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how many calories in a pound of muscle?
- Thread starter T-800
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Creatureofnight
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I dont think T-800 is refering to meat you would get at the butcher.
I think he means a lb. of bodyfat and a lb. of LBM.
In that case, both are 3,500cals. One is not heavier nor lighter. Thats like the old thought process of someone saying they weigh more because of all the muscle they carry and muscle weighs more than fat.
The only reason someone might weigh alot more than they appear to be is because muscle is more dense and compact looking while fat just lays or sits on top. Thats all.
I think he means a lb. of bodyfat and a lb. of LBM.
In that case, both are 3,500cals. One is not heavier nor lighter. Thats like the old thought process of someone saying they weigh more because of all the muscle they carry and muscle weighs more than fat.
The only reason someone might weigh alot more than they appear to be is because muscle is more dense and compact looking while fat just lays or sits on top. Thats all.
plornive
New member
Ok, fair enough but muscle naturally contains some fat --- even within the sheath of the muscle cells. Butcher meat probably isn't that far off.Creatureofnight said:
So you are saying it is "common sense" that a lb of muscle contains the same number of calories as a lb of fat? Why? Fat cells contain fatty acids. Muscle cells contain amino acids. Fat is 9 calories per gram. Protein is 4 calories per gram. Muscle holds lots of water. Muscle contains fat, intramuscular triglycerides, glycogen, mitochondria...
I'm curious how many calories one has to *gain* to gain one pound of lean mass. I assume it's something like 2000. Can anyone confirm this?
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Remember that there are 2500 calories in a pound of muscle and 3500 calories in a pound of fat. For a client to gain one pound of muscle per week, you need to make sure that every seven days they have consumed 2500 calories (average of 350 calories per day) more than they expended. For a client to lose one pound of fat per week, make sure that every seven days, the client has consumed 3500 fewer calories (average of 500 calories per day) than they expended for the week.
http://www.protraineronline.com/past/july2/nutrient.cfm
http://www.protraineronline.com/past/july2/nutrient.cfm
Ummmm NO. I don't know where those folks got 2500 cals per pound of skeletal muscle from, but it's wrong. Fully hydrated human skeletal muscle is no more than 20-25% protein, 4-8% fat and minimal glycogen. the rest is water (70-75%) and minerals. This makes 800-1000 cals per pound MAX. This is why it's so easy to lose LBM if you screw your cutting diet up, but much harder to lose the same amount of fat. Adipose tissue has 300+g of fat per pound which makes it more than 3 times as calorie dense as muscle. The positive side is that you only need an extra 200g of protein deposited as muscle to gain a pound of LBM! Of course getting it deposited is the hard part......
Creatureofnight
New member
Plorn- You can relxa bro, i wasnt flaming anyone. I was simply stating that w/ everything i have read regarding fat loss and muscle gain suggested you needed a deficit or excess of 3,500 cals.
MS- You seem to be very knowledgeable on this subject, i was wondering why you stated most people mess their cutting or bulking plans up and such. Also, where did you get your figrues from and can you reccomend any good reads on this topic ?
thanks bro
MS- You seem to be very knowledgeable on this subject, i was wondering why you stated most people mess their cutting or bulking plans up and such. Also, where did you get your figrues from and can you reccomend any good reads on this topic ?
thanks bro
I'm not saying most people mess up their cutting diets. Bodybuilders are especially aware of the importance of proper nutrition and training to maximize fat loss while minimizing muscle loss. It's more your average fat couch spud that decides to eat 500 cals per day to lose weight and impress themselves with how quickly the scales drop (initially). What they don't realize is that it's very easy to drop weight quickly if it's mostly water or muscle you're losing. It's much slower dropping genuine fat weight.
I also realize now where that 2500 calorie figure came for a pound of muscle. They prolly mean how many cals you need to consume to ADD a pound of muscle. This will no doubt vary a lot between individuals and it may be that so-called "hard gainers" need even more cals than this to add a pound of muscle. This is not the same as how many cals are actually contained in a pound of muscle since it takes a lot of energy to stimulate the synthesis of a pound of muscle even with adequate protein intake. So you may need to eat 2500 extra cals to add 400 cals worth of muscle. I also made a mistake in my calculations since I'm a metric person. That figure of 800-1000 cals was per KILO of muscle, not pound. A POUND of muscle only has 80-90g protein and 4-8g fat and less than 4g glycogen. The rest is water and minerals.
I also realize now where that 2500 calorie figure came for a pound of muscle. They prolly mean how many cals you need to consume to ADD a pound of muscle. This will no doubt vary a lot between individuals and it may be that so-called "hard gainers" need even more cals than this to add a pound of muscle. This is not the same as how many cals are actually contained in a pound of muscle since it takes a lot of energy to stimulate the synthesis of a pound of muscle even with adequate protein intake. So you may need to eat 2500 extra cals to add 400 cals worth of muscle. I also made a mistake in my calculations since I'm a metric person. That figure of 800-1000 cals was per KILO of muscle, not pound. A POUND of muscle only has 80-90g protein and 4-8g fat and less than 4g glycogen. The rest is water and minerals.
Creatureofnight
New member
So your basically stating you need to more of a cal deficit for fat loss, than you would need a cal increase for gain?
Since fat is more calories than muscle?
I used to always believe it was pretty much universal for both. Meaning, if you wanted to lose fat or gain muscle, you would pretty much increase/decrease cals the same.
Since fat is more calories than muscle?
I used to always believe it was pretty much universal for both. Meaning, if you wanted to lose fat or gain muscle, you would pretty much increase/decrease cals the same.
To gain muscle or lose fat might require similar changes in calorie intake, in other words you need to burn 3500 cals of fat to lose a pound of fat, or eat an extra 2500+ cals to gain a pound of muscle...BUT you only need to burn 400-500 cals of muscle to lose a pound of muscle. This is what makes bodybuilding so interesting. It is much harder to gain muscle than fat, AND it is much easier to lose muscle than fat if you don't know what you're doing. Fat gain is the default when calories are in excess to requirement and no weight training is performed. Muscle loss is the default when calories are restricted and no weight training is performed, especially if protein intake is low. Intense weight training and adequate protein are needed in either case.
Creatureofnight
New member
Thanks for clearing that up MS, i always like hearing everyones thoughts and ideas and some of you insights just taught me a few things.
I never knew it only took a loss of 500 cals from pro to lose a lb. of muscle. Im guessing this would be thecase when cals are restrcited and protein intake isnt adequate.
I never knew it only took a loss of 500 cals from pro to lose a lb. of muscle. Im guessing this would be thecase when cals are restrcited and protein intake isnt adequate.
Anatomywiz
New member
I'd love to see some hard info-studies etc on this. To further confuse or enlighten this topic, in order to send the signal to your muscles to grow, you need to work them hard right(I mean can't walk for four days after sqatting 405 15 times sore)? Has anyone here ever seen a picture of a muscle biopsy after a person has done high intensity exercise? It looks like you took a hammer to it. So not only do you need a little protein to build the new muscle tissue, you also need a lot to re-build all the old. Not counting the calories burned during the exercise itself, I wouldn't be surprised if it didn't take at least 2,500 extra calories of protein to build that new tissue. That's why I'm going broke right now getting in 275-300 grams of protein per day. When your not taking anabolics people can and do take in huge amounts of protein, but they simply don't have the testosterone levels to use it all. The rest is used to convert into fat stores, or if they are catabolic(dieting) into carb stores. What do you guys think?
A lot of that muscle damaged protein will get recycled, so you don't need grossly large amounts of protein to repair them. But you do need energy both to train them hard, as well as for recovery processes. This energy can come from carbs or to a limited extent from fat. Protein is an expensive and inefficient way to fuel intense workouts and recovery since up to 25% of the energy in protein is lost when it has to undergo gluconeogenesis to provide glucose.
Whatever dietary approach you choose to gain muscle, I have yet to see any evidence (personally or scientifically) that more than 1.8g of protein PER KILO will result in any better muscle gains. I think a lot of bodybuilders started eating more than this because a lot of people rounded 1.8 up to 2g, and got pounds confused with kilos!!!
Whatever dietary approach you choose to gain muscle, I have yet to see any evidence (personally or scientifically) that more than 1.8g of protein PER KILO will result in any better muscle gains. I think a lot of bodybuilders started eating more than this because a lot of people rounded 1.8 up to 2g, and got pounds confused with kilos!!!
HollywoodF1
New member
What you said is true if you're only looking at the product, but the question is really twofold: How much energy is required to assemble the muscle, and how much energy is in the product. You answered the second part, but fabrication of muscle is a process that is only 30-40% efficient.
Therefore, it takes about 1600 kcal to assemble the muscle, and the product, i.e., the muscle itself, contains about 900 kcal worth of energy. Add them up, and it took you about 2500 kcal to make a pound of muscle. And if your body metabolizes the muscle back to energy, you only get about 900 kcal back.
