How Hard is It to Lose Muscle?

Diet and Nutrition
1

Hi everyone,

As the very question says, how hard is it? Ive read different oppinions online, some say its extremely hard, almost imposible, and that u need to starve yourself, while others claim that u can easily lose muscle on a cut, or not having enough sleep, nutrients etc. (which i find hard to believe).

Im asking this cause im currently on a short cut (just wanna go from 9 to 6% bf which can hoppefully be done in several weeks). Im affraid that in this process i might be losing muscle coz i already look thin to me.

If my strength is at the same level or above, does that mean that im not losing any muscle? I also reas that you can lose muscle but keep getting stronger since strength has to do more with your cns. What are your oppinions?

2

[quote]Podgorica10 wrote:
Hi everyone,

As the very question says, how hard is it? Ive read different oppinions online, some say its extremely hard, almost imposible, and that u need to starve yourself, while others claim that u can easily lose muscle on a cut, or not having enough sleep, nutrients etc. (which i find hard to believe).

Im asking this cause im currently on a short cut (just wanna go from 9 to 6% bf which can hoppefully be done in several weeks). Im affraid that in this process i might be losing muscle coz i already look thin to me.

If my strength is at the same level or above, does that mean that im not losing any muscle? I also reas that you can lose muscle but keep getting stronger since strength has to do more with your cns. What are your oppinions?[/quote]

Well personally I lost muscle pretty easily. The key is to A. Not eat enough protein and do cardio and not lift heavy. Wallah, you lose your muscle.

I hear from tons of people that if you aren’t losing strength then your muscles aren’t being broken down. However to your question. CNS. If you aren’t eating enough to provide for your muscles or are overworking and using up much more than you consume then how would you be eating enough to saturate your brain, and organs to the fullest allowing greater lifts.

Just personal thought, not a specialist here. Personally im a month into a cut and I was making gains and then I KNOW i was eating too little and doing cardio, but. My lifts went up still. Why? Because I made form changes that gave me a little boost, luckily I fixed the calorie deficit within a week.

3

[quote]Podgorica10 wrote:

Im asking this cause im currently on a short cut (just wanna go from 9 to 6% bf which can hoppefully be done in several weeks). Im affraid that in this process i might be losing muscle coz i already look thin to me.

?[/quote]

Hey mate, not really all that on topic I guess, but if you’re already lean and are going to get leaner, however you said that you already look thin. I’m confused as to why you’d want to drop more weight.

4

[quote]sexyxe wrote:

[quote]Podgorica10 wrote:

Im asking this cause im currently on a short cut (just wanna go from 9 to 6% bf which can hoppefully be done in several weeks). Im affraid that in this process i might be losing muscle coz i already look thin to me.

?[/quote]

Hey mate, not really all that on topic I guess, but if you’re already lean and are going to get leaner, however you said that you already look thin. I’m confused as to why you’d want to drop more weight.

[/quote]

My opinion is that it really doesnt make sense if im 200lbs but 15 % bf. Id rather be smaller but more ripped coz all the fat in our bodies does no usefull function.

Also, im on anabolic diet now, and the point on this diet is that you never exceed 10% bf even when you bulk. Why? Coz its harder to lose fat later. Thats why i wanna get to 6% and bulk to 10%. the effect is the same and plus u look ripped all the time.

5

[quote]sexyxe wrote:

[quote]Podgorica10 wrote:

Im asking this cause im currently on a short cut (just wanna go from 9 to 6% bf which can hoppefully be done in several weeks). Im affraid that in this process i might be losing muscle coz i already look thin to me.

?[/quote]

Hey mate, not really all that on topic I guess, but if you’re already lean and are going to get leaner, however you said that you already look thin. I’m confused as to why you’d want to drop more weight.

[/quote]

Not sure what thin for u is, but to me im thin and i wanna get bigger. Im 179cm, this morn carb depleted i was 78.3 kg, i guess at 8%bf.

6

6% bodyfat???

Why would you want that? Are you competing?

At a true 6% you going feel like shit, and plus its not very sustainable.

tweet

7

well from my experience muscle loss is grossly over analyzed on a cut. so many things come in to play, fat surrounding muscle, glycogen within a muscle, water storage etc… all of these things in my opinion are what lead people to believe they are loosing ‘muscle’ during a diet. now obviously if you eat 500kcal a day, do 2 hours cardio and don’t sleep at night you will eventually lose your muscle, but at a normal kcal deficit, controlled cardio and good training it shouldn’t be a huge issue

8

[quote]titleist55 wrote:
well from my experience muscle loss is grossly over analyzed on a cut. so many things come in to play, fat surrounding muscle, glycogen within a muscle, water storage etc… all of these things in my opinion are what lead people to believe they are loosing ‘muscle’ during a diet. now obviously if you eat 500kcal a day, do 2 hours cardio and don’t sleep at night you will eventually lose your muscle, but at a normal kcal deficit, controlled cardio and good training it shouldn’t be a huge issue[/quote]

100% agreed! Ppl just have more fat and less muscle than they think, then they go on a cut, lose all that fat (that they did t think they had) and then they think they lost muscle. I think ita actually very hard to lose muscle. My gf is trying that (she was a gymnast for 10 yrs) and no way she can do it!

9

exactly! If your body was so weak that it pissed its pants and lost all its muscle as easily as people think the species would’ve been doomed!

folk just don’t realise how fat they are

10

[quote]Podgorica10 wrote:

[quote]sexyxe wrote:

[quote]Podgorica10 wrote:

Im asking this cause im currently on a short cut (just wanna go from 9 to 6% bf which can hoppefully be done in several weeks). Im affraid that in this process i might be losing muscle coz i already look thin to me.

?[/quote]

Hey mate, not really all that on topic I guess, but if you’re already lean and are going to get leaner, however you said that you already look thin. I’m confused as to why you’d want to drop more weight.

[/quote]

My opinion is that it really doesnt make sense if im 200lbs but 15 % bf. Id rather be smaller but more ripped coz all the fat in our bodies does no usefull function.

Also, im on anabolic diet now, and the point on this diet is that you never exceed 10% bf even when you bulk. Why? Coz its harder to lose fat later. Thats why i wanna get to 6% and bulk to 10%. the effect is the same and plus u look ripped all the time.[/quote]

I guess as long as you know why you’re doing it. Noting that you said you’re already 8% going for 6, so you’re already below the 10% goal.

Id say 79kg@179cm isn’t thin. Im pretty close to that too.

Good luck on the anabolic diet, I really liked it, but found even after a few months I couldn’t concentrate properly so gave it in. It got me the leanest I’ve ever been though, whilst maintaining and even gaining strength.

11

[quote]sexyxe wrote:

[quote]Podgorica10 wrote:

[quote]sexyxe wrote:

[quote]Podgorica10 wrote:

Im asking this cause im currently on a short cut (just wanna go from 9 to 6% bf which can hoppefully be done in several weeks). Im affraid that in this process i might be losing muscle coz i already look thin to me.

?[/quote]

Hey mate, not really all that on topic I guess, but if you’re already lean and are going to get leaner, however you said that you already look thin. I’m confused as to why you’d want to drop more weight.

[/quote]

My opinion is that it really doesnt make sense if im 200lbs but 15 % bf. Id rather be smaller but more ripped coz all the fat in our bodies does no usefull function.

Also, im on anabolic diet now, and the point on this diet is that you never exceed 10% bf even when you bulk. Why? Coz its harder to lose fat later. Thats why i wanna get to 6% and bulk to 10%. the effect is the same and plus u look ripped all the time.[/quote]

I guess as long as you know why you’re doing it. Noting that you said you’re already 8% going for 6, so you’re already below the 10% goal.

Id say 79kg@179cm isn’t thin. Im pretty close to that too.

Good luck on the anabolic diet, I really liked it, but found even after a few months I couldn’t concentrate properly so gave it in. It got me the leanest I’ve ever been though, whilst maintaining and even gaining strength.
[/quote]
Can u pls tell me more about ur cut? What were ur calories on normal day and what on carb days etc.

12

Whenever I have cut I always look like I have lost some muscle when I am glycogen depleted, muscles just don’t look as full. I also agree that people have more fat to lose than they realise, but most people look better and in some cases bigger, when they are cut. If you don’t you probably need to add on more muscle before you focus on cutting, assuming that is your goal.

13

I highly doubt that you are anywhere close to 9% bf. Post pics please.

Going for 6% and not competing? Why would you do that?

14

[quote]NuYi wrote:
I highly doubt that you are anywhere close to 9% bf. Post pics please.

Going for 6% and not competing? Why would you do that?[/quote]

Read for reasons above, i said already. It has to do with anabolic diet…

15

For me, it’s incredibly easy to lose muscle if I don’t watch that I’m getting enough protein, sleep and if I have little-to-no training stimulus for a while. Or if I’m for whatever reason experiencing a large degree of stress. Seems to happen really easily.

I remember reading somewhere that, when on a high-protein diet, the body tends to adapt to a certain intake of amino acids and begins to sacrifice muscle when you start giving it less. I’m not sure if that’s quackery or not, but it might explain, for instance, why I tend to lose muscle rather easily on vacation when I don’t care much about my diet or training.

16

In my opinion, the best way to maintain muscle is to maintain your strength. If your mass isnt being put to constant use, why would your body work so hard to keep it when it has need to allocate the proteins elsewhere, like your starving body. Granted you arent actually starving but your hormones can only tell one sided stories.

Just as soil that is prone to erosion can be held in place by tree roots and other vegetation, your nervous system behaves as the roots that hold your muscle from catabolism. Strength is a harder adaptation to acquire and thus your body wont rid itself of it willingly.

17

[quote]Podgorica10 wrote:

[quote]sexyxe wrote:

[quote]Podgorica10 wrote:

[quote]sexyxe wrote:

[quote]Podgorica10 wrote:

Im asking this cause im currently on a short cut (just wanna go from 9 to 6% bf which can hoppefully be done in several weeks). Im affraid that in this process i might be losing muscle coz i already look thin to me.

?[/quote]

Hey mate, not really all that on topic I guess, but if you’re already lean and are going to get leaner, however you said that you already look thin. I’m confused as to why you’d want to drop more weight.

[/quote]

My opinion is that it really doesnt make sense if im 200lbs but 15 % bf. Id rather be smaller but more ripped coz all the fat in our bodies does no usefull function.

Also, im on anabolic diet now, and the point on this diet is that you never exceed 10% bf even when you bulk. Why? Coz its harder to lose fat later. Thats why i wanna get to 6% and bulk to 10%. the effect is the same and plus u look ripped all the time.[/quote]

I guess as long as you know why you’re doing it. Noting that you said you’re already 8% going for 6, so you’re already below the 10% goal.

Id say 79kg@179cm isn’t thin. Im pretty close to that too.

Good luck on the anabolic diet, I really liked it, but found even after a few months I couldn’t concentrate properly so gave it in. It got me the leanest I’ve ever been though, whilst maintaining and even gaining strength.
[/quote]
Can u pls tell me more about ur cut? What were ur calories on normal day and what on carb days etc.[/quote]

I wasn’t deliberately ‘cutting’ I was just using the anabolic diet. I was taking on ~3200 calories a day, (I have two photos on my phone listing my diet one day is 3200 another is 3600 325/100/240) which for me is a heap, and I was getting leaner. I would eat as much protein and nuts as I wanted a day and I felt full, which I like. I don’t like the 6 meals a day, as I prefer to feel full, then get hungry before I eat.

Sorry I can’t help much more than that. It wasn’t a perfect example of anabolic diet, but it worked.

18

[quote]sexyxe wrote:

[quote]Podgorica10 wrote:

[quote]sexyxe wrote:

[quote]Podgorica10 wrote:

[quote]sexyxe wrote:

[quote]Podgorica10 wrote:

Im asking this cause im currently on a short cut (just wanna go from 9 to 6% bf which can hoppefully be done in several weeks). Im affraid that in this process i might be losing muscle coz i already look thin to me.

?[/quote]

Hey mate, not really all that on topic I guess, but if you’re already lean and are going to get leaner, however you said that you already look thin. I’m confused as to why you’d want to drop more weight.

[/quote]

My opinion is that it really doesnt make sense if im 200lbs but 15 % bf. Id rather be smaller but more ripped coz all the fat in our bodies does no usefull function.

Also, im on anabolic diet now, and the point on this diet is that you never exceed 10% bf even when you bulk. Why? Coz its harder to lose fat later. Thats why i wanna get to 6% and bulk to 10%. the effect is the same and plus u look ripped all the time.[/quote]

I guess as long as you know why you’re doing it. Noting that you said you’re already 8% going for 6, so you’re already below the 10% goal.

Id say 79kg@179cm isn’t thin. Im pretty close to that too.

Good luck on the anabolic diet, I really liked it, but found even after a few months I couldn’t concentrate properly so gave it in. It got me the leanest I’ve ever been though, whilst maintaining and even gaining strength.
[/quote]
Can u pls tell me more about ur cut? What were ur calories on normal day and what on carb days etc.[/quote]

I wasn’t deliberately ‘cutting’ I was just using the anabolic diet. I was taking on ~3200 calories a day, (I have two photos on my phone listing my diet one day is 3200 another is 3600 325/100/240) which for me is a heap, and I was getting leaner. I would eat as much protein and nuts as I wanted a day and I felt full, which I like. I don’t like the 6 meals a day, as I prefer to feel full, then get hungry before I eat.

Sorry I can’t help much more than that. It wasn’t a perfect example of anabolic diet, but it worked.
[/quote]

Sound like a lot of food hey… What are ur maintenance cals? What is ur weight?

Cheers for that!

19

folk just don’t realise how fat they are[/quote]

This.

People underestimate how much fat they have to lose to accomplish their illusion of lean.

20

I’m 178cm and currently 80ish kg. Was high 70s at the time.

Using full cream and EVOO on most things is an easy way to get the calories up
My maintenance would be around 2400 when I eat carbs - like I am now.