In Part I, we discussed the definition of metabolism as the rate at which your body burns calories. We also covered the Laws of physics in relation to weight loss and weight gain, which dictated that a consumption of calories over the daily calorie needs would end in weight gain; consumption of calories below the daily calorie needs would result in weight loss.

The Difference

In this Part, we will discuss metabolism as it relates to muscle gain and fat loss. Now, at the beginning I want to distinguish two related but different things- weight loss/weight gain with fat loss/muscle gain. I need to distinguish because the first doesn’t necessarily equate to the other. At least absolutely. What I mean is, one can lose weight and it not all be fat- it could be a combination of fat and muscle. One could also gain weight and it not all be muscle- it could be fat and muscle. But, calorie intake is a good reference point to insure the ”best” results of both. You can insure you lose mostly fat, by taking in enough of the right kind of calories below your daily calorie burn and weight train regularly. People often make the mistake of taking in too few calories- which leads to a breakdown of muscle tissue. Let’s take a look at the actual tissues themselves to see why this a bad thing.

Muscle

Muscle is required for your body to perform all it’s functions. More specifically, muscle comes as a physiological response to the type of stress you put your body under when lifting weights. Muscle is a biologically “active” tissue- it both stores and expends energy. Because of this, muscle is what is deemed “calorically expensive”; muscle costs your body alot to maintain (in the form of calories).

Muscle requires alot of energy to maintain because it expends alot. The more muscle one has, the more calories that will be used by your body. Remember that one has to take in less calories than one consumes over a period of time to lose weight. So, being able to burn more calories makes this process easier.

Fat

Your body stores fat when it is under extreme stress (like stranded on a desert island), or when there is an excess of calorie intake. When one takes in too many calories (beyond what your body needs- including preforming basic functions and repairing tissues like muscle), the excess that isn’t excreted is stored. Your body is like an individual very efficient with their money- whatever isn’t used is put away. Fat stores are a “savings account” in your body. Just like we don’t like to use up our savings unless we have to, your body doesn’t like to burn fat unless necessary.

I hope this helps. In Part III I will discuss how one can increase their metabolism and decrease fat stores.

The Metabolism is a frequent term in all talk of fitness and nutrition. However, most don’t understand what the term is referring to. Let’s see if we can sort it out.

Metabolism

Metabolism is the rate at which your body burns energy. This energy is also known as calories. So, Metabolism is the rate at which your body burns calories. This rate is determined by your body composition. Body composition is how much muscle versus fat an individual has on their body. Those who have a higher metabolism have a body composition that is composed of more muscle mass with lower fat. Those with a lower metabolism have a body composition that is comprised of higher fat and lower muscle mass. The higher the metabolism, the more calories burned.

Why is Metabolism important?

One may ask why all this talk of metabolism is important. At the end of the day, weight loss and weight gain center around metabolism. We stated earlier that a calorie is a unit of energy. According to the laws of physics, energy is not created or destroyed; energy simply changes forms (Law of Energy Conservation). An example would be the change of water to an ice cube. Now, more specifically calories are changed into various tissues in our body, like fat or muscle. The laws of physics also state that any change in a system’s (or body) internal energy is equal to the amount of energy taken in from it’s enviroment (calories consumed) versus the workload done on that enviroment (calories burned). So, any changes in a person’s weight is equal to the amount of calories they are consuming versus how many they are burning. If one was to take in more calories than they burn over an extended period of time, this would produce weight gain. If one was to take in less calories than they burn over an extended period of time, this would equate to weight loss. In Part II, I will explain how this applies to fitness and the process of fat loss and muscle gain.