How many calories does a pound of muscle burn?

Q: Once and for all - how many calories does a pound of muscle burn?

A: To be honest - it seems we really aren't completely sure. Everyone originally thought (until recently) that is was about 50 calories per pound of muscle per day. Recently numbers have surfaced that suggest it's closer to 10-20 calories per day. Maybe the next study will tell us that it's only 7 calories, or it's actually 57 calories...

In reality though - does it matter? If I told you that it was exactly 13.172 calories - what would you do differently in your fat loss training because of that information?

Here's what we know for sure - Muscle burns calories. About 5 times as many calories as the same amount of fat does. The acquisition of muscle and the use of muscle (and the presence of muscle - even if it's just sitting there doing nothing) all requires calories.

Muscle is metabolically active tissue -- increase your muscle mass and your metabolism goes up, reduce your muscle mass and your metabolism goes down. Everyone agrees on that.

So the take home message when looking at increasing metabolism - is to focus on increasing or at least maintaining muscle. And then using as much of it as possible in your workouts.

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AC
www.alwyncosgrove.com