Jonathan Steedman (00:01.295)

Hey food groupies, just wanna have a quick chat about muscle loss today. It's a question I get a lot, I guess essentially around how can I reduce it, how can I stop it from happening, around, I guess, injury or travel, sickness, anytime where maybe you're someone who does regularly train, you do regularly get to the gym, and for whatever reason, you can't get to the gym for a little while. So we're gonna talk about that, we're gonna talk about the things that you can do. And I'm quite confident that by the end of this podcast,

 

you're gonna be feeling way more optimistic about things. this is like a good news podcast in a sense, right? I'm gonna be speaking quite vaguely because unfortunately, we don't have tons of great data on this. And it is also really hard to measure muscle properly. So yeah, I don't have specific numbers for you overly because it kind of differs from study to study. And to be perfectly honest, I don't think that's super helpful for most of us anyway. I think just big picture, some big strategies. So that's what.

 

we're gonna be focusing on, right? So first and foremost, there are two things that moderate this. And what I mean by that is there's a very big difference between taking time off the gym versus being say bed bound. the first thing is, okay, so you're not training anymore, you're not doing weights. How active or inactive are you? Okay, so if you just can't get to the gym, but you're still walking around, you're still, I don't know, gardening.

 

Maybe you've got kids that you're throwing around or you're doing other activities. Your rate of muscle loss is going to be slower compared to someone who maybe is unfortunately say you're like bed bound or you have injured a limb and you have to keep that limb really still. Okay, so you're not using it at all. So rates of muscle loss increase. So you lose muscle quicker essentially the less active you are. So first recommendation is try and stay as active as you can. Now, obviously if you've got an injury do what your doctor or your physio says don't.

 

But again, still within those guidelines, try and move as much as you can. Doing other physical activity is going to help. It doesn't strictly have to be the gym. The second thing is the older you are, the quicker this stuff happens. Unfortunately, you know, just as we age, we become more prone to age related sarcopenia, which is a fancy way of saying losing muscle as we get older. And so that means taking time off from muscle loss, muscle loss, taking time off from the gym, just the muscle loss kind of ramps up a little bit quicker than it would if you were saying your 20s or.

 

Jonathan Steedman (02:24.065)

maybe your 30s or something. So just be mindful of that, okay? Now, the good news is, I told you there was some good news. We probably, if you regularly go to the gym, let's say two to three times per week of plus, of regular resistance, picking up weights, machines, picking up machines, you know what I mean? Doing all of that resistance style training. If you're doing that two plus times per week, and then you suddenly stop it completely, if you're, I don't know, between the ages of like 20 and 50,

 

and you're still reasonably active outside of that, you're not bed bound, you're not gonna lose any muscle for like at least a month, four whole, maybe plus weeks, four, five, even six weeks of no gym before your actual muscle tissue starts to degrade or still you start to lose some of that, which is pretty awesome. I think most people I talk to who are worried about losing muscle when they travel are like, I'm going away for a week, I won't get to the gym, I'm not gonna lose all my muscle. The good news is no.

 

You can go away for six weeks, knock yourself out. So that's the first thing, right? It's much less of a problem than we think it is. So I think most people who ask me about this stuff, would say even, I'd say mild injuries, your recovery time probably is four to six, maybe eight weeks. So even then you're not taking a heap of time out of the gym in the context of muscle loss. So don't stress too much about it, particularly if, like I said, you can keep up any additional movement that you can.

 

The next thing is if you can get to the gym in any way, the amount of work you need to do to maintain muscle versus grow muscle is probably way lower than you think. Even in older populations, so people where muscle gain or muscle maintenance is harder, we see if they drop down to like a third of their volume. So let's say that you're going three times per week and you go once a week.

 

they can maintain for, I think the figure I remember off the top of my head is like at eight, at least eight months, eight months. So for the next eight months, you go from three day arms a week to once a week, you're probably gonna maintain. That's amazing, right? How good? So that would be the next thing. And so any kind of like, you know, even if worst case scenario, you're gonna do pushups and bodyweight squats or like some kind of still resistance, it doesn't strictly have to be the gym. All of that stuff is going to be super duper helpful, which leads me to my next topic.

 

Jonathan Steedman (04:50.88)

because this is the thing I always get asked being a dietitian, probably should say a little bit more in my lane. I got a bachelor of exercise and nutrition science, so can talk about exercise, but speaking of nutrition, there's not really too much that you can or should worry about when it comes to nutrition for muscle loss, okay? By far, the biggest driver is movement and training and resistance and all of those sorts of things. So that's why I've spent the first bulk of this podcast talking about that stuff.

 

What I often get asked is, should I eat more protein? The answer is no, okay? Ideally, if you're training regularly, we wanna be eating an optimal amount of protein. I've got a whole heap of podcasts talking about how much that is. But if you're already eating an optimal amount of protein, stopping going to the gym and eating more protein is not gonna help you. Continue eating the same amount of quote unquote optimal protein and that will give you your best chance. Okay, so that's the first thing.

 

Increase your protein, know, so essentially if you're someone likes numbers if you're currently eating 1.5 to 2 grams of protein per kilogram of body weight Eating above that is not going to protect your muscle more You're better off trying to do one gym session a week or two Body weight sessions at some point in the week, right? That's going to be infinitely better than worrying about what you're eating in terms of food though The one other thing I would definitely be careful of is a being in a deficit. So that means making sure that sorry

 

making sure you're not in a deficit, i.e. making sure that you're eating enough food to maintain your weight because losing weight when you're not doing any resistance trainings definitely increases the likelihood that the weight you're losing is more muscle than fat. It's not like you're gonna lose no fat and all muscle, but kind of the ratio of fat to muscle loss will be skewed a bit more towards muscle. If you're in a deficit, you're losing weight and you're not doing any kind of resistance training.

 

That would be what I would be recommending from a nutrition standpoint. If you have to take one plus week off your regular gym program, don't panic, don't try and diet slash don't try and lose weight and just keep your protein intake where it is. If you're doing those things, you're pretty much doing enough. There's a little bit of evidence around maybe creatine helping, but like at the moment I'm a little bit nervous. I love creatine, it's in like got this renaissance of like, what can't it do? And I suspected in a year or two, we'll probably.

 

Jonathan Steedman (07:16.117)

we'll probably chill out a little bit with it. anyway, what else are you gonna say? last thing. Now you may be listening to this being like, nah, Giorno, I have taken a week or two off the gym before and my muscle just disappears. I see it. I look smaller, I feel smaller. I know that I lose muscle really quickly. You don't, but I know what you're talking about. Basically what does happen is your muscle cross-sectional area, hoo-hee, the size of your muscle does shrink. That's because

 

you probably can't see me, but imagine I'm holding my hands like I'm holding a balloon, right? The rubber of the balloon is your muscle tissue. That's like the red stuff, right? The actual stuff that we grow, the actual structure of your muscle. But inside your muscle, you've also got fluids, right? You've got water, but you've also got something called glycogen, which is your muscle fuel store. Imagine little pockets of air or little pockets of liquid all throughout this muscle. When we take

 

about a week or longer off training, our muscle fuel stores shrink. The hydration status of that muscle, muscle, muscle, Sean Connery, the hydration status of that muscle drops. That muscle has less fuel and less water in it, so it looks smaller. You do actually look smaller. You're not making it up, but it's not because you've lost muscle. In that example I gave before, that balloon does not have less rubber.

 

It's just a smaller balloon because it has less air in it. And that's also probably why you've experienced regaining that muscle really quickly when you go back to the gym for a week or two. You haven't gained new muscle tissue. You've just pumped it back up with fuel and hydration, which is not a bad thing. It's just that shift happens really quickly. And I think that's what makes people panic about muscle loss. Actual muscle tissue being lost is a far slower process, particularly if you're able to do some kind of movement.

 

even if it's one gym session a week, that's amazing. All of those things, if you take those into account, don't add more protein, don't diet, try and do as much movement as you can. If you can do any form of resistance training, all of those things are gonna mean it's pretty unlikely that you lose much muscle, if any. And the last little bit of good news is regaining lost muscle is quicker than growing new muscle. So if you do have an extended absence for whatever reason,

 

Jonathan Steedman (09:40.527)

or you've had a pretty serious injury and you've had to keep a limb quite immobile for an extended period of time, you will probably have lost muscle. But the good news is, once you get back into your regular training routine, that muscle is gonna come back quicker than the first time you had to grow it. So even if you've lost muscle, it's still kind of a good news story. You're gonna get it back a bit quicker. So if you have worried about losing muscle or muscle loss, historically, I hope that has helped. I hope it's allayed your fears. You're gonna be okay. Don't eat more protein.

 

I think I've said that enough times. Anyway, whatever. I'll talk to you next time. Bye.