muscle calorie burning explained

You want to eat more, or maybe you want to shed some bodyfat, so you’ve decided to lift in order to gain muscle. While exercise burns calories, and the process of breaking down and building muscle burns calories too, the amount of calories one pound of muscle burns daily is a mere 4-6 calories. So, even if you put on an additional 10 pounds of muscle, that’s under 100 calories those muscles eat up.

Adding muscle takes time too. For a beginner lifter, a pound of muscle gained per month is ideal (maximal). After about a year, those gains taper off.

If I’m in the gym weight training, I’ll burn over 300 calories in an hour. If I’m training clients for three hours, and I lift for an hour that same day, I’m burning about 600 calories. That’s not too shabby for a tiny female like me (I’m 5 feet tall).

If you want to eat more total calories, or lose bodyfat, adding more daily activity, in addition to adding muscle, is the way to go.

photo: me