Fat loss and weight loss—aren’t they the same thing? The answer is no; they are not. It is not your fault if you did not know that. The terms get used so interchangeably that people think both are the same thing when, in reality, they are not.
Weight loss indicates loss of body weight, whereas fat loss refers to only loss of body fat. Usually, people track their weight loss by using a weighing scale, but that does not show fat loss.
The weight can be loss for several reasons. The reasons are:
Losing Excess water weight: Almost 60% of our body is water. Losing water weight refers to losing excess water from the body. Usually, the body removes excess water through urine. However, if you consume too much sodium, your body tends to hold down some water to maintain balance.
Consuming sodium or salt is not bad, but it should not be consumed excessively, as it can cause different health complications. Ultra-processed foods tend to have a higher sodium level; to balance the excess sodium, the body holds water to balance the salt-to-water ratio.
Losing lean body mass or muscles: Losing lean mass refers to losing muscle. Losing muscle can be terrible for your body. Having good lean mass benefits our body in many ways. Such as:
- Improves metabolism
- Strengthen bone density
- Improves posture
- Improves joint health
- Prevents injury, etc.
Losing fat: Losing fat means losing the excess amount of fat that our body stores. Usually, when our body needs energy, it burns the excess fat to generate energy. The process goes like this: Our body initially generates energy from glycogen storage. When the glycogen storage gets emptied, it breaks down fat cells to produce energy.
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Should you go for weight loss or fat loss?
You should go for fat loss. If you lose weight and a good amount of muscle in the process, it can have negative consequences, whereas fat loss is always beneficial to a certain level. It is considered healthy for a man to carry 15% to 20% body fat, and for a woman, it is 20% to 25% body fat.
Losing excessive muscle will decrease your strength, slow your metabolism, and possibly hinder your performance.
How do you track body fat percentage?
If you go through the internet, you will find various techniques to measure your body fat. Some are cheap, and you can use them at home, and some are comparatively expensive, so you need to go to special facilities. Some popular methods are:
- Skinfold Caliper: The caliper is an instrument for measuring body fat at home. You must take measurements of your chest area, lower abdomen, and quads. Sum up the results and divide them by 3, and you will get your body fat result. However, this method does not provide accurate results. It has a good amount of error rate. The accuracy depends on the expertise of the person operating the caliper.
- Body fat scale: The body fat scale looks similar to regular weighing scales. However, it shows your weight and body fat percentage. You can find it in many gyms or order it online. It uses Bioelectrical impedance analysis (BIA) to measure body fat. However, it does not provide accurate results and has a higher error rate.
- Body Mass Index (BMI): This was a very popular method for tracking your body fat ratio. You can find a lot of BMI calculators online. You just need to provide some inputs like your age, weight, height, activity level, etc. Based on the inputs, you will get a result showing whether you are overweight, underweight, among other metrics. This method is also very faulty. It is suitable for taking a rough estimate but does not provide accurate results.
- Online Body Fat Calculator: You can find many online body fat calculators that also track body weight based on some inputs, but usually, they are very faulty. One of the popular online body fat calculators is the Omni calculator. It is free but has the highest error rate.
- Dexa Scan: It is one of the most popular fat-tracking methods. It is usually very costly, and finding a facility that provides one is really tough. Still, it has some marginal error.
How can you determine your body fat if every method has some marginal error?
You do not need to have pinpoint accuracy on your body fat percentage. You can take a rough guess by looking at the picture:
How can you prevent muscle loss?
When people try to cut down on weight, the most common mistake is restricting calories and increasing cardio exercises. The result is that they can lose weight if they stick, but they also lose muscles in the process.
When our body requires energy, it taps into glycogen storage. When you start crash-dieting, you will not have enough glycogen in your body to produce the required energy. At that time, your body breaks down the excess fat storage, and after that, it breaks down muscle tissues to produce energy. Losing excess muscle can negatively affect your strength, sleep, metabolism, bone density, etc. Thus, you need to be very careful when cutting down on weight.
It is hard to distinguish if you are losing fat or muscle when losing weight, especially for beginners. To prevent muscle loss when trying to lose weight, you can do two things to help you hold onto the muscle and even increase it. They are:
- Doing Weight Training: Lifting weights provides your body with stimuli to increase muscle mass. To break it down in simple terms, when you do weight training, your body sends signals to your brain that it is going through stress, and to overcome it, your body will require muscular strength. Thus, over time, your body increases muscle mass and strength.
That is why the weight you struggle to lift now becomes comparatively easy after some time. Weight training tends to hold onto the muscle even when cutting unless you starve yourself.
- Increase your protein intake. Muscles are made of amino acids or proteins. Increasing your protein intake and weight training will help your body develop new muscle tissue.
Much research has been done over the past many years to determine the ideal protein ratio everyone should follow. It has been found that 0.8 grams per pound of body weight is the minimum protein requirement that everyone should fulfill daily. However, 0.8 g is for the average person. If you workout, especially on a weight loss journey, then it will be ideal for you to consume somewhere between 1.2 and 1.6 g per pound of body weight.
Consuming protein will help you on the weight loss journey by helping you hold onto your existing muscles and develop new ones.
How can you lose fat?
The journey will begin by reducing the number of calories you eat daily. It takes an almost 3,500-calorie deficit to lose one pound of body fat. Do not worry. You do not need to lower the calories by only cutting food; increasing calorie expenditure by exercising will also assist you.
When you start, start with a small deficit of 200 or 250 calories and start exercising. Measure your weight daily on an empty stomach every morning and note it down somewhere. You need to calculate the weekly mean number and compare two weeks’ mean numbers to track progress.
In the initial days, you will see you are losing pretty fast. The reason behind that is that your excess water and glycogen storage will be replenished when you start your fat loss journey. After that, your fat will start to burn. Fat loss is a slow process, so you need to be patient.
You might not see weight changes for a week but do not get disappointed. If you do see any changes between the mean numbers of the two weeks, then cut down another 250 calories from your diet, and you will start seeing results.
Do not rush the process by doing crash dieting, as it will lead to systemic fatigue, and you will lose muscles in the process, which we do not want.
By combining a proper diet with good training, you can easily lose fat over time. I can tell that from my own personal experience, as I went from 110 KG to 80 KG over 6 months without losing much muscle in the process.
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