What is “water weight” when you’re initially working out?

Question

When you start working out and people often say something like “that’s just water weight”. What is that “water”?

In: 0

Answer 1

Your muscles and liver store something called glycogen, which serves as a short-term storage mechanism for glucose. When you start exercising, glycogen stores are typically the first stored source used. The thing about glycogen is that every gram requires four grams of water to store it in your body. Once you start using the glycogen, all that water gets released causing a big drop in weight even though you haven’t really used any fat.