Eating to Build Muscle and Lose Fat

Building muscle and losing fat can be complicated and overwhelming concepts for many new and beginner individuals.

With the large amount of information of the internet these days, it is no wonder that most people end up following the wrong type of advice and waste precious time, energy, and money during their journey.

If you are new to the world of fitness, perhaps the best thing you can do is read and learn as much as you can about bodybuilding nutrition and training.

In this article I will discuss a few important concepts for muscle building and fat loss. It is my hope that by the end, you will have a better grasp on the information and have a better idea of what you need to do next.

The first thing you need to learn about muscle building is that it doesn’t happen without a surplus of calories. In order for your muscles to grow, you body needs more calories than it takes to maintain your current weight.

A caloric surplus can be attained by calculating your daily caloric needs and activity level and adding no less than 500 calories to it. To do this, calculate your basal metabolic rate (or how many calories your body would need to maintain its current weight if you slept all day) then add your activity level.

This calculation can be found on many websites by just searching “BMR calculation”. Now, this may seem counter-intuitive because losing fat requires a caloric deficit, however if you gain weight properly you should see minimal fat gain and in the end, your muscle will burn more calories resulting in fat loss.

Getting back on track - once you have this number and have added 500 calories, you now know how many calories you need to eat in order to gain muscle mass. A great way to make sure you are getting enough calories is to use a calorie tracking website.

These websites make is fast and easy to add up your daily calories and keep you accountable. Remember, if you don’t eat enough, there is simply no way you will build more muscle.

To gain muscle while losing fat it is critical that you eat the right types of food. For minimal fat gain with your muscle gain, it is recommended that individuals stick to natural, unprocessed foods.

There are three “categories” or macronutrients that you want to get these healthy foods from.

They are: protein, carbohydrates, and fats. Your body needs all three to function properly and build more muscle mass. Ideally, you will get around 1.2-1.7 grams of protein per pound of bodyweight (each gram of protein equals 4 calories).

Your fat should consist of roughly 20% of your total calories (each gram of fat contains 9 calories), and you should fill in the rest of your calories with complex carbohydrates (each gram of carbohydrate equals 4 calories).

When starting a new healthy lifestyle these are the first concepts you should think about. Combine these nutritional concepts with a solid training routine focused on heavy, compound lifts and you will see incredible progress in no time!

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