A fat burner does what it says on the bottle: it supports fat loss during a diet.
A fat burner won’t burn fat if your diet isn’t working, but it can provide you with an additional edge and support your lifestyle changes. This means more results for the same work – which is always ideal.
Today we’re going to discuss how you can make the most of this and use fat burners to maintain muscle on a cut. Stick around for the best products to achieve this and what they can do for you!
Why Bother?
Fat loss is a common goal for many people: almost everyone wants to look better and be healthier. Fat loss is one of the best ways to achieve both of these at the same time.
However, doing this can risk muscle mass that you’ve already built. The hardest part of cutting weight when you’re already trained is maintaining those muscles; if you’re not careful, it may undo months of hard work.
There’s always a continuum when you’re losing weight, a line that ranges between maintaining muscle and losing kilos as quickly as possible. The more rapidly you’re losing fat, the harder it is to maintain muscle, and vice versa.
This balance is what we’re going to discuss today – and how fat burners can help you support both processes effectively. The point is to aim for the maximal fat loss possible that either doesn’t cause muscle loss or even supports muscle gain during fat loss.
That’s why we’re going to recommend one key product here today – a fat burner designed to work with fasting and fasted training to support lean muscle mass…
It’s called Performance Lab SPORT Fat Burner.
Myth-Busting: Fat Loss and Muscle Gains are Possible Together
Muscle gains are entirely possible while on a weight-loss diet. The science on this has been hit and miss, primarily because most studies use very restrictive diets, but a slower approach to weight loss has been shown to allow better muscle growth.
This is one of the keys to balancing out your diet and supporting a better body composition. This also allows you to perform effective strength training and improve performance while also getting leaner.
The point is to aim for around 0.7% bodyweight loss per week. This is going to be important later on – but the key point is that a narrow calorie deficit is enough to lose weight while also producing more muscle.
However, this only works if you’re following certain key processes effectively. They are:
- Effective protein and carb intake that are proportional to your training intensity and volume. Don’t over-eat, but support recovery during tough resistance training.
- Getting plenty of pro-energy, pro-metabolism, hormone-supporting nutrients. Vitamin and mineral intake must be in the right place to effectively re-composition your body. This is why we also recommend using Performance Lab Whole-Food Multivitamin.
- Great training with effective weight, rep, and set schemes.
These are all going to be important, and an effective fat burner like Performance Lab’s SPORT Fat Burner should help with at least one of these processes. The stronger you are on these basics, the better you’ll maintain and build muscle.
Key Fat Burning Ingredients to Look For
There are some key compounds that you need to look out for when it comes to an effective fat burner. They work in a few different ways and these can add up when it comes to supporting muscle maintenance during a cut.
HMB: this is a metabolite of Leucine that is primarily useful for supporting muscle maintenance. While Leucine is specifically useful for building more muscle mass, HMB is just as effective for anti-catabolism.
A high dose of HMB provides a reliable way to support muscle maintenance independently of any of the other ingredients. This is a great start and the more scientifically-effective products like Performance Lab’s SPORT Fat Burner that incorporate HMB are going to support an effective weight-loss process.
For regular Leucine, you can rely on the Performance LAB SPORT BCAA for effective supplementary intake to support muscle maintenance and growth.
Forskolin: This is an herbal remedy that is usually used in traditional Indian medicine. However, the science has shown that this may boost your testosterone levels – or at least regulate them.
During the weight loss process, hormonal support is important to counter-act the catabolic effects of energy restriction. This is a great way of maximizing your results, since testosterone levels adjust your muscle gain potential and resting fat levels.
Capsaicin: This is where most of the fat burning comes from in fat burners. This is a pro-metabolism compound that increases your calorie costs and allows for you to burn more weight.
This stimulates increased metabolic cost with a more moderate effect than caffeine or other powerful stimulants. It also fights inflammation and has powerful antioxidant properties to combat cancer and mutation risks.
Catecholamines: Catecholamines are compounds involved in the process of using body fat for fuel. This is a useful way of ensuring that your calorie restriction is supported by calories from body fat, rather than a limited energy source or relying on muscle-proteins for fuel.
If you’re getting plenty of catecholamines from your diet, as well as pro-metabolism compounds like capsaicin or HMB, you’ll ensure you’re protecting muscle and losing weight effectively. These are common aspects that add up.
A product that provides all of these effects like Performance Lab’s SPORT Fat Burner ensures that you’re supporting fat burning while sparing as much muscle as possible. Obviously, this is the entire goal – so keep your eyes open for these key ingredients.
Piperine: This is an extract from black pepper that increases the absorption of compounds through the wall of your intestine. It sounds a bit gross, but this is key for increasing the absorption of vitamins, minerals, and other food-bound nutrients.
This is a great compound to combine with your fat burner to ensure you’re getting the most from each of the ingredients. This ensures that every gram you take in is more effective.
This is a benefit that also extends to other nutrients you take in – which is why we recommend combining this with Performance Lab’s Whole-Food Multivitamin. This supports energy transfer, hormonal health, and metabolic regularity, especially so thanks to the high-absorption effects of piperine.
Synergies and Other Benefits
The important point here is that you’re relying on compounds that are associated with improved health, performance, and recovery. These are a key aspect of what makes this product the best choice for your goals.
This is important because the needs of a weight-loss and muscle-gain diet aren’t so different. If you put the calories aside, the only difference is that you have less food to get your nutrients in when attempting to cut weight.
This is because of a very simple principle that you need to keep in mind whenever you’re looking to lose weight and maintain muscle – fat burner or not:
What builds muscle best in a surplus maintains it during a deficit.
The way you structure your diet should still revolve around nutrient-dense foods, effective supplementation, and prioritizing the basics. This is what Performance Lab’s SPORT Fat Burner does but should also push you to a better diet and a performance multivitamin.
Alternatively, supporting your muscle amino acids can be a key way to support mass during a cut. The Performance Lab SPORT BCAAs provide a high-quality, bioavailable source of the key amino “Leucine”. During a cut, this is anti-catabolic and supports effective muscular recovery.
The effectiveness of your fat burner is affected by the other foods and supplements in your diet. Responsible use of supplements is about choosing the right products, but also integrating them effectively.
Also, Worth Noting: Diet Structure and Muscle Gains on a Cut
A fat burner like Performance Lab SPORT Fat Burner is an effective support during a muscle-maintenance cut.
The estimated benefits of catecholamines and capsaicin are roughly 50-100 calories. This is relevant because a 0.7% bodyweight loss goal isn’t a huge calorie restriction.
With a goal of 0.5kg loss per week, or even less, calorie restriction of around 500calories per day may be enough to produce significant fat loss and maintain/build muscle. In this type of diet, an extra few hundred calories from an effective fat burner – alongside the anti-catabolic effects – makes a significant difference.
The point isn’t to burn maximum fat in the shortest time possible. It’s to support your body choosing fat as the #1 thing to burn up, rather than lean mass. These are supported by the various ingredients mentioned above, but also from this clever approach to dieting.
Remember that your diet is going to come first. Performance Lab’s SPORT Fat Burner is an effective supplement, but it’s not a replacement for an effective diet or exercise regimen. This is why it’s a supplement: it’s a bonus on top of what should already be a fantastic weight-loss, muscle-supporting diet.
Put the basics first, invest in supplements that actually square up with your goals, and you could be more muscular after your cut than before!
Our Final Thoughts
The fat burner you want is the one that supports your long-term goals. This means matching your goals to where on the continuum – between speed and maintenance – you want to be, with the product and ingredients.
There are products that have no concept of this, that push for maximum fat loss at the cost of your hard-built muscle. These are worth avoiding if you’re trying to maintain muscle while you lose fat.
This is why we prefer a performance-focused product. Your needs are greater than just being healthy, and muscle support makes the difference here. This is why we love Performance Lab’s approach to supplementation and their SPORT Fat Burner – as it lives up to the name!
Patience and effective supplement choice are important to maximize your results and make sure that, while you get lean, you’re staying strong!
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