The Myth Of Gaining Muscle Without Gaining Fat

Prior to starting your exercise routine, you need to determine whether you want to lose fat or gain muscle.

Although some beginners ask the vital question 'how to gain muscle without gaining fat?', most experts will tell you that there is no way in which you can lose fat and gain muscle at the same time, so do not waste time and money on pills, products, or exercise routines that promise you both and start concentrating on only one objective – how to build a muscular body.

It is puzzling why thin people shirk away from gaining fat and yet want to build a muscular body. You can only control the amount of calories you consume and maintain a disciplined exercise routine. You do not have any control on your genetic makeup or metabolic rate. With all these uncontrollable factors, it is difficult to control the amount of fat and muscle you tend to gain while starting on a body building routine.

Do not compare yourself to other bodybuilders. You may not have the same constitution as these people and have a different rate of metabolism.

Bodybuilders may have excess fat content in their body and only want to tone their muscle, not gain weight. The diet and exercise routine they follow is targeted at converting the fat into muscle and does not concentrate on lowering the fat content in the body. If you want to increase the muscle mass in your body, you need to follow a different routine.

There is a difference between gaining weight due to fat content and gaining muscle mass.

Consider the example of body builder Big Joe, who weighed 189lbs with 18% fat (34 lbs fat and 155 lbs muscle). With the required training, he managed to cut down his fat by 5%, thereby achieving a total weight of 168lbs, out of which 8.4lbs was fat and 160lbs was muscle. Therefore, even with a total weight loss of 21lbs, he managed to gain 5lbs of muscle and lose 26 lbs of fat. In this example, the objective was to lose the fat in the body and obtain a more toned and trimmed physique.

This type of training cannot work for everyone, especially for those who have a very thin frame and low fat and muscle content. You can't think of gaining muscle without gaining fat; you have to first add the necessary calories and then chisel the body to build more muscle.

When the extra calories are added to the body, you can then concentrate on losing fat and in the process, add to the existing muscle mass.

There are special dietary considerations you need to keep in mind to get a muscular body - eat enough calories to give your body the energy and source for building the muscle fibers and follow an intensive workout routine that helps stimulate the muscle fibers to grow bigger.

Keep in mind that a balanced diet consisting of protein and fat will provide your body with the adequate raw material to build a good physique.

While performing weight training exercises, use more weights and shock your body with intensive training every few weeks. Along with this, you also have to allow your body to recuperate and give your stimulated muscle fibers room to grow.

Forget about shedding just the excess weight. Even if it can be done, it is difficult to gain muscle without gaining fat. And in the end, when you have a muscular body, the increase in muscle weight will make it worth all the effort, and you will forget about the weight gain.