279. Losing Fat but Not Seeing Muscle Definition? Here's Why!

So this is what we're misunderstanding, and I really do think you should go back and listen to the episode 275, Body Composition.

How can you tell if you're really losing fat and building muscle at the same time? That is a piece of this.

But something that is really important for you to understand is if you are trying to body recomp, as I said in that episode, you are trying to add muscle and lose fat at the same time.

It is going to be a slower process.

process.

You also have to have enough fat in your body to actually turn that into muscle.

So if you're very, very lean, a body recomp is going to be a lot harder and it is going to take a lot longer, but it is definitely possible.

Now, where people get confused is they want to add muscle.

They could be doing strength training, but they're in a fat loss phase.

Now, when we are adding muscle, it is a slower process.

So if you are losing fat and you are doing strength training, the muscle that shows once the fat is lost when it is kind of a quick fat loss phase, because typically fat loss phases come from calorie deficits that shouldn't be more than like four to 12 weeks, sometimes 16 weeks max, but they're not supposed to be a long-term thing.

I talk a lot about how you shouldn't live your life in a deficit.

So when I'm saying a fat loss phase, I'm talking about a calorie deficit.

So these phases of a calorie deficit, they bring on fat loss.

Here's another quick example to help you understand this.

If you see someone and they go on a GLP, now that could be Reta-Trutide, which is obviously a variation.

It's not exactly like the other ones, but it could be Ozempic, whatever it is.

If they lose fat and they have previously built muscle and during their fat loss phase of being on the GLP-1, they focused on having enough protein, they made sure they were still strength training, and they had the muscle from years previous, when the fat is gone, it's going to reveal the muscle that they have already built previous years.

So I know someone who has done CrossFit for 12 years.

She's put on a ton of muscle.

When she did a GLP-1, it just revealed the muscle when she lost the fat that she had already built.

That doesn't mean that that is how that is going to work for everybody else.

If you don't have that base of a ton of muscle underneath, when you lose the fat from being on the GLP-1, and if you haven't maintained the muscle by strength training through it and having enough protein and quality recovery, then you're going to lose the fat.

But it doesn't mean that muscle is going to pop suddenly just because there is a fat loss phase.

There has to be muscle built previously or a muscle phase or a body recomp to be able to see that.