CREATINE WHILE CUTTING: DOES CREATINE BURN FAT?
Most trainees already know about the awesome strength boosting and muscle building benefits that creatine monohydrate has to offer.
Bodybuilders have been using creatine as a staple in their supplement plans for many years, and for good reason.
But what about creatine and fat loss? Does creatine have any direct fat burning effects? Should it be used as part of your fat loss supplement plan?
The Relationship Between Creatine And Fat Loss
The short answer is that yes, creatine monohydrate should be supplemented with whether your goal is to add mass OR to lose body fat.
Any time you aim to lose body fat, you need to create a calorie deficit by burning more calories than you consume. This deficit is what stimulates the body to release fat for fuel.
The central goal during a cutting phase is to maximize body fat losses while minimizing muscle losses. You work damn hard for every ounce of muscle you build, and you want to protect as much of it as possible while you lose fat.
This is why intense weight training is just as important during a cut as it is during a mass gaining phase. You need to stimulate your muscles in the gym in order to encourage your body to hold on to its lean mass.
This is where creatine supplementation comes into play…
Creatine’s main effects are on increasing strength, power and performance in the gym. It accomplishes this by increasing the efficiency of your body’s ATP system, which is the primary system involved in short, explosive activities.
By continuing to supplement with creatine during your fat loss phase, you maximize your performance in the gym which helps you maintain strength and spare a higher percentage of your overall lean muscle tissue. And since muscle burns calories all on its own, this also translates to a greater amount of total body fat burned.
Some people raise concerns about the potential of creatine to cause “bloating”, which may cause the body to appear softer and less lean. However, this is nothing more than an outdated myth which has been long-since debunked.
Creatine does cause additional water retention, but that water retention is entirely intra-cellular and not subcutaneous. In other words, creatine drives water directly into the muscle cell and does not deposit it underneath the skin.
If anything, creatine will increase your body’s levels of hardness and overall definition.
Creatine And Fat Loss: Quick Review
Creatine should definitely be supplemented with during a fat loss phase as it allows you to maintain strength and maximize performance in the gym.
This forces your body to spare a higher percentage of muscle tissue as you lose fat, which improves your appearance and also translates to a higher resting metabolic rate.
The dosage for creatine is the same on both a muscle building or fat burning phase. Just take 5 grams of high quality creatine monohydrate daily in order to keep the muscle tissue continually saturated.
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