muscle loss

Originally Posted by BananaClip

I was at 160 about 2 months ago and I have cut down my calorie intake drasticly over the past 2 1/2 weeks, I now weigh 153 but it feels like I've lost 7 pounds of muscle.

so if I want to maintain my muscle mass without weight lifting/cardio and just shed body fat instead what should I do? keep calories down n drink protein shakes or I need to at least incorporate some working out? like push ups n such.

Thats a little too much weight to lose in two 1/2 weeks.The most should be 2lbs. a week to keep muscle.Go to ifit or one of those websites and find out how many calories you need to consume for maintenance and so on.If your body fat % was low to start,you probably lost all muscle,but if your body fat% was high like you had 10lbs. or more to lose,i would think most of that might be water weight.High protein intake without training might cause you to add some fat as the protein wont be building/repairing muscle.

Banana Clip I am going to give you a little reality. You are not going to like this but to make the statement you made you need this.

You want to maintain muscle mass without weight lifting... c'mon man are you serious?? The best is you say you want to maintain muscle muscle and loss fat without weight training and cardio. This is the real world and that is IMPOSSIBLE. There is no magic pill. Hard work equals results not a protein shake when there is a full moon.
Look, you want to get shredded.... hit the weights!!! hard and intense you are 22 frigging years old you can't worry about getting lean you are already lean; you need to gain muscle mass!! If you are not in the gym at least 4 days a week you are kidding yourself and I am not just talking about doing push-ups when commericals come on during your favorite TV program.

This goes out to everyone on this website that wants to be lean and cut; you have to have muscles if you want to look lean. Dropping calories alone is not the answer, your body is a survival mechanism and will slow down it's metabolism if you decide to drop calories drastically.

Now go to the gym hit the weights and friggin eat!!!!!!!!!

To Djones, this is why I post a pic because when I give someone the truth like this I better have results or what I say is just full of sh@t!

If you want to trim fat and not muscle, you need to use your muscles. Your body will use for energy what is not being used, if you are inactive, that is muscle. When body builders want to lean out the lift heavy to preserve the muscle mass. Cardio is helpful, but you HAVE to continue weight training. If I stop weight lifting while doing cycling for even a week, no matter what I eat I will loose 5 lbs or more on all of my lifts.

Engaging more muscles burns more calories, at the expense of recovery. Hit some higher reps doing one armed push ups on a medicine ball. Do pull ups with your legs jack knifed. Do bench press with 5 pounds more on one side, hit your set, add 5 to the other etc, and keep adding. It will build a great wall of stability.

I like nasty core exercises mixed in with regular training regimes.