Running & weight, does muscle really weigh more than fat?

[Surelyshirley4]

Hi there, just wondering if anyone can tell me if muscle really does weigh more than fat and if it's enough to cause a significant difference in weight? I only started running 5 months ago and I'm only running 4/5k about 3 times a week, so don't think my increase in muscle mass would be much at all.

However, I seem to weigh a lot more than I actually feel I weigh!! I fully realise it's all about how you feel & look, not what you weigh (and in fact I have pretty much ditched the scales as was obsessed previously & realised it was destroying me daily). So, I hadn't weighed myself for months but decided to the other day as I was feeling good about the better shape I was in. But it has mortified me again! I am convinced that I look about half a stone less than the scales are reporting - 2 sets of scales too so no problem with the scales themselves....

Yes, I know you could say just ditch the scales and feel all positive etc. & it really doesn't matter what I weigh but I'm worried that my brain is telling me I look good and actually I don't! I was a stone lighter a couple of years ago and that is my ideal weight where all my clothes fit and I feel at my best, so just a bit gutted that I could still have such a long way to go to get back to that feeling (and healthy BMI), when I was convinced I only had another half a stone to go

So, just want your thoughts please on whether my newly acquired muscles in my firmer legs could weigh half a stone!!

No! A pound of muscle weights exactly the same as a pound of fat!

Muscle is denser though so a pound of muscle is smaller in volume than a pound of fat.

(hope that makes sense, I thought I'd get it out of the way fast before the pedants arrive)

As a female doing only running I'd be really surprised if you had managed to pack on half a stone of muscle. It's quite hard to gain meaningful muscle as a woman even if you are lifting big big weights. You may be like me, I do put muscle on reasonably easily but I'm relatively unusual in that and even then I do quite heavy weights to get Thr results.

However madness lies in the scales. Are your clothes looser? Have yo measured inches? More importantly do you feel better and fitteR? If so ignore that dial!

Muscle is more dense, so has a more streamlined look with fewer inches than the same weight with a greater proportion of fat. A tape measure is often a better guide of progress.

I also find that when I've been working hard, my body temporarily retains more water as the muscles heal and build up which adds a subtle difference to my weight.

A pound of muscle weights exactly the same as a pound of fat!

Yes, because that's what "a pound" means.

And a pound of feathers weighs the same as a pound of lead, but one is BIGGER than the other.

Which would you rather have to carry about under your clothes?

Half a stone of fat takes up more space (and makes you clothes tighter) than half a stone of muscle.

If you look how you want to look, and feel how you want to feel, it doesn't matter what the scales say.

Trills, if you could stop rolling your eyes for a minute, you have just basically reported exactly what I said.

So, the good news then is that my extra "pounds" probably look better than they previously did and fit into a tighter space in my trousers!! Still absolutely gutted at what I weigh though.... But yes, my clothes do feel better and perhaps that is where my confusion comes from as I definitely didn't fit in to these clothes before when I weighed this much.

Sounds like my increase in muscle wouldn't weigh much at all then - that's what I thought. All those people saying "but muscle weighs more than fat" is a bit rubbish then....

Oh well, I'll keep up with the running and carry on trying to get to that healthy BMI then. Am very aware that the running doesn't lose me weight though, it's ALL about what is going in my mouth and cutting that down.

"X weighs more than Y" is only ever a meaningful sentence when you are comparing volumes of X and Y.

So people don't bother to say that muscle is heavier than fat "by volume" because it is implied.

Nobody ever means that a pound of X weights more than a pound of Y, there is never any reason to dispute that or to say "No!" like that.

Bad day trills?