The Best Way to Gain Muscle is to Lose Fat?

THE FOLLOWING IS A PORTION OF AN ARTICLE WRITTEN BY JOHN ALVINO. I CLAIM NO RIGHTS TO THIS ARTICLE. I DO AGREE WITH THE BASIC PRINCIPLE BEHIND IT THOUGH. READ ON FOR SOME GOOD INFORMATION ABOUT LOSING FAT. 

You see, following a properly executed fat loss phase, your body becomes considerably more sensitive to the MOST anabolic hormone — insulin.

For those of you who don’t know, insulin is a storage hormone.  It can shuttle glucose (blood sugar) and proteins into muscle cells.  This is great for anyone who wants to build muscle.

So an effective muscle building diet will encourage the release of insulin.  Initially, when you start a diet like this, you will definitely see gains in your lean muscle mass.

But before long, your insulin receptors will become saturated and get resistant to insulin.  In other words, the same amount of insulin that was effective at shuttling nutrients into your muscles at the start of the diet will not be enough after a couple short months.

Your body will respond to this by releasing more and more insulin.  More insulin equals more muscle, right?  Wrong!
Unfortunately, there is a flip side to insulin.  Remember, insulin is a storage hormone.  Sadly, it is just as effective at storing fat as it is at storing muscle!

You see, once your muscles (and liver) are full of glucose, and your receptors are getting resistant, insulin will dump glucose into fat cells. So you will be getting fatter and your body will get more and more efficient at shuttling nutrients towards fat cells.

And this, my friends, is the beginning of the classic muscle building plateau.  The bad news is that this phenomenon is extremely frustrating.  The good news, however, is that it is completely avoidable!  All it takes is a temporary shift in your short-term goals.

For 8-12 weeks, you should focus on losing body fat.  The fat loss plan you should follow MUST be one that maintains ALL of your hard earned muscle while INCREASING insulin sensitivity.
To best accomplish this, your plan must include:

1) Heavy training- If you switch from heavy lifting to light circuit training, you will lose a significant amount of muscle mass and strength, guaranteed.

2) Carbohydrate cycling- Eat carbs on your heavy training days and more specifically around your workout.  This will provide energy and necessary muscle glycogen for optimal recover.1) Heavy training- If you switch from heavy lifting to light circuit training, you will lose a significant amount of muscle mass and strength, guaranteed.

On non-training days, reduce the amount of carbs to allow for more fat burning and increase insulin sensitivity.

3) Calorie waving- In order to lose fat, you must burn more calories than you intake.  But if your calories stay low for too long, you will risk losing muscle and slowing your metabolism.  So be sure to increase your calories to maintenance level at least two times per week.

4) Control your cardio- High intensity interval training (HIIT) definitely burns more fat than slower steady state cardio does.  But doing too much of it can have a negative effect on your recovery abilities and lead to muscle loss.  Therefore, you should only do HIIT in small doses.

AP