How to Burn Fat & Keep Muscle
One of the biggest problems when you are dieting or exercising for weight loss is that the body tends to lose muscle in addition to fat. And while the loss of both muscle and fat leads to an overall reduction in body weight, the loss of muscle tissue can also hamper fat burning. Muscle is active tissue and burns calories, even at rest, and maintaining muscle tissue helps with overall fat burning. Some muscle loss is inevitable, but there are ways to preserve as much muscle as possible, while losing fat.
Instructions
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Get enough calories. Muscle tissue uses a lot of them. When the body doesn't get enough calories, it breaks down muscle tissue in order to conserve energy. Imagine that the fat stores are the body's savings account. When the body doesn't have enough calories, it will break down muscle tissue in an effort to conserve energy and avoid tapping into its fat stores. Not only that, but if we cut too many calories, the body will take any surplus and put it in savings because it thinks that a famine is coming. The same way a person may reduce expenses in order to save money, the body "cuts" out muscle tissue to save energy.
Unfortunately, weight loss depends on creating a calorie deficit, thereby forcing the body to use its fat stores.
So, in order to preserve as much muscle as possible, we need to conduct a delicate balancing act where we cut calories just enough to get the body to use its fat stores but trick the body into thinking it's getting plenty of food.
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Eat several small meals. By eating frequently, we maintain a constant, steady flow of nutrients and calories and keep our blood sugar levels constant--all things that signal to the body that food is plentiful. Feeding the body constantly also ensures that the body has enough resources to convert fat into usable energy.
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Do resistance training. Resistance training builds muscle mass, directly counteracting the effects of restrictive diets and aerobic exercise. When we exercise for fat burning, the body recruits energy from all tissues, indiscriminately. This is why we tend to lose muscle mass along with fat mass. Resistance training rebuilds the muscle mass lost during aerobic activity.
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Reduce aerobic activity. Rather than doing aerobic exercise every day, alternate days, doing resistance training on the off days.
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Get adequate rest. The body builds muscle at rest, not during activity. Allowing the body to rest between resistance sessions allows those muscles to rebuild. This is why you don't work the same body part two days in a row. The body needs at least 48 hours to rebuild tissue.
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Tips & Warnings
There are several resources on the web for calculating daily caloric needs based on age, height, weight and activity level.
