this post was submitted on 01 Aug 2024
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me_irl
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A kind of 'side benefit' to muscle-building exercise, is that it increases the amount of calories your body burns 'by default', because by weight, muscle takes much more energy to maintain than fat.
So on top of eating less (fewer calories going into your body), you can 'attack' it from the other side at the same time by increasing your body's 'consumption' of the calories/energy stored in it.
This is a commonly repeated myth. One I believe myself until talking to my doctor about it.
https://www.latimes.com/health/la-xpm-2011-may-16-la-he-fitness-muscle-myth-20110516-story.html
Seems like its a "technically true" but in practice irrelevant because muscle and fat only make up a tiny percent of total energy usage (because things like the brain, heart and liver are so energy intensive):
And that's why I referred to it as a 'side benefit'. It doesn't do much more, but it's not nothing, you know?
Not to mention all of the other more overt health benefits from exercise in general.