If you are someone who wants to get rid of skinny fat to become lean and muscular, then congrats, you are at the right place.
Most people who have a skinny fat physique have questions like –
- why am I skinny,
- how should I train,
- how much calories and protein should I eat,
- should I lift weights or do cardio more, etc.
If you also have these doubts in your mind then don’t worry. Here is the ultimate solution to all your queries explaining how to get rid of skinny fat. So let’s dive deep into it.
What Is Skinny Fat?
What does a skinny fat look like? Someone with a normal body weight with too little muscle mass and have some fat over his body comes under the category of skinny fat.
SKINNY means thin or not having any noticable muscles and FAT means having fat especially in the mid area of body.
In short, it’s about your body composition. Skinny fat people have a very low muscle to fat ratio. They may have a healthy weight and look average with clothes on but looks out of shape on removing their shirt.
If you also look somewhat like this, then don’t worry. In this article, I’ll give you a complete blueprint to get rid of skinny fat.
Why am I Skinny?
There can be many reasons behind your skinny fat condition. The four major ones are:
1. No weight training
As you know that the skinny fat problem arises when you have a low muscle to fat ratio because you have too few muscles. Since weight training is the best way to build muscles, hence it is also the best way to come out of the skinny fat zone.
Now you don’t need to be a gym rat for that. Just three to four weight training sessions in a week can do the work for you. Along with the skinny fat solution, weight training will improve your muscular strength and body shape also.
2. Low protein intake
You can’t build muscles by doing weight training alone. Your body needs good food and enough protein supply to build and maintain muscles.
Not lifting weights and not having enough protein in your diet make it almost impossible for your body to build muscles. And this works like a perfect recipe for you to end up being skinny fat.
3. Doing too much cardio
Cardio is no doubt very helpful for improving your cardiovascular ability and endurance. But everything has a limit. Some people do hours and hours of cardio every day to lose weight or to reduce belly fat.
Cardio aids your health in several ways but excess of it may lead to skinny fatness. It interferes with your ability to gain muscles. That’s the reason why most endurance athletes look very thin and have low muscle mass.
Hence, avoid doing too much cardio to get rid of skinny fat.
How to Get Rid of Skinny Fat?
Now after knowing the reason for being skinny fat, it’s easier for you to get rid of it. As you know that skinny fat solution is all about body recomposition, so you need to do two things – building muscles and losing fat.
For trained individuals, it is very difficult to do both simultaneously. However, being skinny fat, you can lose fat and gain muscle at the same time.
So how should you approach?
Some people do the mistake of losing fat first. NEVER do that. By doing this, you’ll end up being more skinny as you don’t have enough muscle mass. Hence, focus on building some muscles first.
After some months, you’ll gain a decent amount of muscle mass. Now you can focus on losing that excess fat over your muscles and you’ll see drastic changes in your physique.
So what actually do you have to do now? THE ACTION PLAN
Lift Moderate To Heavy Weights
To get rid of skinny fat, the main thing that you have to do is muscle building. And lifting moderate to heavy weights for 6-12 reps is the best way to build muscle.
However, other rep ranges are also beneficial but as a beginner, it is the most effective way to go. So instead of doing high rep training to get the pump, do focus on building strength and hypertrophy.
Also, try to keep on increasing intensity by lifting heavier weight, or by adding more reps or exercise. This gradual increase in stress on your muscles (progressive overloading) is very important for muscle growth.
Do More Focus on Compound Lifts
Compound lifts or compound exercises are the ones in which you use multiple muscle groups and joints simultaneously. These exercises burn more calories and result in the overall development of your body as you are using multiple muscles at the same time.
As a beginner, you should do more focus on compound movements. They help in muscle building as well as in burning more calories.
Some of the most common compound exercises that you must include in your skinny fat workout routine are squats, bench presses, barbell rows, deadlifts, and overhead presses.
Add Some Cardio in Your Routine
Cardio is very important for the development of your endurance and stamina. However, its duration and intensity varies with your health and fitness goal.
In addition to burn fat, your primary target is to build a decent amount of muscle mass to get rid of skinny fat.
Hence, 3-4 cardio sessions of about 20 minutes and 5-6 weight training sessions with moderate to heavy weights is a good workout strategy to get rid of sinny fat.
Also, make sure to start your workout with weight training and do some cardio after that. Avoid doing cardio before weights as this will reduce your energy levels which compromise your weight training.
Take Enough Protein
Everybody knows the role of protein in building muscles and how important it is to eat enough of it to gain muscles.
But how much protein you need to consume to get rid of skinny fat?
Some people have a misconception about protein that the more you eat, “the more muscle mass you build”. Well, this is not true. Our bodies doesn’t work like that. Though protein is necessary to build muscles everything has a limit.
1 gm of protein per pound of bodyweight is good enough maintaining and building muscles.
In 2018, a study was done at Schoenfeld to see the effects of protein intake on body composition. They showed that “subjects on a high protein diet (~1g/lb of bodyweight) gained muscle while losing a kg of fat. Whereas, subjects on a low protein diet (~0.4g/lb of bodyweight) still lost fat but some of them also lost muscle or didn’t gain any muscle“.
Eating a lot of protein won’t give you extra benefits in muscle building. Your body will excrete that extra protein through urine. Also, too much protein is not good for your health and may lead to digestive problems or even kidney-related issues.
Eat smartly
To get rid of skinny fat fast, some people do the mistake of going on a crash diet or a very low-calorie diet. This will help you cut fat but you’ll end up looking skinny.
So don’t fall for instant results and set your diet smartly. So eat in a slight caloric surplus to build muscles and if you first want to burn fat then go on a slight calorie deficit.
Read More: Skinny Fat Transformation Diet (Complete Macros Setup)
