Muscle weighs 5 times more than fat??!

.. This is what I read in the French "Cosmopolitan". Could anyone confirm or comment please?

It would explain my recent weight gain.. I have indeed put on 2-3 kg since starting an exercise regime. I do 30-50 minutes cardio 4-5 times a week, calculate the burn, and increase my consumation of calories by that amount. Theoretically, it seems, my weight should thus be stable..

(I am maintaining after losing 17kg since February 2008).

 So if anyone could solve this grand mystery... please do not hesitate. :)

Thank you all, "merci à tous",  for your answers.

Some of it could be muscle, some could be water.

If you're only doing cardio, instead of strength training, then you probably haven't gained lots of muscle, though. Sorry.

How do you feel? Do you feel solid and lean like you've added muscle, or do you just feel "heavier"? If your clothes are fitting the way you want, and you feel healthy, then I would say it's nothing to worry about.

Hello!  I have read and heard that many times, and it is true that muscle is more dense than fat.  It takes up less space, though, so inches matter, especially when you don't have much to lose or you are simply maintaining.  I found this link for ya...thanks for posting because it helped me realize a one pound weight loss for the week isn't a failure.  I did a lot of lifting, so I may have gained muscle--I need to measure!  Happy working out!

http://exercise.about.com/od/weightloss/f/gai ningweight.htm

Amanda

no, a pound of fat = a pound of muscle.. they both equal 1 pound. the whole "muscle weighs more than fat" thing is not correct. muscle doesn't weigh more than fat, it's just denser.. meaning it takes up less space. so the "muscle weighs 5 times more than fat" thing probably refers to how much more muscle than fat is required to take up the same amount of space.

I found an interesting visualization of fat vs. muscle:

http://www.onemorebite-weightloss.com/images/ fat-v-muscle.jpg

Also, you might want to keep in mind that there's no way for CC or a cardio machine or anything else for that matter to predict the calories you're burning with 100% accuracy.  I try to allow for a margin of error when calculating.

Thank you everyone for your quick and interesting feedback! I think I now have a clearer idea of the whole process. :)

Here's a picture that will clear it up for you.  See how the 5 pounds of muscle is smooth and tight and small, and the 5 pounds of fat is huge and lumpy?

Muscle vs Fat

edited to add:  Sorry I didn't see that this picture had already been linked.  Apologies!

Seems to be cleared up.  Just remember that muscle is more dense (not heavier), meaning it takes up less space when it weighs the same as a fat.  I think terminology can make it unclear at times... you may gain muscle, though, as you lose fat, which makes it seem like you're not losing weight when you're still losing fat.  FOCUS on measurements and less on actual weight. 

You're good as long as you stay consistent.

Really, let's not get caught up on semantics, technically all you can say is that "muscle is denser" but in common speech people use "heavier" to mean "denser," because if you have a given volume of substance, the denser substance is heavier. 

In any case, muscle is more dense than fat, but it's not by a factor of 5, not even close. Muscle has a density of about 1.06 g/mL, and fat is about 0.9 g/mL, so muscle is about 1.18 times as dense as fat, significant, but not 5. For reference, water is 1 g/mL.

Incidently, if muscle was 5 times as dense as fat, it would have a density of 4.5 g/mL, which is extremely dense, especially for organic material. For comparison, aluminum has a density 2.64 g/mL, concrete is about 2.4, and steel is around 7.9.

Ok I also thought that number seemed like a gross exageration.

But just to get things REALLY straight: say, hypothetically, a body part keeps the same measurements, but becomes harder and more muscly. The muscle having the same volume as the fat it "replaced", and being denser, that body part will be heavier, no?

I should really write to Cosmo about their misleading article...

correct. Weight = Mass x Gravity. Density = Mass divided by Volume. So, by your hypothetical, given the same volume, muscles will have more mass and hence more density. Gravity doesn't change for us, so the higher mass will therefore weigh more.

One quick important point.

Your body must burn 3 calories a day to maintain a pound of fat, but burns 30-50 calories per pound of muscle.

In other words, even though you may not be losing much overall weight through training, the muscle replacing your fat will not only reduce your overall size but will up your daily calorific requirement, making it easier to maintain weight/lose more fat.

You're forgetting that gravity is stronger the closer you are to the earth's surface, so if you were once fat and laying down all the time, it may seem you are heavier than the muscly self which is standing up and doing something with their ass.

Get off the message board and back to the washboard! Get moving!

I think they may be talking about the mass of fat vs that of muscle.

r u frickin' joking 86bg? there's NO WAY u will be able to tell the difference in gravity from sitting/lying down to standing up. wow, that's one of the dumbest things i've ever heard.

and fredontoast, you're right. I believe I mentioned that earlier. Mass is what accounts for the difference.

I'm still just surprised at what 86bg said. geez.

rgupta, that was definitely a joke. 86bg was just being silly.

Perhaps he was trying to prove how ridiculous it is to grab onto a small scientific fact with negligible affects, and to twist that fact into a hugely-exaggerated basis for explaining origins of very large discrepancies within one's life (much the way the magazine did when they claimed muscle is 5 times denser than fat).

He was possibly countering exaggerated misinformation with MORE exaggerated misinformation in a reducto ad adsurdum attack.

Or, like I said, he was just being silly.  :P

Spot on

Original Post by yummy_kitty:

rgupta, that was definitely a joke. 86bg was just being silly.

Perhaps he was trying to prove how ridiculous it is to grab onto a small scientific fact with negligible affects, and to twist that fact into a hugely-exaggerated basis for explaining origins of very large discrepancies within one's life (much the way the magazine did when they claimed muscle is 5 times denser than fat).

He was possibly countering exaggerated misinformation with MORE exaggerated misinformation in a reducto ad adsurdum attack.

Or, like I said, he was just being silly.  :P

It's not an argument, peeps.  It's about education--that's why I provided a link.  Have a good one! 

10 Points go to the first person who actually remembers why pomme was asking this question.

Pomme, it is more than likely that your weight gain isn't muscle. I'm not going to create a whole litany on water fluctuation and such because, chances are, you already know most of it anyway. Instead I will focus on troubleshooting your weight gain.

Problems

1. If you tell someone that you have jogged 30 minutes (or for that matter, 30 km) every day for the last 10 years, chances are they will think nothing of it (other than that you're crazy). But imagine telling someone that you have benched 60 kg every day for 10 years. "Um. . . didn't you ever get any stronger?"

Just as your body adapts to lifting weights by growing stronger, so your body adapts to cardio by becoming more efficient. Blood moves better, your heart beats stronger, you VO2max increases, etc. The end result? You burn fewer calories for the same time or distance. Biking 30 minutes will burn a lot of calories, in the beginning. In a month? Not as many. In six months? Fewer still. 

2. A gram of protein or carbs yields 4 calories. A gram of fat? 9. Is this true for everyone? Probably not. It'd take some rather rigorous scientific testing to figure out if a gram of fat is exactly 9.4 k/cals for everyone on the planet. And even if it is, this is assuming that every human body uses a gram of fat the same way, which we know isn't true. I'm also going to assume that your caloric intake is approximate and that you don't measure all of your food. The measurements of each gram, your total intake, and your total output are approximate; treat them as such.

3. Non exercise activity thermogenesis (NEAT) is a big term that basically means the stuff you do that’s not for exercise. It’s true meaning is more technical, but that definition will work for now. Walking across the room to get that book? NEAT. Cooking? NEAT. You get the idea. When you start exercising and losing fat, your body, ever afraid it’s going to die a virgin, starts putting a stop to NEAT. You don’t feel like reading a book and you stuff a Lean Cuisine in the microwave instead of slaving over a stove. Why? Because your body convinces you that you don’t want to. NEAT is the one of the major sources of your caloric expenditure,  so cutting out some of it could put you off by a few hundred calories.

Solutions

1. Mix up your cardio. Bike, jump rope, do kickboxing, swim, run sprints; whatever it is you’ve been doing, change it out. Change at least every six to eight weeks, if not more often. Adding some strength training wouldn’t hurt either.

2. Don’t treat your body like a steam engine. Listen to your body. Figure out how many calories it feels like you need and consume them. If you start gaining or losing weight, adjust up or down.

3. Just because you exercise doesn’t give you the right to be lazy. Pace on the phone, don’t sit there like a lump, and make sure you do all your chores.

Good luck, and tell us how it works.

If you are only performing cardio I would say it's unlikely that the gain is muscle. It could be water retention but it could simply be a flaw in the calculation.

Remember, calorie expenditure estimates are just that... estimates. There are a lot of factors that go into calculating how many calories an individual burns during exercise and it's very likely you simply burn less than the site calculates. A small discrepancy between the amount you believe you are burning and the amount you're actually burning could lead you to eat a calorie surplus that would easily explain a few pounds. If you are gaining weight, drop your daily caloric intake down by 250 calories. Play around with the your daily calorie consumption every few weeks until you find a balance. It's just a process of trial and error. Good luck.