Calories in 1 Pound of Muscle?

[CWP50]

I tried posting this in the general nutrition forum but didn't get any responses. So I'm giving it a try in the advanced nutrition forum to see if anyone has an answer. Thanks much in advance.

I have recently been surprisingly successful in cutting down via a simple yet intense regimen. I calculated by basal metabolic rate, added exercise calories, subtracted calories for fat reduction, cut out alcohol and refined flour. I have gone from 183-4 pounds in late April to 168 pounds at the end of July. Body fat from 17% to 11%-12%. (The exact fat number awaits a forthcoming hydrostatic test.)

When I started the program, I set a fat loss goal of 1.5 pounds per week. To get there, I used 3,500 calories per pound of fat, meaning 5,250 calories per week, or 750 per day, below BMR + Exercise. Sometime in August, I will reach my lean-out goal, which was the lower of 165 pounds or 10.5% body fat. (Trust me, I have been pleasantly shocked as hell by how well this has turned out.) Then I will swing into a bulk-up program, with a goal of ending up at 190-195 pounds with 13% body fat or less.

Here's my question: In figuring out how much above my BMR to go during bulk-up, is there a number of calories per pound of muscle, similar to that per pound of fat, that I can add my BMR to arrive at a total caloric intake? As during cut-down, I will be in the gym four times a week, but during bulk-up I will be significantly reducing (yet not eliminating) my cardio workouts. I have begun to read through the library of bulk-up articles on this site, and don't see anything expressed in those terms, i.e., extra calories per pound of muscle. I'm thinking that the concept might not transfer between muscle and fat, but I thought I would ask here just to be sure.

I apologize for this awfully long posting for a simple question. I'm really not, at least at this point, asking for other advice. Between my trainer and the library articles here, I think I'll have enough advice. But if someone does know whether there's a direct muscle-calorie connection like there is with fat and calories, I'd love to hear about it. Thanks much!

[MarkGates]

well muscle is made up from amino acids in its dry form so i would say 1kg is 1kg of protein meaning around 4000cals for 1kg of dry muscle weight. this is irrellevent thought as muscle is around 70% water and then you have glycogen also these two factors will vary from person to person aswell as other factors so i think it would be hard to give an accurate anwser. im sure emma-leigh or another expert will give a more clear anwser

[EmperorRyker]

1 pound of muscle, according to Lyle McDonald, equals 600 kcal. Here's the link to the article with the said assertion.

[CWP50]

1 pound of muscle, according to Lyle McDonald, equals 600 kcal. Here's the link to the article with the said assertion.

Thanks very much!

[dat]

The nutritional energy of 1lb of muscle would be around 600kcal, but for actually building it my sense tells me it would be considerably higher.

[Emma-Leigh]

The nutritional energy of 1lb of muscle would be around 600kcal, but for actually building it my sense tells me it would be considerably higher.

Taken from here ( http://www.ajcn.org/cgi/reprint/30/9/1514 )
^ [note: this was done a while ago, and is in children who were recovering from significant illness]

But:
"Fat has an energy content of 9.4 kcal/g and protein, 5.7 kcab/g. Assuming that fat tissue has 1 5 % as water, the stored energy of tissue fat is 8 kcal/g. Similarly, since lean tissue has an average protein content of 20%, it has a storage energy value of 1 .2 kcab/g. A hypothetical line can be constructed using the axes, cost of growth and increase in muscle mass expressed as a percentage of the increase in body weight. Thus if all the tissue laid down is fat tissue, the cost of growth would be 8 kcal/g and 0% of the increase in body weight would be due to new muscle tissue. Similarly, if all of the new tissue is muscle, the cost of growth would be 1 .2 kcal/g and 100% of the weight gain would be muscle tissue. Figure 2 shows this hypothetical line. It also shows that the experimentally obtained points relating cost of growth to tissue composition fall closely on the hypothetical line".
^
so - 1 # muscle = 454.5 x 1.2 = ~ 545 cals (which is close enough to the 600 Lyle puts forward).

but, yes, you would probably need to increase total cals far over and above this to get the 'real' growth of 1lb - reason being is that:
1, no one gains 100% lean mass when bulking
2, you will lose some cals associated with thermogenesis/ up-regulation of NEAT and enzymes/cellular processes etc etc...

[musicianman]

protein, 5.7 kcab/g...

I don't know where you get your protein, but I'd certainly like to try some protein with 5.7 Calories per gram.

Protein is closer to 4 Calories per gram.

[Emma-Leigh]

1. it was the paper I quoted, not my writing.
2. you might want to read these:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modified_Atwater
http://www.fao.org/DOCREP/006/y5022e/y5022e04.htm
http://www.fao.org/DOCREP/MEETING/00...E/M2847E00.HTM