Hi there pinksta66.

You have unfortunately come across one of the most frustrating parts of the fitness world; lose the weight in fat, not muscle.

Sadly there doesn’t seem to be a perfect answer yet to science. Every individual is different and their bodies work like this too. The general advice is that is you’re gunna start your cut (weight lose programme to get shredded) of all the weight you lose, 75% will be fat and 25% will be muscle; not much we can do about that. However, the current research suggests that if performing heavier weight exercises with your resistance work, free weights, sprints, machines etc. then the loss will be limited. But you will have to accept you’re going to lose some muscle.

Some of the best inspiration for this actually comes from bodybuilders. Not that I’m advocating the same level of training they do for the lay exerciser, but they actually have some of the best exercises and advice for dealing with this problem. As you’ll see, they tend to bulk up pretty large till nearer show time, then cut down to their desired weight; accepting they will lose the odd few pounds of lean muscle. Its important to bear in mind however, that they work towards a specific date, not a general weight they would like to maintain.

I would advise looking at the “Harris Benedict equation” to work out your daily calorie needs, then minus that by 500kcal to limit the amount of muscle lost over the long term when trying to lose weight. Keep up your gym work and recovery, and hold onto that muscle!

It’s a complicated subject, but if you’d like some more specifics I’d be happy to expand on any of these points.

JC

Thats great! Shows its working for you and if that’s what you’re aiming for with your training then perfect.

If you’re new to exercise then the body can burn fat and building muscle for a short period of time. However, after this period has past then it is extremely inefficient at this. The only other times its good at this is when you come back to exercise after a break due to illness or whatever other reason for stopping. Additionally the muscles will firm up and become more active, increase in muscle tone leading to the increase of size and firmness you have explained. But in terms of strength gains, the first thing to change with your body when you start to train is the muscle recruitment, i.e. how much of your muscle you use, on a biological level; nothing you can actively decide to do about it.

If you’re interested have a look at this website, it gives a nice little explanation of this factor.

http://emedicine.medscape.com/article/1141359-overview

However, once this phase has past you will find it pretty hard to continue to build measurable increases in muscle size whilst on negative calorie diet (having less calories than your body needs to maintain its current size, hence why it burns fat). Give measuring yourself a go and see how you get on. It can be really encouraging to have figures to measure yourself with, or even before and after photos.

No worries pinksta66! You’ve hit it on the head there, just don’t worry about it. Have you taken your physical measurements or pictures of before and after? They’re a really nice way to be able to see actually how well you’re getting on, but its great you’ve begun to notice things changing.

Let us know how you get on!