Muscle Mass...are they the same?

I always thought a muscle mass was a religious service for Catholic bodybuilders.

Seriously, do you know the answer? I am trying to find the answer through Google, but can’t come up with an answer. I’d really appreciate anyone who can answer this.

The density of muscle indicates how strong it is or how much weight it can handle. There are guys who weigh 170lbs and can bench 400–500lbs – they have very dense muscle. Lean muscle typically refers to the muscle being toned and not really going for the body builder type look. I think its fair to say nature intended lean muscle – whether or not you lived in an agrarian or hunting society would determine the density part i suppose.

Essentially, the two are not exclusive of each other.

There’s no one right answer. The beauty of the human body is that it’s adaptable. If you’re a person who does lots of heavy lifting, nature has made your body adaptable, in that it will compensate for this work by growing muscle. If you’re a long distance runner, nature will adjust your body accordingly.

Muscle mass usually goes along with good health because it involves lots of working out and so, assuming you’re not on steroids or doing some weird diet, people with good muscle mass are usually healthy.

That being said, unless you do something requiring great muscle mass, ideal health is usually associated with being lean. When I was in my 20’s, I was very muscular, but as I age, I’ve found that being leaner feels better and is generally healthier.

@zaphod I appreciate what you’re saying, but I don’t think there’s a human being out there that weighs 170 pounds that can bench press 500 pounds

So, do you think the human body was intended to have slender lean muscle, because not everyone is a body builder and spends hours lifting. Would this be the choice for optimum health, nature intended? The slender lean muscle would come about, just by doing daily work. Correct?
I’m so confused.

@TheIowaCynic – Joe Mazza at 163 pounds bench pressed 652 pounds. And Ray Hickman at 165 pounds bench pressed 536 pounds. I would suspect there are others out there in that category that weigh 170 pounds or so.

@Darwin OK. I stand corrected. That is amazing.

@TheIowaCynic – It is amazing what strides have been made in weightlifting these days. The world record bench press is now 1075 pounds, and what weightlifters seek as their goal is to be able to bench press four times their own body weight.

Interesting question, I’ve never really heard of dense muscle SO…... I went to the University of Texas online library and did a search through a great number of databases for “lean muscle mass” and “dense muscle mass”. I even went to the Cochrane Library of Systematic Reviews (of research studies). There is nada on dense muscle mass but a great deal on lean muscle mass. So I guess that’s your answer. We want strong LEAN muscles.

Doesn’t lean = Dense as far as muscle foes? large muscles that don’t life much are generally flabby/not dense and are not lean. Lean muscles are usually smaller,leaner and more defined, than the muscles that lift the same amount but are 2–3 times the size. Am I missing something important here? As far as I have known since I started lifting, this is true.

Yes, you can build lean muscle at work, but only in the areas you use frequently and challenge their limits (sometimes not even that, but if you feel tiredness in a muscle it is a good sign that you should eat something with a high protein count and low carbohydrate count, it will promote the growth of lean/dense muscle).

When you build lean muscle, it does better than the same flabby muscle when it reaches the same size, usually 2–3 maybe 4 times over.

Lean muscle is also healthier in the long run because it has better blood flow, in the process of building lean muscle you clean up your main arterial blood flow and your body senses the need for and creates more capillaries going to the muscles that then supply better fuel to the muscle cells and allow it to perform better, longer.