Fat Loss Workouts, Abs, & Spot Reduction
What's Inside Issue #23 you will lean that fat loss workouts and ab exercises can't help you with spot reduction of fat. To lose fat, you need to do intervals and strength training to increase your metabolism in the long run. You'll also get...
- The Myth of Spot Reduction
- Gourmet Nutrition
- Exercise of the Week for Abs
1 - Turbulence Training Myth Busting #1: Spot Reduction
One of my on-going projects for Men's Fitness magazine is to find out the truth behind the numerous fat loss myths that you hear about in the gym every day. Here's one of my past columns...
If I told you that there was one secret exercise that could magically reduce the fat from one of your trouble spots, then I'd be lying.
Fat burning isn't like building muscle. When you strength train to build muscle, you only make gains in the specific muscles that were trained ('spot gaining'). But no exercise has the ability to burn fat from one specific area only (also known as 'spot reducing'). When you exercise, you burn fat from all over your body. Doing ab crunch after ab crunch won't help you lose your belly fat any better than doing squats.
The best approach to fat loss is one that includes three major components. The first and possibly most important component is nutrition. It is so important for people to follow good nutrition principles when they are trying to improve their body. If you haven't already heard these basic recommendations for fat loss nutrition, here are the 5 best fat loss nutrition tips:
1. Eat several small meals per day, rather than 2-3 large meals.
2. Monitor your food intake using fitday.com.
3. Determine how many calories you should eat per day to maintain your bodyweight.
4. If you want to lose fat, start by reducing your food intake by 200 calories per day below your maintenance level and add 3 workouts per week using the exercise techniques discussed below.
5. Stop eating processed foods and replace all sweetened beverages with water. This can quickly reduce your food intake by many, many calories.
The second component is resistance training. Small exercises like ab crunches are less effective than squats for fat loss. When you choose efficient and effective exercises like squats over ab crunches, you train more of your muscles and therefore get more results in less time. With squats, lunges, presses, and rows, you'll build the foundation for a lean physique while burning more calories and fat than you would by spending 30 minutes on your abs alone.
The third component is interval training (interval training is a form of cardio training). I prefer intervals to traditional cardio because we have simply found them to be more effective than slow duration cardio sessions. If you train someone for performance, then they will develop the physique they desire. Intervals and resistance training are the best two methods for performance and fat loss. That's no coincidence and should come as no surprise to those that read my newsletters.
The 3 Components of Fat Loss are the backbone of the Turbulence Training for Fat Loss workouts - guaranteed to help you lose fat and gain muscle.
Click here to learn more about the TT family of workout manuals.
2 - How to Build a Great Body & Eat Great Food
If you've tried every fat-loss diet, then you're probably very, very frustrated with the promises that these programs make. And like most people, you wish for a simple program that told you how to lose fat in simple, easy-to-follow steps. We're going to give you some tips today on how to do just that, but first, here's a startling top-secret admission!
Nutrition is even more important than exercise when it comes to losing fat. And as hard as it is for me, a fat loss workout expert, to admit it, even my workout strategies might not help you lose fat if you aren't following a proper fat loss nutrition plan.
Eating properly has the greatest impact on fat loss, bar none. You have to have a nutrition plan, so spend a couple hours on your day off preparing as much food and as many meals as you can for the upcoming week.
But everyone knows that it is incredibly hard to make nutrition changes. So I want you to start making small, but consistent changes starting today. After all, you'll have a better chance of success if your goal is to eat more 2 more servings of vegetables today, rather than to eat perfect for the rest of the month.
To help you, I've broken down how to make some simple nutrition changes. For the first step, I recommend that you put aside an hour or two to plan your meals for next week. Take an extended trip to the grocery store with a set list of foods, including fruits and vegetables.
It's important to get a variety of foods in your diet (see how to get your 5-9 below). After your shopping, come home and do some washing, chopping, cutting, cooking, and freezing. Tupperware will come in handy.
How to Get Your 5 to 9 Every Day
You should get at least five servings of fruits and vegetables every day. In a perfect world, you'd get far more than that.
According to the American Diabetes Association, fruits and vegetables provide nutrients that 'help lower risks of certain cancers, heart disease, and other health problems'. In fact, I believe that a high consumption of fruits and vegetables also helps clients lose fat.
Now, 5 servings might sound like a lot, especially when I insist that all 5 servings be whole food, and not from juices. But I want you to get the benefits of the fiber, not just the nutrients. Here's a sample plan to get 3 vegetables and 2 fruits per day (and this only represents your minimum intake).
Breakfast: 1 apple (1-2 servings depending on size)
At work mid-morning: 1 grapefruit (1-2 servings)
Lunch: A vegetable salad with actual vegetables, not just some bad lettuce and carrot shreds. You should get some spinach, tomatoes, and peppers cut up in the salad. Make this at home for convenience. And you know what, throwing in some orange or strawberry slices to a nice chicken breast, cashew, and spinach salad really adds some desired sweetness. (4 servings)
Mid-afternoon: Carrot sticks & pepper slices (2 servings)
Dinner: 1 cup of broccoli and/or asparagus (1-2 servings)
Dessert: Blueberries (1 serving)
There, now you've eaten up to 13 servings of fruits and vegetables. You'll have reduced your appetite and increased your energy. All you needed was a little prep work. Now for those with some goals of even more advanced, delicious, nutritious and healthy eating, here's a great new resource I want to share with you.
I want to change the notion that 'delicious' and 'healthy' are two words that can't be used to describe the same meal. If you are one of those people that think that eating healthy means losing taste, then we promise you that your opinion is going to change once you get a look at the new cookbook called Gourmet Nutrition.
"Being that I'm an active graduate student on-the-run, having a cookbook that offers time-friendly, nutritionally-superior recipes is imperative for success with my academics and my athletic goals. Thank you for creating such a wonderful resource! I'm looking forward to savoring those Apple Cobbler Protein Bars after my next work-out (they're on page 171, and look so good... everyone HAS TO try them!).
Cassandra E. Forsythe, MSc, PhD candidate in Nutrition
Gourmet Nutrition includes:
· Recipes to keep your taste buds alive and your body looking great
· Cooking tips so you can save time while impressing others with your culinary skills
· Nutrition strategies so you can build the body you want and keep it for life
Simply put, everyone should have this e-book. I want everyone to know that Gourmet Nutrition contains over 100 recipes and the authors offer you a 100% Money-Back Guarantee. Click here to order.
3 - Exercise of the Week: Stability Ball Jackknife for Abs
This exercise is one of the core training movements I use in the TT for Fat Loss workouts and it can used to make your home ab workouts more challenging.
Recently I have made the exercise even more challenging by adding a 'Tempo' to the exercise. That refers to the speed of the movement. I suggest a
Technique
· Brace your abs.
· Put your elbows on the bench and rest the insteps of your feet on the ball.
· With your arms straight and your back flat, your body should form a straight line from your shoulders to your ankles.
· Keeping your back straight (don't round it), roll the ball as close to your chest as possible by contracting your abs and pulling it forward.
· Pause and then return the ball to the starting position by rolling it backward.
· Hold the extended position for 5 seconds with your hips up.
· Do NOT round your lower back round or sag down. Keep your hips and torso in a straight line at all times.
The information on TurbulenceTraining.com is for education purposes only. It is not medical advice and is not intended to replace the advice or attention of health-care professionals. Consult your physician before beginning or making changes in your diet or exercise program, for diagnosis and treatment of illness and injuries, and for advice regarding medications.
CB Athletic Consulting, Inc.
2100 Bloor Street West, Suite 6315
Toronto , Ontario
CB Athletic Consulting, Inc.
2100 Bloor Street West, Suite 6315
M6S 5A5
