Originally Posted by
fuego
Well it's obvious he lost fat and gained muscle which is heavier than fat. He's definitely smaller, but the same weight, which means he replaced a lot of that fat with muscle. Just more proof that you can get smaller without losing weight when including weightlifting in your regimen. If he'd been going by weight loss only he'd have gotten pretty discouraged. Which is why you have to go by the measuring tape and not weight when eating right and working out while doing it.
Way back in the day I read a great book by Covert Bailey called "Fit or Fat?" That's where I first learned the concept of fat being lighter than muscle, and when getting fit you can actually lose size without losing weight because of the muscle gain. He actually had female clients that got discouraged and actually quit his program because they didn't lose any weight, even though they lost inches, which is really the goal. They couldn't get past that there was no weight loss, even though they were smaller, which is what they were really after.
He also redefined 'fitness' not according to weight, but fitness as the ratio of body fat to muscle mass. A person can be say 6' and weight 250lbs. But the weight isn't the point. The thing is how much of that 250lbs is lean muscle mass compared to body fat? That 6' person can be 250, and have 5% body fat, and be totally fit, or he can be 250, and 40% of it can be fat which obviously means he is unhealthy.
Think about this: say you are 30% body fat (which means you have 70% muscle) and then you lose a lot of weight. You can have lost weight but still be at the same 30/70% ratio which means you lost size, but you're no 'fitter' in regards to ratio of body fat to muscle mass! On the other hand, you lose weight, yet exercise and do strength training at the same time, and you don't lose as much weight, but you gain muscle mass and now you're only 10% fat (you lost 20% of your fat) and much 'fitter' and smaller to boot. Hope that makes sense.