Retaining
Your Muscle Mass
Proportionate Body Fat Is
Important
Retaining
your muscle mass while on a weight loss program is one of
the most important aspects that you need to concentrate
on as this will help you to keep your fat percentage down
long-term.
On the ultra low calorie diets
the body begins to cannibalize its own muscle tissue as its
defense mechanisms come into play.
An example of this is shown with
some of these apparently slim fashion models who have quite
high levels of body fat in proportion to their overall
size.
The reason for this is the fact
that they haven't done any form of exercise or resistance
training to maintain any reasonable level of muscle mass and
this is only made worse by the fact that they are often eating
a very low quality diet and nutrition is lacking.
It is not uncommon to see skinny
models with cellulite and that is a sure sign that they are
retaining fat in a higher percentage than they should
be.
They would find that if they
added a little bit of resistance training or even some form of
decent exercise to their daily routine they would be able to
still retain a slim figure but the body fat percentage would be
considerably lower and they would look a lot more toned and
healthy.
And healthy is what you should be
aiming for when you go on a weight-loss program and not simply
losing weight as actually improving your overall health and
well-being will help you to live a better lifestyle for a lot
longer.
Increasing your muscle mass also
improves your metabolic rate whereas body fat has a very low
level of metabolic activity. Nutritionists regard muscle as the
furnace that burns in the body and this is what you should be
aiming for.
If more weight loss programs
focused on retaining muscle mass people would be unlikely to
put the weight back on rapidly once they finished the
program.
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