THE BEST 3 EXERCISE TIPS TO LOSE BELLY FAT FOR MEN

Having a washboard stomach is the holy grail of physical fitness. It’s a sign that you have put in the work in the gym. Have the discipline to watch what you eat, and give an almighty punch to your body fat levels.

You will have come across some questionable fitness advice on this topic. Something along these lines…You can perform some fantastic exercise, that not only burns more fat, but in less time from a specific area of your body and you can achieve it yesterday.

“To lose fat anywhere from your body you will have to reduce the body fat on your whole body”.

You cannot “spot reduce” body fat and target a specific area over others. Yet this shouldn’t deter you from making it your mission to say goodbye to your belly fat for good. In fact, to live a longer and healthier life, you should stay on this mission.

Studies inside the British Medical Journal found that increased belly fat increases the risk of dying earlier.

https://www.bmj.com/content/370/bmj.m3324

The 2.5 million-person study revealed as waist size increases so do all causes of mortality. While every 10 cm added to your waist size it increases the chances of early mortality by up to 11 %. The object here is not to sound like the grim reaper is around the corner. It is to show the importance of not only chasing the washboard abs, but to focus on your health.

WHAT IS BELLY FAT?

Sounds obvious we know but stay with us.

“Belly fat is the fat that is around your organs and your waist. When you have too much belly fat it increases the risk of higher cholesterol, higher blood pressure, heart disease, diabetes, and strokes. To understand belly fat in more detail it is important to know the differences.

TYPES OF BELLY FAT AND THE DANGERS.

• SUBCUTANEOUS FAT

The soft layer of chub that sits under the skin – the wobbly bits, the overhang. The muffin tops are familiar names.

• VISCERAL FAT

The stuff you can’t see. This forms around your organs and sits deep inside the body. Too much visceral fat increases the risk of disease, especially diabetes, heart problems, strokes and cancer. When you lose weight and body fat, you lose both types of fat. You not only start to look better you add years back to your life and reduce your risk of disease.

While reading this it’s likely that you are thinking we are the bearers of nothing but bad news. Let’s flip it into the three positive steps that you can do today to start reducing your belly fat levels.

3 THINGS TO DO TO BLAST BELLY FAT

1. Focus on full-body workouts. It’s common for people to not follow a structured exercise plan and focus on exercising in a balanced way. This usually means they get bored and stop. Not very good for reducing your belly fat for obvious reasons.

There are over 600 muscles in your body so you can use this to your advantage when you exercise. Gone are the days of single body part splits. Pair your upper and lower body exercises on the same day for the win. This means you will burn more calories, spend less time in the gym and start to reduce your belly fat faster.

2. Focus on compound exercises. You will have heard the phrase do compound exercises over isolation exercises before. Usually with very little context to back it up. Compound exercises are exercises that work more than one muscle group at the same time. For example, a squat is a compound exercise that works the whole lower body. (knee, hip, ankle) The problem is that compound exercises are tough. They get you out of breath and make you work harder. So it’s easy to get in the trap of doing the easier exercises.

The reality of changing your belly fat is you need to put the work in and this is where compound exercises come in.

The good news is when you master how to exercise with compound exercises. You will reduce how long you spend in the gym exercising and generate better results. Good if you’re busy.

3. Focus on less rest in the gym.  This simple trick is never used enough when you look around a gym. Rest periods are for you to rest, yes, but they are not for you to flick through Instagram. A simple trick is to pair exercises together (links in with point one) and shorten your rest period. This helps you bring more intensity to workouts.

You can use the RPE method to assess how hard your intensity levels are during your workouts. Rate of Perceived Exertion,  is a way of measuring physical activity intensity level. Perceived exertion is how hard you feel like your body is working.

The RPE scale runs from 0 – 10. The numbers below relate to phrases used to rate how easy or difficult you find an activity. For example, 0 (nothing at all) would be how you feel when sitting in a chair; 10 (very, very heavy) is how you feel at the end of an exercise stress test or after a very difficult activity.

Use the table below to see what your intensity level is like in the gym.

Hope this article helps. If you need help with losing belly fat, then get in touch.

Speak soon Rob