What are the general principles of losing weight without getting loose skin and stretch marks?

Question

I have seen strongmen Eddie Hall and Terry Hollands lose weight without getting loose skin. Maybe it's because of the massive amount of pure muscles they carried before losing weight.

While I am aware that losing lots of weight will definitely make the skin loose and also quick muscle gain will result in stretch marks, I want to know the general principles of losing weight and gaining muscle mass without making the skin loose and getting stretch marks.

Questions:

1. How much weight is it recommended to lose per week, or maybe month?

2. How to balance this with a muscle building workout?

Some information (if needed)

Type : Beginner (used to lift earlier)

Weight : 77 kg

Height : 169 cm (5'7")

Age : 26

Possess Equipment : Bench, Few bars, adjustable dumbbells, plates.

I will appreciate any advice. Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

Loose skin and stretch marks are not so much a product of the rate of weight loss, but rather the elasticity or plasticity of the skin when loss or gain occurs.

When we gain considerable size, whether through increased muscle or fat bulk, our skin is required to stretch or grow to accommodate the change. If the gain is made slowly, new skin cells will be produced. However, if the gain is made too rapidly, skin cell growth cannot keep up with the change, and our skin is consequently stretched. And if our skin is stretched past the point of its elastic limit, plastic change will be visible as stretch marks.

Similarly, when we lose considerable size, we hope that the tension of our skin will still be sufficient to hug our shape. Of course, if the change has been too great, our skin will be reduced to its resting length, and will sit loosely on our diminished frames.

Thus, the ability for our skin to accommodate us at a given size is dependent on its tension and elasticity. Younger, healthier skin is tenser and more elastic, and can therefore accommodate considerable change without evidence. However, as we age, our skin becomes stiffer, less tense, and less flexible, and we are consequently more susceptible to gaining stretch marks when we gain size.

Once the skin is stretched, there is no known natural mechanism for it to return to its former size, and surgical intervention is necessary.

So to answer your question plainly, you can lose any amount of weight within a given time-frame. If you are concerned about its being loose, then you can simply moderate fat loss with muscle gain within the bounds of your genetic potential.

I hope that helps.

Answer 2

Actually there are natural mechanisms for this. In cases of extreme weight loss, fasting can help reduce the amount of loose skin accumulated.

The basic principals of this phenomenon are:

• Autophagy - Body's ability to repair damaged cells by neutralizing and replacing those cells
• Ketosis - Fat cells are roughly 30% water. While fasting and doing keto (low carb) your body switches from a carbohydrate fuel to a fat based fuel and in the process it shrinks the fat cells, which hold water.

When you eat carbs those usually get stored as fat unless participant is very active. When those carbs store as fat, they are pumped full of water and give you the bloated look and feeling.

• Fasting definitely helps with loose skin
• Dry Fasting, which can be dangerous if done incorrectly, also lends itself well to minimizing the amount of excess skin after fat loss.

To answer your questions:

1. The recommended weight loss posed by today's experts is ridiculous. They say 2lbs max per week is healthy. I say I've lost 2lbs in 1 day, so should I stop there? No, the idea with fasting focused lifestyles (snake diet) is you will lose vast amounts of weight quickly because you are probably holding 6-10lbs of water at any given time. If you were to do back to back 48 hour fasts in one week, you would lose all the water weight and then some.

2. Full body workouts 3 times a week. You won't have much energy if fasting, so keep the workouts to 30 minutes. You will be astonished by results. Also look into drinking salt water (electrolytes) while doing prolonged fasting routines.