Muscle is The Mortal Enemy of Fat

If you have excess body fat and think there is no hope to lose it, then you are dead wrong. It’s going to take some effort, but it is really not as hard as you think when you break it down scientifically. If you never liked science, do not despair, this article will be simple and easy to understand.

When experts discuss fat loss they often refer to the 40-40-20 diet with minimal calories. The breakdown is 40% protein, 40% carbohydrates and 20% fat with 800 calories (daily) for woman and 1200 calories for men. This is your basic starvation diet. They will tell you that no complex carbs (grains, oatmeal, bread) after the breakfast meal and 16 oz of water before every meal. However, you can eat unlimited veggies through out the day. What they fail to discuss is your metabolism and the chemical process that might prevent you from losing fat even when following their prescription. Why?

In any sedentary person, including people who are not actually obese, fat invades the muscle slipping in between muscle fibers like marbling in beef. Fat infiltrates individual muscle cells in the form of lipid droplets that make the cells sluggish. These pools of fat, which occur in the liver and muscles, block a key step in the conversion of glucose (required for energy and exercise), which leads to insulin resistance, a prerequisite to diabetes. This is why some sedentary people of normal weight are at risk of diabetes, it’s not how much fat we have, but rather how it is distributed throughout your body. When fat builds up were it does not belong, in the muscles and liver, then disease is more likely to occur. More fat means less muscle, and ultimately fewer mitochondria, the cellular power plants that are most plentiful in muscle tissue. The majority of fat cells have almost no mitochondria. This is the reason fat loss is so difficult. The fatter you get the harder it becomes for your body to burn off stored energy.

If you suffer from chronic pain it is because you have excess fat. Obesity causes chronic inflammation. You can consider your excess fat to be a time released pain distributor. This is all the more reason to lose body fat, but also the reason you are lacking the desire and motivation to move.  Be consciously aware of these scientific facts and make a conscious effort to change.

More Fat Means Less Muscle

Less muscle means fewer mitochondria, the cellular power plants that are most plentiful in muscle tissue. The majority of fat contains almost no mitochondria. This explains the major problems with obesity. The fatter you become the harder it becomes for your body to burn off that stored energy. Not all fat is bad however; the fat under our skin called subcutaneous fat is padding for our body; protecting the body from injury. It is what makes young people look so firm and healthy and it fights infection and heals our wounds. Subcutaneous fat produces an important hormone called adiponectin, and this helps control metabolism and fights certain cancer, most know for fighting breast cancer. This is why becoming to skinny is dangerous. Subcutaneous fat dissipates in old people as noticed by bonier hands and accumulation of blobby fat around the midsection. This is the visceral fat that is dangerous to health.

Build Muscle, Burn Fat!

The more muscle you have, the more mitochondria, and the faster you burn fat. Intense exercise creates new muscle. Slow twitch muscle, the most prominent in elite athletes has far more mitochondria density than any other kind; so they are much more efficient at burning fat.

New Muscle Changes Body Chemistry

Muscle affects the organs starting with the liver, which acts as the body’s fuel depot. Our muscles are considered one of the most dynamic systems in the body; when muscles contract (weight training) they undergoes huge changes on a cellular level. The mortal enemy of fat is muscle. Working out with intensity causes the liver to send out more glucose, the primary fuel for physical activity.

Muscle is an endocrine organ, and exercising your muscle produces chemical secretions called myokines, which communicate with the rest of the body. Skeletal muscle is the organ that counteracts fat. In 2003 two biologist, Mark Febbraio and Bente Pedersen figured this out. These two researchers identified the most common myokine called IL-6, the inflammatory myokine that is produced by excess fat. The interesting thing that they discovered is when Interleukin-6 (IL-6) is released during exercise, there are actually beneficial results. It tells the liver to increase the rate of fat oxidation! So when IL-6 meets exercise it becomes anti-inflammatory. Obese people have low but constant levels of IL-6. When obese people exercise, IL-6 spikes and then dissipates over a few hours. A fat person who exercises will have less chronic levels of inflammation.

Scientist Dr. Nathan LeBrasseur specializes in muscle tissue at the Mayo Clinic. According to  Dr. LeBrasseur “healthy muscle may lead to a healthier liver, a healthier gut, a healthier pancreas, and a healthier brain”.

Scientists have discovered other myokines like “irisin” that try to convert fat into an energy consuming system like muscle. Harvard scientists discovered that irisin was a hormone secreted during exercise, and tricks our gooey white fat and deep visceral fat into acting like “brown” fat. “Brown” fat, a far less common type of fat, is dense with mitochondria and burns energy just like muscle. Like all researchers, they look to synthesize this process into a pill that might trigger its release and help obese people burn fat.  Exercise creates beneficial chemical reactions that no drug can ever replace. Exercise is the best medicine for good health!

Fat is like that house guest that never wants to leave, or “the guy on the couch.” When obese people train they often claim that as they make fitness progress, their overweight friends try to prevent their success by tempting them with unhealthy foods. Your body fat wants to keep you fat and most people lack the will power to start exercising. The scientific reason is not just lack of will power, it stems from a hormone called leptin, which is produced by fat tissue. Ordinarily leptin tells the brain it’s time to stop eating. Somehow the brains of obese people are deaf to the leptin signals and they do not get this important message. Without leptin to notify us when enough enough food has been consumed, obese people struggle to stop eating despite the detrimental health effects. People can consume ridiculous amounts of food without control. Exercise helps restore your brains sensitivity to leptin, which helps maintain a normal appetite. The bigger you get the less sensitive you are to leptin. That is why you need motivation to get in better shape. Do not wait around for a heart attack to become a catalyst for change. Get started now!

Many obese and sedentary people who begin exercising have difficulty getting started, but once they get going they start to feel so well that exercise become their new addiction. One of the problems is their past comes forward to potentially slow them from their greatest potential. Atrial fibrillation is caused by an enlarged heart generally acquired by years of excess weight. Ironically a-fib is also known to be the side effect of long term, intense exercise, (marathon runners& extreme body builders for example) particularly in middle aged or older adults.

The best science say’s work out for short durations with high intensity. Very heavy weight training, working a muscle quickly to failure and short duration high intensity cardio, generally sprinting (once a person has been cleared by a physician/cardiologist) using the 28minuteworkout that was designed with the best scientific principles. Push the body to a maximum result in the shortest amount of time. This creates EPOC and creates the chemical process that will burn fat, build muscle and restore the body to homeostasis.

Excess post-exercise oxygen consumption (EPOC)

EPOC is a measurably increased rate of oxygen intake following strenuous activity intended to erase the body’s “oxygen deficit.” In recovery, oxygen (EPOC) is used in the processes that restore the body to a resting state and adapt it to the exercise just performed. These include: hormone balancing, replenishment of fuel stores, cellular repair and anabolism. Post-exercise oxygen consumption replenishes the phosphagen system. EPOC is accompanied by an elevated consumption of fuel. In response to exercise, fat stores are broken down and free fatty acids (FFA) are released into the blood. In recovery, the direct oxidation of free fatty acids as fuel and the energy consuming re-conversion of FFAs back into fat stores both take place.