Raphael Calzadilla, B.A., CPT, ACE
eDiets Chief Fitness Pro
Spring has sprung and your ab muscles are just as soft and belly just as flabby as this time last year.
It’s easy to lose your motivation during the long winter months, but now it’s time to shed that belly flab and get your abs nice and tight. The lazy days are over and the eating frenzy must stop now.
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Now is the perfect time to get your butt, ummm, I mean your abs in gear. With the right nutrition and exercise program -- plus my no nonsense four tips and great ab workout -- you’ll start seeing results fast.
Shaping up doesn’t have to be an on-going nightmare that has you sacrificing every enjoyable thing in your life. It does require some sacrifice, but the key is to keep things simple and realistic. This steady approach will have your tummy looking tighter as each week goes by.
Let’s get right to it.
Tip 1: Smart Nutrition Will Give You A Flatter Stomach
This is the most important component in achieving a flat stomach. Nothing is more important than food, yet this is where people totally screw up!
The biggest mistake people make is reducing calories as low as possible and eating a few salads during the day. After two days of this insane approach, they’re back to eating more junk then ever because the approach is not realistic. The key is to reduce calories low enough to lose fat, but still keep calories high enough to sustain your energy. Food, when used properly, can actually stimulate the metabolism to lose body fat.
First, you’ll need to control blood sugar levels in order to lose body fat. This is best accomplished by consuming four to six meals per day. Don’t mistake the definition of a meal for a six-course extravaganza. A meal might be an egg white omelet with low fat cheese and oatmeal with some blueberries in it; a strawberry protein shake with peanut butter; cottage cheese with fruit and some almonds or maybe a vegetarian burger and spinach salad with oil and vinegar.
Get the picture? I’m referring to them as meals, but they’re actually feedings. Each of the meals is comprised of protein, some fibrous and non-fibrous carbohydrate (depending on the meal) and a little bit of fat. In some cases, the fat is built into the protein. In other cases, it’s added to the meal. For eDiets members, this is already accomplished with your easy to use meal plan.
You must begin your journey with an easy to use and livable meal plan that has you reducing body fat week to week. It all starts here.
Tip 2: Working Out With Weights Will Give You A Tighter Stomach
Lifting weights forces the abs to work harder and look tighter. Free weight squats, dumbbell rows, lat pulldowns, chest press etc. will all work your abs because you must stabilize your core muscles to perform each of these movements correctly.
One of the best ways to get a soft and flabby body is to do nothing but cardiovascular exercise. Dieting places a lot of stress on the body and forces the body to lose fat weight and muscle weight. If you do nothing but cardio and never lift weights, you will lose muscle. A lot people never seem to accept this fact.
Many women think that if they even look at a weight they’ll immediately begin to look like Arnold Schwarzenegger. It will never happen -- no way, no how. Women just don’t have enough testosterone to build huge amounts of muscle. Unless you’re on steroids, there is nothing to worry about. In fact, the more fat that you lose and the more muscle that you gain -- the leaner you’ll look.
In a study conducted by renowned exercise physiologist, Dr. Wayne Westcott, 72 people followed an exact diet and exercised for 30 minutes three times a week for eight weeks. The 72 people were divided into two groups. Both groups exercised for 30 minutes -- one group did only aerobic exercise; another group did aerobic exercise and weight machines combination.
At the end of eight weeks, the 30 minutes of cardio-only group lost three pounds of fat and a half-pound of muscle. On the other hand, the combination cardio/weight training group lost 10 pounds of fat and gained two pounds of muscle. Both groups exercised 30 minutes, but the difference in results was quite profound and proves just how effective weight training is for reducing fat and attaining that elusive flat stomach.
Tip 3: Cardiovascular Exercise Will Give You A Tighter and Flatter Tummy
Remember, we need to burn calories to get your belly tight and flat, but we must use exercise as a tool not as a “do as much as possible” event. That’s called the “cardio queen” mentality. Cardio queens stay on cardio equipment for 2 hours at a time in the hopes that fat will disappear. Fat will disappear and so will a great deal of muscle. The result is a soft and stringy body that looks unappealing.
Perform two days per week of moderate cardio exercise for approximately 40 minutes. On two other days of the week, you can exercise at higher intensity levels combined with lower intensity to accelerate fat loss (with a reduction in time).
For example, after a 5 minute warm-up, 2 minutes high intensity followed by one minute of low intensity. Keep repeating this cycle for 25-30 minutes. If you’re a beginner, then remember to increase gradually.
Still not convinced this will help your belly flab and that you should be performing 500 abdominal crunches per day? According to the International Journal of Obesity (vol. 21, 1997), walking 4 or more hours a week reduced women’s risk of gaining weight around their waists by 16 percent. Researchers tracked more than 44,000 women for 10 years.
There’s more... According to a study published in the October 2005 Journal of Applied Physiology, exercise helps control visceral fat. Visceral fat is located deeper in the body than subcutaneous fat, which lies just underneath the skin. Visceral fat is very dangerous because it accumulates around the organs inside the belly.
Increased levels of this type of fat have been linked with cardiovascular disease and other metabolic syndromes. Duke University Medical Center researchers conducted the study using two control groups. One group exercised and the other group did not.
"In our study, the control group that did not exercise saw a sizable and significant 8.6 percent increase in visceral fat in only six months," said Duke exercise physiologist Cris Slentz, PhD, lead author of the study.
Visceral fat is not only awful for your health, but will also destroy your goal of a tight and flat stomach.
Tip 4: Work Your Abs No More Than 3 Times Per Week
Performing endless amounts of abdominal crunches will not make your abs flat and tight.
I receive questions related to this issue approximately 50 times per week. It is not possible to spot reduce any area of the body. The only answer is to reduce overall body fat through a slight caloric deficit, weight training to stimulate the metabolism to burn fat and cardiovascular exercise to burn additional calories. That’s the sure fire way to fat loss and a flatter stomach.
Performing crunches will never reduce the abdominal area because you’re working to strengthen muscle. Just as 200 biceps curls will not make the arm smaller, nor will 200 abdominal crunches make the waist smaller.
This does not mean you shouldn’t work your abs.
The abdominals represent muscle and muscle needs to be worked with intensity and then receive rest to improve. Focus on a circuit style workout 3 alternate days per week.
Perform 12 to 15 reps of each of the following exercises in a circuit style fashion and keep repeating for 12 to 14 minutes. Work them hard and fast and with efficiency. Don’t rest at all for the 12 to 14 minutes!
1. Lying Bent Knee Leg Lift
Starting Position:
# Lie on your back with your feet on the floor and knees slightly bent.
# Place your hands under your head for comfort, not support.
Movement:
# Contracting your lower abdominal muscles, draw your knees toward your chest until they form a 90-degree angle with the floor.
# Slowly return to the starting position, stopping just short of the feet touching the floor.
Key Points:
# Exhale while lifting your legs.
# Inhale while returning to the starting position.
# Your back should remain comfortably against the floor during the entire motion.
# Eliminate this exercise if you experience any discomfort and perform standard crunches on a mat or carpet.
2. Double Crunch
Starting Position:
# Lie on the floor face up.
# Bend your knees until your legs are at a 45-degree angle with both feet on the floor.
# Your back should be comfortably relaxed on the floor.
# Place both hands behind your head
Movement:
# Contracting your abdominals, raise your head and legs off the floor toward one another.
# Slowly return to the starting position, stopping just short of your shoulders and feet touching the floor.
Key Points:
# Exhale while raising up.
# Inhale while returning to the starting position.
# Keep your eyes on the ceiling to avoid pulling with your neck.
# Your hands should not be used to lift the head or assist in the movement.
3. Machine Angled Leg Raise
Starting Position:
# Support your body on your elbows in a Roman Chair or by hanging from a chin up bar.
Movement:
# Contracting the abdominals and obliques, draw your knees up on an angle so that they move toward your right elbow. Stop when you get a full contraction of the obliques and abdominals.
# Slowly return to the starting position, stopping when the hips are almost fully extended.
# Alternate side to side to complete the set.
Key Points:
# Exhale while lifting your legs.
# Inhale while returning to the starting position.
# Keep the upper body stationary throughout the exercise.
If you don’t have access to the Machine Angled Leg raises machine, simply perform the first two exercises for the continuous 12 to 14 minutes.
It doesn’t matter if you have 10 pounds to lose or 100 pounds, the formula works. So, how bad do you want it? As always, please check with your doctor before beginning any exercise program.
(Note: the stomach is actually an organ in the gastrointestinal tract used to digest food, but I’ve used the word as we commonly refer to it to describe the mid-section of the body.)
Looking for more information? Join eDiets and visit Raphael’s support group (Fitness For You) for interactive support! We all know fitness is a vital part of living a healthy lifestyle -- let Raphael and eDiets help you on your way!
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