# Lyle McDonald article on Body Compostion- what do you guys think?



## cpush (Mar 21, 2006)

http://readthecore.com/200501/mcdonald-body-composition.htm

What do you guys think about some of this theories?

I was especially curious about his comment about muscle mass not increasing metabolic rate 

"...to significantly affect metabolic rate would require a monstrous gain of muscle mass, far more than you could gain in 3-4 weeks."

thoughts?


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## The13ig13adWolf (Mar 21, 2006)

some things to consider, you have to take that quote in context with the entire article. i think he's a smart dude and it makes sense, honestly.


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## cpush (Mar 21, 2006)

ok thanks... I'm on his website now and reading more of his articles, some interesting stuff.  He's also entertaining to read.


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## Emma-Leigh (Mar 21, 2006)

Lyle knows his information.

I didn't read the article but the quote is true. Adding a few pounds of muscle doesn't contribute a lot to metabolism... 

Although old figures fall as something between 35 and 75 cals per pound of muscle a day... The newer research suggests that a pound of muscle, at rest, will only burn about 6 cals extra per day (~13 kcal per Kg per day).

So say you gain 4 pounds over 4 weeks - and 60% is actually MUSCLE tissue, then you will only be needing about 14-15 extra calories a day to feed that muscle.... 

So unless you gain a hugo-amount of lean mass you are not going to need that much more food.


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## Dale Mabry (Mar 22, 2006)

Those figures by Emma are as accurate as one can get.  Trainers will tell clients that the reason they are burning more cals is because they have added muscle, which is a half truth.  The reason they are burning more cals is because they have added muscle and are recruiting the units during training.  Very little recruitment of the new fibers comes thru everyday activity, which is why if you stop training the fibers shrink and so does your metabolism.

BTW, Lyle is a good guy for info.


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## cpush (Mar 22, 2006)

yeah for sure. I was on his website and could not stop reading.  I read all of the articles, great information and easy to understand.


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## Dale Mabry (Mar 22, 2006)

And most importantly not 10 pages long.


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## CowPimp (Mar 22, 2006)

Okay, maybe a muscle at rest requires an extra 6 calories a day at rest, but doesn't that become a pointless statement when you get out of bed in the morning?  I mean obviously the more active you are the more your added muscle mass contributes to your basal metabolic rate, but your muscles are contracting all day long just to keep your ass sitting up in a chair.


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## Dale Mabry (Mar 22, 2006)

CowPimp said:
			
		

> Okay, maybe a muscle at rest requires an extra 6 calories a day at rest, but doesn't that become a pointless statement when you get out of bed in the morning?  I mean obviously the more active you are the more your added muscle mass contributes to your basal metabolic rate, but your muscles are contracting all day long just to keep your ass sitting up in a chair.




I think, but I am not positive, that they are higher threshold motor units.  Makes sense physiologically and would explain why you lose muscle when you stop training.


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## topolo (Mar 22, 2006)

Dale Mabry said:
			
		

> I think, but I am not positive, that they are higher threshold motor units.  Makes sense physiologically and would explain why you lose muscle when you stop training.




This is correct.


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## CowPimp (Mar 22, 2006)

Dale Mabry said:
			
		

> I think, but I am not positive, that they are higher threshold motor units.  Makes sense physiologically and would explain why you lose muscle when you stop training.



Could be.  At the same time, I think there are other factors involved that make having additional muscle mass lead to a higher metabolic rate.  I can tell you anecdotally that my BMR went through the fucking roof once I got back into resistance training and added an appreciable amount of muscle mass to my frame.

Let's look at my caloric intake a few years ago before I started lifting weights and exercising again.  My maintenance caloric intake was about 2500 per day @ 165 pounds.  I now weigh about 195 and my maintenance caloric intake is about 4300 per day.  Yes, I am more active now.  Still, there is no way in Hell that activity accounts for the entire difference of 1800 calories each day.  I know there are other things like more frequent eating and a higher protein intake that help, but even then there is a big something missing from this equation.


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## Tom_B (Mar 23, 2006)

I've always wondered if where you hold your muscle has any effect on metabolism either? Like for instance Say if you were 160lbs and you primarliy added 10lbs of LBM to your chest in scernario 1. And in Scenario 2 you were 160lbs but you added 10lbs of LBM primarliy to your legs. Would there be any difference, metabolism wise?


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## Gordo (Mar 23, 2006)

Tom_B said:
			
		

> I've always wondered if where you hold your muscle has any effect on metabolism either? Like for instance Say if you were 160lbs and you primarliy added 10lbs of LBM to your chest in scernario 1. And in Scenario 2 you were 160lbs but you added 10lbs of LBM primarliy to your legs. Would there be any difference, metabolism wise?



What type of muscle fiber makes up that 10lbs will likely throw a wrench in the theory. Leg's do a lot of work in a day....but they're built for it.


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## Gordo (Mar 23, 2006)

Emma-Leigh said:
			
		

> Lyle knows his information.
> 
> So unless you gain a hugo-amount of lean mass you are not going to need that much more food.



So unless you are someone with a rapid fire metabolism, slow bulks are likely still the best bulks....unless you really really like cardio and extreme dieting.  (or you're on gear)


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## Dale Mabry (Mar 23, 2006)

CowPimp said:
			
		

> Could be.  At the same time, I think there are other factors involved that make having additional muscle mass lead to a higher metabolic rate.  I can tell you anecdotally that my BMR went through the fucking roof once I got back into resistance training and added an appreciable amount of muscle mass to my frame.
> 
> Let's look at my caloric intake a few years ago before I started lifting weights and exercising again.  My maintenance caloric intake was about 2500 per day @ 165 pounds.  I now weigh about 195 and my maintenance caloric intake is about 4300 per day.  Yes, I am more active now.  Still, there is no way in Hell that activity accounts for the entire difference of 1800 calories each day.  I know there are other things like more frequent eating and a higher protein intake that help, but even then there is a big something missing from this equation.




I think the higher activity level coupled with the lean gains certainly help.  Like say you gain 5 or so lbs of muscle.  You are, in fact, carrying around 5 more lbs of weight every day.  And you are activating those fibers when you lift which would bump up your cals burned to activity.

You should get that bodygem indirect calorimetry reading.  I got one 4 years ago and it put my BMR at 2170.  I got it for free while I was working at Bally's, though.


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## Emma-Leigh (Mar 23, 2006)

Gordo said:
			
		

> So unless you are someone with a rapid fire metabolism, slow bulks are likely still the best bulks....unless you really really like cardio and extreme dieting.  (or you're on gear)




Slow and steady is the best way.


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## CowPimp (Mar 23, 2006)

Dale Mabry said:
			
		

> I think the higher activity level coupled with the lean gains certainly help.  Like say you gain 5 or so lbs of muscle.  You are, in fact, carrying around 5 more lbs of weight every day.  And you are activating those fibers when you lift which would bump up your cals burned to activity.
> 
> You should get that bodygem indirect calorimetry reading.  I got one 4 years ago and it put my BMR at 2170.  I got it for free while I was working at Bally's, though.



My BMR was suggested to be 2060 or so by a tanita BIA scale a couple days ago.  I have a feeling that is highly innaccurate.  I don't see over half of my calories consumed for the day coming from my level of physical activity.


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## Dale Mabry (Mar 23, 2006)

The body gem is about as accurate as you can get, it measures gas exchange.  I was around your weight at the time too.  If you did a decent amount of cardio I would think 40% would be possible, but certainly not 50%.

That tanita uses the LBM equation so it can be very inaccurate.


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## CowPimp (Mar 25, 2006)

Dale Mabry said:
			
		

> The body gem is about as accurate as you can get, it measures gas exchange.  I was around your weight at the time too.  If you did a decent amount of cardio I would think 40% would be possible, but certainly not 50%.
> 
> That tanita uses the LBM equation so it can be very inaccurate.



I do 2-3 cardio sessions each week that last about 25 minutes, but they are intervals of fairly high intensity activity; you can peek in my journal if you're interested in a sample.  

I guess I am somewhat active besides that too.  I walk probably 45+ minutes a day: 10 minutes to the subway from my house, another 10 minutes from the subway to work, multiplied by 2.  I also walk 5-10 minutes each way to the gym I workout at most every day.  Also, you know as a trainer you are pretty much walking around the whole time you're training people.  It's certainly not on the level of a desk job by any means.

Whatever.  I'm not really that worried about it.  I know what I need to eat to control my body composition, so knowing my BMR is pretty much moot.


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## Dale Mabry (Mar 25, 2006)

That is certainly on the higher end of the activity spectrum, much like me.  I walk like 3 miles to and from work a day, too.


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## CowPimp (Mar 26, 2006)

Dale Mabry said:
			
		

> That is certainly on the higher end of the activity spectrum, much like me.  I walk like 3 miles to and from work a day, too.



When I was working as a baggage handler at the airport my metabolism was fucking disgusting.  At a bodyweight of about 181 I was putting down the same number of calories I am now without any change in weigiht.  Ridiculousness.


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## Favre (Mar 26, 2006)

A pound of muscle added will only require 6 calories more per day? I don't care what study claims that I don't believe that for one second. There's no way to account for different bodytypes and all that jazz.

I'm not saying it's 50 per pound as I've often read but from personal experience, I know I need hundreds of calories more just to maintain boydweight than I did just 4 or 5 years ago and nothing has really changed other than carrying more muscle. I was bulking this year and I needed 5000 calories plus to gain substantial weight which is the most I've ever needed. So why do I need more and more calories evertyime I bulk? Frequent high protein meals are nothing new to me.

10 years ago I weighed around 135 Ibs. or so and anything around 3000 calories and I'd gain weight. Now I get down to sub 10% bf on 3000 calories a day. So the 35 Ibs. more of muscle I'm carrying now means I should only need 210 more calories a day then back then? BULLSHIT


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## CowPimp (Mar 26, 2006)

I think the whole 6 calories per pound this is referring to an increase in your resting metabolic rate.  This doesn't factor in increased activity levels.  

I'm still a little skeptical of these numbers myself, but at the same time I can almost see how these other increases in metabolic rate are attributed to the massive boost in metabolic activity that is seen for many hours after a resistance training session related to protein turnover and activation of this muscle mass during the actual session.  These amounts are probably largely amplified as you increase muscle mass and also improve the neural factors that help you activate a larger percentage of this muscle mass.


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## Dale Mabry (Mar 27, 2006)

Favre said:
			
		

> A pound of muscle added will only require 6 calories more per day? I don't care what study claims that I don't believe that for one second. There's no way to account for different bodytypes and all that jazz.
> 
> I'm not saying it's 50 per pound as I've often read but from personal experience, I know I need hundreds of calories more just to maintain boydweight than I did just 4 or 5 years ago and nothing has really changed other than carrying more muscle. I was bulking this year and I needed 5000 calories plus to gain substantial weight which is the most I've ever needed. So why do I need more and more calories evertyime I bulk? Frequent high protein meals are nothing new to me.
> 
> 10 years ago I weighed around 135 Ibs. or so and anything around 3000 calories and I'd gain weight. Now I get down to sub 10% bf on 3000 calories a day. So the 35 Ibs. more of muscle I'm carrying now means I should only need 210 more calories a day then back then? BULLSHIT



How old are you?


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## Favre (Mar 27, 2006)

Dale Mabry said:
			
		

> How old are you?



I just turned 29 a couple weeks ago.


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## Dale Mabry (Mar 27, 2006)

You would figure your metabolism would have slowed a bit, but guessing from you weighing 135 at 19 years of age, I would have to guess you have a pretty fast metabolism.


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## Favre (Mar 27, 2006)

It's wicked fast. This past year I was down to 5% bf without doing any cardio at all and I didn't use ephedra. This works against me though when I try to pack on muscle. 

I just don't understand how they come up with 6 calories more needed for a pound of muscle. That's like getting up off the couch and walking to the fridge and back. I'm sure in some strange way in a lab the number may be correct for certain people. But in real life I'd say packing on 10 pounds of pure muscle will raise your metabolism quite a bit, not just oh you can eat 14 more peanuts now.


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