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The Top Supplements for Fighting Muscle Loss During a Cut

muscle loss

Are you hoping to fight muscle loss during a cut?

Body recomposition requires high-quality supplements to cut fat and gain muscles for significant change to your physique. It’s the ideal balance of healthy nutrition and exercise that leads to an athlete noticing great improvements in strength and physique while burning fat and developing muscle mass.

We’re here to teach you about the best supplements to look out for to cut fat and gain muscle simultaneously. These are the ones that make or break your chances at reaching body composition.

We don’t mean general fat burner pills because they don’t do much for muscle mass. We’re looking at products that benefit muscle while cutting fat away. As such, you won’t see classic fat-burning supplements on this list.

The supplements here are more appropriate for athletes and have some scientific background. Let’s get started.

What Is Cutting?

First, let’s cover what cutting is. Elite athletes and bodybuilding competitors cut back on fats and carbohydrates while amplifying protein intake in the cutting cycle. Carbohydrates are consumed at timed intervals to complement exercise regimens.

The safest way to retain muscle while cutting fat is losing 0.5 to 1 percent of body fat loss a week. If you lose fat too quickly by changing up your diet too much you can easily lose too much muscle. As a result, you may also recover more slowly which affects your competitive success.

Cutting fat too fast can also stress out the body. Plus, it can alter many bodily functions that can affect your long-term health. 

Cutting usually occurs anywhere from several months to one month ahead of a competition. Bodybuilding is renowned for cutting cycles. Other competitions include sports such as boxing, wrestling, karate, jiu-jitsu, and taekwondo.

1. Creatine

We naturally produce creatine. It comes from three amino acids which are glycine, arginine, and methionine. Creatine provides the energy necessary to fuel muscles for high-intensity workouts and exercises.

Creatine is primarily found in skeletal muscle. 

Your body must replace one to three grams of creatine per day. Your levels depend on your muscle needs and hormones such as testosterone. If you perform intense exercises, you use up your stored creatine quicker.

You’ll need to take in more to keep your muscles power. To produce more creatine the natural way, consider a diet rich in meat and fish. Both have creatine that helps refuel your body.

Top athletes use creatine supplements before and after training to enhance intense power performance, increase strength, and improve post-exercise recovery for years. Creatine monohydrate is an excellent form of creatine supplement that may help enhance muscle size and power.

2. Multivitamins

Ongoing use of multivitamins and other single-nutrient supplements such as calcium or folic acid prove positive effects in a wide range of health-related areas. They work particularly well when paired with minerals.

Plus, when you’re dieting, you’re sometimes not taking in some of the essential nutrients you usually get from foods cut from your diet.

3. BCAAs

Amino acids are the building blocks of protein. When you consume protein food, it gets digested into individual amino acids and short chains of amino acids that are absorbed into the bloodstream.

These amino acids provide many effects in the body, including building and repairing tissues. They also produce chemicals that allow our brains to function optimally, providing you with all the energy you require to maximize your training improving recovery simultaneously.

Branched-chain amino acids (BCAAs) have been scientifically proven to quicken recovery and improve ATMP production. They’re also known to encourage cell volumization, prevent tiredness by blocking the entry of fatigue-inducing tryptophan in the brain, boost protein synthesis, aid immune function, digestive health, and improve growth hormone levels.

BCAAs are excellent supplements for muscle gain during cutting because they ensure you’re avoiding catabolism, which is loss of muscle size. They also encourage the retention of muscle mass.

4. Whey Protein

Whey protein delivers the required building blocks to the body to create amino acids. Amino acids are used for building muscle tissue.

Whey protein typically contains an excellent combination of amino acid makeup with the ideal concentrations for optimal performance in the body. Consistent whey protein consumption teamed with plenty of exercising leads to excellent muscle building.

5. Glutamine

After exercising intensely, glutamine levels in the body are significantly reduced. The body relies on glutamine as cellular fuel for the immune system, and it’s suggested that glutamine supplements can reduce the breakdown of muscle tissue and enhance protein metabolism.

Bodybuilders typically use a lot of their glutamine working out, so the immune system relies considerably on the amino acid. Muscle breakdown can happen if the body takes muscles of glutamine for use elsewhere, like nitrogen transport or aiding the immune system.

As such, glutamine supplementation is essential to help maintain muscle.

6. Thermogenics

Thermogenics are also known as fat burners, and they encourage fat loss without muscle loss. There are several ways thermogenics helps burn fat.

Firstly, they work well at ‘convincing’ stubborn fat tissue to open and allows fat to enter into the bloodstream so that it becomes a usable energy source when we’re working out.

As the name suggests, thermogenics increase your body temperature internally, so your body warms up and burns more calories throughout the day.

7. Nitric Oxide Booster

Nitric oxide is also known as pre-workout l-arginine.

Nitric oxide boosters manage the circulation of blood and transfer messages between nerve cells. As nitric oxide boosts blood flow, it’s a very attractive supplement to bodybuilders. Increased blood flow delivers more nutrients to muscles, helping muscles largen when stressed.

Recently, dietary supplements containing arginine have grown in popularity thanks to arginine’s nitric oxide-creating ability. Its ability to signal muscle cells, scavenge free radicals, release growth hormone, and increase fat metabolism makes arginine supplements attractive.

Arginine is also renowned for being essential for muscle growth because of its vasodilating properties. It also helps with protein synthesis.  A supplement containing arginine is sure to get you vasodilation, encouraging oxygen and nutrients to move to your cells. Supplements featuring caffeine can also help boost your energy.

8. Caffeine

Caffeine is an excellent supplement for athletes seeking muscle gain and fat loss. It heightens energy levels, improves focus, and reduces hunger. Many supplements use caffeine to help encourage a full daily calorie burn, working as a fat burner for athletes.

These types of stimulants should give you more than a boost.

9. Green Tea

Green tea is teeming with antioxidants and catechins. The latter makes the extract excellent as a fat burner. Green tea is known to boost the body’s metabolic rate.

10. Arginine

As the precursor to nitric oxide (NO), arginine can create more muscle pumps during a powerful workout. Arginine works by widening your blood vessels during exercise. This allows more oxygen and nutrients to reach your muscles.

Arginine provides you more muscle pumps and growth. It also works well as a high-quality fat burner. While glutamine stops the storage of fat, arginine uses that freed fat as fuel. This process is called lipolysis.

11. Coenzyme Q-10

Coenzyme Q-10 boosts metabolism, providing you with plenty more energy. It accelerates the rate at which food is used for fuel. This helps stabilize the levels of fat in the blood.

The antioxidant is also excellent for supporting essential cell function in the body.

Nutrition for Cutting Fat and Preventing Muscle Loss

For these supplements to work, you must ensure that you’re following the right diet. Calories must be below maintenance, and you need to increase your protein intake to make sure synthesis is occurring, and you’re fueling muscles properly for muscle growth.

Depending on your sport, you should check up on specific information to make sure you reach the golden zone of body recomposition. Ensure that you’re running an excellent strength routine twice a week, aiming to activate as much muscle as possible.

Why Some Fat Burners Can Damage Muscle and Performance

It can be challenging to understand why some fat burners work more effectively than others to cut fat and spare lean muscle. We’ll go through it the simple way. Be aware that some external factors can impact this.

Your body has three ways it can gain energy: through carbohydrates, fat, and muscle. Typically your body will always select carbohydrates, and they’re quick and easy to break down.

After this, your body will usually use up stored glucose in muscles for energy. Then your body will select fat for fuel. If fat isn’t accessible, your body will begin to break up the amino acids in your muscles.

This essentially breaks down your hard-earned muscle tissue. Of course, this isn’t what you wanted f you’ve spent months building it up. As you’re in a fasted state and reducing calories when you cut fat, usually you can end up training fasted or with low glycogen for muscles.

This may lead you to experience a decline in strength and muscle loss. But don’t worry, this is natural.

Considerations and Side Effects

Any negative side effects occurring from supplementation usually have to do with cutting too many calories or losing too much fat too quickly.

Quick weight loss from cutting can cause negative effects on the body and mind. These effects are likely to be different for each individual.

Common adverse effects include an upset stomach and weight gain. Diarrhea and stomach irritation can occur. Taking smaller doses over a longer period of time can help avoid such problems.

Cutting too aggressively can also lead to rebound weight gain during the recovery phase following the competition.

Rapid weight loss during competition preparation time can also affect heart rate, blood pressure, energy levels, and hormone levels.

Additionally, men may experience lower testosterone levels during the cutting phase. Women may experience a lack of periods.

Tips For Healthier Cutting

For healthier cutting, it’s best to plan for slower weight loss. This method of cutting is safer and preserves lean muscle mass and energy while still slashing fat.

It’s also essential to consume a healthy diet for proper nutrition. This includes eating 1.25 to 1.5 grams of protein per kilogram of body weight. This delivers protection for preserving lean muscle mass.

You should also know that a maintenance dose of three grams is excellent for strength, power, and recovery. Drinking plenty of water is also essential for healthier cutting.

Finally, get plenty of sleep during cutting as it’s essential for mental and physical stamina and focuses.

Which of These Muscle Loss Fighting Supplements Will You Try?

By consuming a healthy diet and a balanced amount of protein and calories, you can make an environment where your body can effectively preserve and build muscle. Remember, while dropping 300 or more calories a day, it’s essential that your body is getting the appropriate nutrition.

Your goal is to successfully lose weight while keeping muscle mass, after all.

This is where muscle loss fighting supplements that cut fat but keep muscle come in to help. By supplementing the right product, you can boost your energy expenditure and also promote you’re your body to break down fat before muscle. This is even if glycogen levels are low.

Choose from the supplements on this list to help you cut fat and gain muscle, transforming your body composition.

Do you want more advice on the topic? Learn how to increase muscle mass with supplements here.