Losing belly fat and stomach fat so you can see your abs can be a challenge because there are too many solutions and “treatments.”
You can use ab rollers, stomach wraps, diet pills, detox diets, diuretics, elastics and even have plastic surgery.
Here’s the catch, however: none of these solutions will allow you to lose belly fat for good.
And I’m pretty sure you are tired of covering up your “stomach pooch” with loose, unattractive clothing.
You deserve a sexy midriff that you are proud to show off.
So let me show you the best strategy for getting those sexy abs.
The Underlying Causes
Before you can effectively lose belly fat you have to understand what causes it. So here are the main contributing factors:
- Excess caloric intake
- A lack of lean muscle tissue
- High levels of estrogen
- Flaccid abdominal muscles
Now the last one doesn’t really contribute to belly fat, but it can create the false appearance of having a bigger stomach.
Because if your abdominal muscles aren’t firm, everything is going to bulge forward. Especially, if your lower back is tight. The medical community calls this “lordosis.”
But before you get discouraged here, keep in mind that all you need is a specialized exercise and diet plan to get a flat stomach.
The right plan will effectively deal with all of these issues.
The Plan Part 1: Exercise
So how do you burn more calories, increase lean muscle tissue, decrease estrogen and tone up abdominal muscles?
With resistance training.
By far, resistance training will be the most effective tool for addressing all of these issues. In fact, it’s the only tool that will be able to reverse all of these in parallel.
This is the main reason why doing ab exercises is not the solution here. Because they only address the flaccid stomach issue and nothing more.
And this reminds me of another important point: you cannot selectively target belly fat.
Doing a bunch of ab exercises will not make your body burn off belly fat at a faster rate.
The only thing that will make you burn fat is a caloric deficit.
And you can’t prioritize where the fat comes off of first. For some women the belly fat will come off rather quickly, for other women more patience will be required.
Ok, so there a million and one ways to resistance train. Which is best for losing your belly fat?
Total body circuits.
You will burn a large amount of calories, increase testosterone (fat burning) and decrease estrogen (fat storing), lower levels of blood sugar and insulin, change the contour of your stomach and you’ll raise your basal metabolic rate – you’ll burn more calories around the clock.
But there has to be a catch, right?
Yes, the catch is that you have to train with intensity to get all of these benefits. But you only need a couple one hour sessions per week. That’s it!
And the good news is that a single one hour session will have you burning more calories for days and days.
This is the most time efficient way to lose your belly fat. And let’s face it, time is precious because it’s non-renewable.
Every single minute you spend exercising is one less minute you can spend with your family.
So how do you create total body circuits? It’s simple. Just pick a series of exercises that target the major muscles in your body.
Create about 3-4 circuits for each workout. You will do each exercise one after another without any rest. Once you finish the group of exercises (i.e., the circuit) you can rest.
Do each circuit 3-5 times in every workout. And for the best results, position your ab exercises towards the end.
This will prevent you from pre-fatiguing your stabilizing abdominal muscles. Muscles that you need to do the other, more challenging movements.
Focus on the following muscle groups:
- Pushing: chest, shoulders, triceps.
- Pulling: upper back, middle back, rear shoulder, biceps.
- Squatting: glutes, hamstrings, quadriceps.
- Abdominal: transverse abdominus, multifidus.
What About Losing Belly Fat With Cardio?
Cardio alone is not enough here, but combining cardio with resistance training can speed things up.
Just be really really careful here because too much cardio can interfere with all those positive benefits from resistance training.
You see, your body can take on a limited amount of exercise stress. If you pile excessive amounts of high intensity cardio on top of your high intensity resistance training, you’ll eventually break down.
How do you avoid this? By listening to your body and doing a combination of lower and higher intensity cardio.
It will all depend on how sore you are.
So ignore all the experts that say you have to do high intensity cardio all the time.
Also, even though low intensity cardio doesn’t burn as many calories it does have many ancillary benefits. It will help you recover faster from your resistance training and will burn some extra belly fat without stressing your system.
It’s a great tool for sneaking in some extra caloric burn without overloading your body.
The Plan Part 2: Nutrition
It’s way too easy to eat more calories than you burn with resistance training. And if you aren’t in a caloric deficit, losing belly fat will become a pipe dream.
So to avoid any pipe dreams here, you have to streamline your nutrition.
Specifically, focus on these two things:
- Caloric load
- Blood sugar
If your caloric load and blood sugar are low the belly fat will fly off of your stomach really fast.
You see, eating less calories puts you in fat burning mode. And lower levels of blood sugar allow a greater percentage of fat to get oxidized.
So how do you address both of these?
With a balanced diet that is portion controlled.
I recommend eating a combination of protein, fat, vegetables and carbs in every meal.
The protein, fat and vegetables will slow down the digestion of the carbs which in turn will keep blood sugar low.
And for even better results, stay away from whole grains and focus on beans and legumes. They are the slowest digesting carbohydrates available and will keep your blood sugar as low as humanly possible.
The Importance Of Fat
Remember that high levels of estrogen and low levels of testosterone contribute to the accumulation of belly fat in women. Luckily, as testosterone goes up levels of estrogen automatically go down.
But in order to produce as much testosterone as possible, you need to eat adequate amounts of dietary fat.
Otherwise, your endocrine glands will not have the right building blocks for making testosterone. Also, healthy fats help keep your blood sugar lower because they make your cell membranes more permeable.
In other words, they help your body shuffle more nutrients away from fat cells.
Because of this, I recommend that at least 25-30% of your calories come from fat.
Although ironic, you need to eat fat in order to lose belly fat.
So please stay away from low fat dieting.
Getting Those Stunning Abs: Parting Advice for Women
Most women fail to lose their belly fat not because they don’t have the right information, but because they don’t take action.
And the number one thing that prevents women from taking action is over analysis.
So please do not analyze too many strategies and programs. Just follow the advice outlined above and get going right now!
CLICK HERE to discover how to get a sexy and flat stomach!
