with a load greater than 90% of the maximum strength.
A very modest increase in muscle mass and a large increase in strength due to CNS and tendon training. You are pushing the limits of power.
However, it should be borne in mind that this is a very debilitating load and traumatic, so it should be used by experienced athletes and in the correct dosage.

How it is expressed in practice.
In practice, muscles have to be trained quite versatile. For example, it is impossible to train too long and often with extreme loads. Such workouts are very stressful for the nervous system, so a reasonable dosage is required, otherwise you can get overtrained or injured. Experienced athletes, in their training plan, combine heavy, light and medium workouts.
Depending on the sport and task, the training plan focuses on a certain type of load and work in a certain range of repetitions.

In addition, the fact of tuning the nervous system to a certain type of work is very important. If you train with high reps to develop muscle mass, then the nervous system is tuned to maintain strength during a large number repetitions. If you develop maximum strength and train with low reps, then the nervous system is tuned to produce a large maximum strength in one repetition.
In addition, the energy supply of muscles should also be tuned to a certain type of work.
Therefore, when switching from one program to another, it takes some time to “tune” the nervous system and muscles to the new kind work. By the way, this is one of the reasons why muscle pain can occur when changing the training program.

Human capabilities are enormous and still remain a mystery.
At the World Championships in weightlifting, middleweights (up to 85 kg.) Push barbells standing overhead for 200 kg. !
Theoretically, one can develop tremendous strength, but practically, there is simply not enough life. If you are engaged in increasing muscle mass, you have less time to power training and training of the CNS. If you train strength, then you have to rest a lot so as not to overload the nervous system and restore ligaments, and there is less time to gain muscle mass ...
But science is developing, training methods are improving, we are revealing more secrets of our body and human capabilities are expanding.

There is an opinion that you first need to gain more mass, and then dry it. When I hear such thoughts, I think that the mass can be dry and wet. And I also know firsthand that bodybuilders in last days before the competition swallow diuretic pills.

I also heard that professional athletes swallow anabolic pills to gain mass. These tablets, in addition to useful properties exist and side effects e.g. sodium retention. Who looked at himself in the morning after eating salty, knows that he retains water, and the body swells.

They say that Americans love everything big and fast. When it comes to gaining mass, unlike athletes in other countries, American bodybuilders tend to gain mass without paying attention to how much water and fat have accumulated. That period of a professional athlete's life, when muscle-water-fat mass is gained, is called the mass-gaining cycle among bodybuilders. If we used the word cycle, then there is some kind of cycle.

Seasonal mass gain

Athletes of all sports compete once every six months. This is called competitive season. In the spring, the snow melts and the waters come down, in the fall the rainy season begins, and nature drains excess water from the sky. So bodybuilders, in accordance with nature in spring and autumn, speaking at competitions, dry their muscles and drain water.

In winter and summer, on the contrary: they eat muscles, fat; collect water; sleep a lot and work little.

And how much is gained excess weight for one competitive cycle?

In one interview, Alexander Nazarenko from St. Petersburg said that even women bodybuilders tend to recommend gaining 30 kg in order to lose 29 (!) Before the competition.

In front of my eyes, the champion of Russia allowed a woman 160 cm tall to gain weight up to 74 kg, so that she then went on stage with a weight of 55 kg. Gaining and losing thirty kilograms in six months, so that the bottom line is 2 kg is a common practice for professional bodybuilders. And what about ordinary people?

Seasonal exacerbations

Spring has come, and people have massively asked themselves the question: how to get in shape? Many want to get in shape for the summer; someone wants to appear in all its glory for the holidays; someone can't wait to surprise everyone on their birthday or New Year. Moreover, these bursts of enthusiasm for improving your body occur annually, as well as the desire to spoil your work with holidays, gluttony and drunkenness. Where does this seasonal thinking come from?

Maybe from nature itself? People do not want to endure the cold in winter and use heating; avoid the heat in summer and use air conditioning. But if the weather can't overtake a person's body temperature, then it may well hit the brain with atmospheric pressure and change the course of thought from “gaining mass” to “drying muscles.” And the weather does this even with those who will never compete.

It is on the psychology of seasonal exacerbations that such a type of business as fitness marathons is based. I think it will soon be possible to run a "Stupid Mass Gain" marathon and it may become popular. Although now it is modestly called the "transformation of hardgainers."

mass stagnation

The psychology of mass gain

The gap between psychology and physiology inevitably leads to damage to mental and physical health. To be healthy is to live in harmony with nature. This means that if you accept a gift from nature, you must be prepared to pay for it.

My training methodology does not involve large fluctuations in weight, and with it, large fluctuations in thought. Consistent thinking is a sign of mental health, and my methodology is based on it. Consistent thinking has many health benefits:

It does not disrupt the endocrine system;

Does not overload the heart and kidneys;

Protects the liver;

Does not create a risk of high blood pressure;

Keeps a healthy psyche;

gives the same output, expressed in kilograms of pure (dry) muscle mass.

The question that torments most people exercising in the gym, how to gain lean muscle mass. Is it as simple as it might seem at first glance? Let's look into this.

Only a few can gain lean muscle mass even with a perfectly matched diet. In most cases, gaining muscle mass and staying lean is next to impossible.

It is only natural that most newcomers to the gym want to gain muscle mass, while looking lean and lean. It would seem that everything is simple, you need to choose a training program, for example - this Program for gaining muscle mass, regularly visit the gym and you will be happy, but not everything is so simple.

More or less dry muscle mass is easiest to gain by nature for a thin person who, before going to the gym, already looks dry, but with a small amount of muscle. By starting training, he will be able to slightly increase muscle volume without gaining excess fat. It will last, however, it is not for long, and for further progress it will be necessary to increase the calorie content of the diet, creating conditions for muscle growth.

All excess calories that do not go to building muscle, of course, will go to body fat. The question arises, what if there is exactly as much as necessary for the growth of muscle tissue?

In theory this is possible, but in practice it becomes very difficult to determine and calculate the exact amount of food. If we take into account the factor that athletes have a different body and the reaction to certain foods in people is different. For example, someone's milk is perfectly digested, while someone swells a lot, and this applies to many products.

In people who initially have extra subcutaneous body fat, in order to boast of dry muscles, you first need to get rid of excess fat. At the same time, gaining muscle mass and at the same time getting rid of subcutaneous fat will not work.

These are two completely different actions:

  1. In order to get rid of subcutaneous fat, you must be in a calorie deficit.
  2. In order to gain muscle mass, you need an EXCESS of calories.

Feel the difference? Two completely opposite processes. Of course, if we consider professionals, then resorting to additional hormonal support, in the form of growth hormone, these two opposite processes become possible. But amateurs cannot afford this, so we will get out with the set of genes that is given to us by nature.

Surely many people have a question, but what about all the competing athletes and just guys with a relief figure? They look dry and with good muscle volumes, but the point is this:

Way to perfect figure consists of several stages:
  • To begin with, we gain muscle mass, for example, according to the training program, the link to which is at the beginning of the article, while not worrying about excess fat, it will inevitably be gained. But we should not relax, we try to choose a diet and food in which we gain a minimum of excess fat.
  • Then, having gained muscle volumes that suit us, we proceed to the stage of the so-called drying. Here we form a relief figure, removing excess subcutaneous fat. I note that at this stage, you do not need to try to gain muscle mass! After all, we cut calories in order to dry out our muscles. Our task is to preserve the gained muscles while removing excess subcutaneous fat.

This is how a beautiful aesthetic body is built. I would like to note that it is not worth striving for the transcendental relief. The form of relief athletes, which can be seen in the photo in magazines, is done on short term for photo shoots or competitions. Maintaining it constantly is very difficult and, moreover, unhealthy.

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