5 Ways to Reduce Body Fat While Building Muscle

This is possibly the most tricky balancing act you'll face when it comes to diet — trying to lose fat while building on those muscle gains. Losing weight can be great for many of us trying to get healthier, but who wants to lose muscle mass after all the hard work put in to gain it? The problem is, when you create a calorie deficit (consuming fewer calories than what you burn every day), your body tends to burn a certain amount of fat before it turns to burning muscle, leaving you feeling leaner, but also a heck of a lot weaker. So, how can you maintain (and build) the muscle while skimming off the fat?

Here are some of our tips to getting a good balance on your weight loss journey:

Eat Healthy Fats

Hold off on that huge scoop of full-fat ice cream — you want healthy fats only here. Dietary fat is really useful for gaining muscle as it can help you boost your energy intake and provide extra fuel for those tougher workouts. They also help promote the production of hormones in our bodies, including testosterone which can help increase muscle mass.¹

Before you grab the chocolate spread or add more butter to your toast in the morning, opt for some Omega-3’s instead. This way, you'll keep body fat levels to a minimum and still build muscle. Just remember you'll need a solid workout to use up the energy from these high-calorie foods.

Omega-3 fatty acids are fats found in some fish, olive oil, and nuts. They have many purposes including improved heart health and muscle gain.² In fact, it's been found that supplementing omega-3 fatty acid for six weeks resulted in a 0.5kg gain in muscle and 0.5kg reduction in fat mass.³

 Rich food sources of omega-3 include:

• Salmon
• Tuna
• Mackerel
• Sardines
• Chia seeds
• Flaxseeds
• Canola oil

Follow a high-protein diet

It's all too obvious — if you want to build muscle protein, you obviously need to eat more... Protein. Of course. Muscles require protein for their growth and repair. So, fill your plate with fish, lean meat, eggs, tofu, beans and pulses, and low-fat dairy. A lot of low-calorie diets result in a low intake of protein which can result in poor growth and loss of muscle mass, even if you're shifting the fat.

Increasing your protein intake can be helpful to minimize the loss of lean body mass or muscle and it also tends to keep you feeling fuller for longer, meaning you're less likely to snack, keeping the calorie count down. Out of a group of young, healthy, elite athletes, those given a high-protein diet lost more weight whilst still maintaining muscle in comparison to those with a normal amount of protein in their diets.⁴

Good sources of protein include:

• Greek yogurt and other dairy products
• Chicken breast
• Turkey breast
• Cottage cheese
• Quinoa
• Chickpeas
• Milk
• Almonds