Muscle Mass

Have you ever heard that loosing inches is more important than loosing pounds?  Why?  Muscle weighs more than fat.  Really it does!  Most diets a person looses pounds of fat as well as muscle mass.  

According to Dr. Chaney, you lose about 5 pounds of muscle for every 12 pounds of weight loss.

Lean muscle is important as it speeds up the metabolism naturally.  One pound of muscle burns 50 calories a day so that 5 pounds you just lost means it cost you 250 calories a day. 
  
If you continue to loose weight at that same rate, you will need to reduce your calories by about 250-500 calories per day.  Yikes!  Let's say that you lose 12 or 24 pounds (corresponding to 5-10 pounds of muscle or 250 to 500 calories per day) and go off of your diet because you got discouraged by the plateau.

When you regain your weight it comes back mostly as fat, not as muscle.  You need to again reduce your calorie intake 250-500 calories a day.  Are you following me?  Then you regain more weight back then where you were at in the beginning.  Now you understand the cause of the dreaded weight loss yo-yo!  

Adding exercise can't do it all.  What you eat is important as well.  This is where leucine comes in.  What is leucine?  Leucine is an essential amino acid.  Leucine has been used by bodybuilders for years to increase muscle mass when they are working out.  It has just been in the last few years that evidence started to accumulate that leucine can also help preserve muscle mass when people are losing weight.  This research was spearheaded by Dr. D.K. Layman and colleagues at the University of Illinois.

How can you get leucine in your diet without a prescription or chemicals?  Cinch.  Cinch is a weight management program.  Click here and find out more about Cinch.

Look next week for more information on lean muscle mass.  We can help you to achieve your New Year's Resolution.