how does catabolism work

austin_88

New member
I had a meeting with a Personal Trainer recently who is also a qualified sports dietician, and we did a skin fold test to determine my body fat percentage and determined what I needed to do to lower my body fat percentage

Current Body Fat % = 22%
Goal Body Fat % = 18%

Basically I need to lose approx 4kg fat.

He said to me that the best time to do cardio was before breakfast on an empty stomach, and delay breakfast until about 9am.
I said that I thought that would result in the body using muscle for energy instead of fat, and he said that that only occurs with people who have next to nothing body fat (like people with Anorexia). He said that I would not be losing muscle mass.

He also said that if I got the proper nutrition (1g protein for each kg body weight) and did 2-3 Resistance Training Sessions per Week (focusing on large muscle groups only) I can expect to get my body fat down that low without losing much muscle.

What I want to know is this whole catabolism thing, and how that works in lamens terms. I saw Steve mention it in a thread about when to do exercise, and that happens if you do it on an empty stomach.

I am confused.
If you have no stored energy in your body when you exercise, wouldn't the next thing to burn be STORED FAT?
Why would the body use lean muscle for enegy when there is fat there to be used? Surely fat would be broken down before muscle?
 
I don't have an answer to your question. But on a similar note, I've heard that your body burns calories from the food you consume during the day, and given that you're running a healthy (not drastic) caloric deficit, you burn fat while you sleep. Sounds a little fishy to me... but I don't know.
 
I don't have an answer to your question. But on a similar note, I've heard that your body burns calories from the food you consume during the day, and given that you're running a healthy (not drastic) caloric deficit, you burn fat while you sleep. Sounds a little fishy to me... but I don't know.

Your body is continually burning calories during the day, even when you sleep.

I just found this blog entry from Tom Venuto.. interesting.

 
"Performing a low-intensity activity (for example, walking on the treadmill at 3.0mph with a 10 degree incline at around 65% of your max heart rate for 30 minutes) will hardly have any negative impact on subsequent performance and muscle mass." TESTOSTERONE NATION

So loss of muscle mass might only occur when the intensity is high?
 
I totally agree with that statement. Things like HIIT... that will probably lead to catabolization of muscle. Even then, I don't know how much it really will do it. I've read the Venuto article before several times (especially when I do AM cardio , just to assure myself I am not doing too much damage). I'd just keep an eye on your BF% with a handheld monitor to make sure the BF is dropping and not the muscle. It might not be the most accurate (like the skinfold, if you trust your trainer and all ;) ) but it will track changes that you want to see.
 
I totally agree with that statement. Things like HIIT... that will probably lead to catabolization of muscle. Even then, I don't know how much it really will do it. I've read the Venuto article before several times (especially when I do AM cardio , just to assure myself I am not doing too much damage). I'd just keep an eye on your BF% with a handheld monitor to make sure the BF is dropping and not the muscle. It might not be the most accurate (like the skinfold, if you trust your trainer and all ;) ) but it will track changes that you want to see.

Thanks! I am tracking my body fat and LBM just to make sure, and if it's not working i'll change it.

I've been doing this the past 2 weeks and I havent lost a great deal of weight but I certainly can notice the difference in my appearance.
 
That thing is actually pretty accurate. I think that's the one I have... lemme check:

Yup, that's it.

Hydration can screw with this sort of test but all in all, it does a great job in monitoring trends and believe it or not, it's quite accurate.
 
That thing is actually pretty accurate. I think that's the one I have... lemme check:

Yup, that's it.

Hydration can screw with this sort of test but all in all, it does a great job in monitoring trends and believe it or not, it's quite accurate.

Yeah for 30 bucks I just might pick it up to have at home. Do weekly BF % tracking... just to make sure my numbers aren't getting TOO high in terms of BF... I don't expect my numbers to drop drastically, but I don't expect them to sky rocket either.
 
Cool. :) My scale purports to calculate body fat, but the reviews for it all said it was worthless for that. (I got it because the reviews also all said it was very good for producing consistent weight measurements.) Maybe I'll use some of my Amazon credits for one of these.
 
It's well worth it IMO.

I have a tanita scale and it sucks bad. It's reported me at 3% BF before which I've been nowhere close and it's reported me at like 30%. Ridiculous. It is good at tracking weight, from what I've found. But BF%, not so much.

This handheld gizmo is much more accurate. And it's real easy to use.
 
???
 
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