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solstice
Fri, Apr-22-05, 10:56
A poster previously replied to me and told me not to eat less than my RMR or I will lose muscle. So let us say as an example your RMR is 1000 calories. If you eat 1000 calories, and burn off 250 calories in excercise every day will you be able to lose a pound of fat in 2 weeks without losing muscle (250 calories burned X 14 days = 3500 calories= 1lb fat) ?

(I know these numbers are unrealistic I am just using them as an example to keep the math simple)

TIA
kbfunTH
Fri, Apr-22-05, 15:05
No, you will lose both. At low percentages of bodyfat, the greater the muscle loss becomes.

Your RMR is the required number of calories you need to stay alive. LBM is not just muscle; it's bones and organs as well. Even a complete couch potato needs 1.2 x RMR. Using your example of 1000 calories, a person that had no activity (couch potato) in their day would need an additional 200 calories to compensate what little movement they did. The average persons need 1.5.

For you, at the very least, you should calculate your RMRx1.2

Taking as much information as I could from your profile and using an age of 30 (I had to guess) your RMR is somewhere around 1087/day. Using the average of 1.55, your total expenditure comes to around 1685. If all you ate was 1087 for the day, you would already be 598 below your maintenance every day.