Need to reduce 'belly' !!!

Butty

Hi there,

I've got a quick query regarding reducing body fat around the stomach area and toning the abs.

Generally I don't tend to put on much weight but whatever I do tends to gather around the stomach area giving me a nice little pot belly and 'love handles'.

I've been working in the gym for the past few months and spend quite a bit of time working on the ab muscles. I generally spend some time doing sit ups, bicycle sit ups (where I lift my right elbow to my left knee and vice versa) and leg lifts on the chin-up bars. I have noticed a strengthening of my ab muscles but very little reduction in the size of my 'belly'.

Just wondering what people think are the best exercises for reducing body fat on the stomach and toning the ab muscles. Also, how often should I exercise this area - daily / every second / third day??? Any how many reps of exercises give best results.

amazingemmet

Diet, diet, diet rinse lather repeat , You can do crunches and sit ups til the cows come home but you won't get definition til your diets sorted out

g'em

as has been said a gazillion times here, the best and possibly only way to lose weight on the stomach is through diet. you can't spot-reduce fat on the body with excercises, and you can crunch til the cows come home but if you have excess flab you won't see the rock-hard abs lurking underneath.

If you're a girl then a little round belly is quite normal and virtually impossible to get rid of.

If you're a guy then you will lose it easier but only through diet.

Post up your eating habits if you think you need a hand with it.

g'em

amazingemmet wrote:

Diet, diet, diet rinse lather repeat , You can do crunches and sit ups til the cows come home but you won't get definition til your diets sorted out

you stole my lines!!!!

Butty

g'em wrote:

as has been said a gazillion times here, the best and possibly only way to lose weight on the stomach is through diet. you can't spot-reduce fat on the body with excercises, and you can crunch til the cows come home but if you have excess flab you won't see the rock-hard abs lurking underneath.

If you're a girl then a little round belly is quite normal and virtually impossible to get rid of.

If you're a guy then you will lose it easier but only through diet.

Post up your eating habits if you think you need a hand with it.

Generally I have quite a healthy diet i believe.
Cereal (corkflakes / weetabix) most mornings for breakfast.
Soup / Sandwich for lunch. Usually have white bread but have been trying to substitute that with wholemeal bread lately.
Dinner most evening with a mixture of potatoes / rice / pasta with meat (eat a variety of meat) and vegetables.
Have been trying to include a lot more fruit in my diet lately also as snacks instead of chocolate, etc.

I know this is quite high level but is there any foods in particular that i should avoid?
Or any foods that i should try to increase my intake of (currently increasing the amount of vegetables and fruit that I eat).

Is alcohol a big factor here - presumably yes??

By the way - I am a guy.

Is exercise still valuable to lose some weight?

g'em

Butty wrote:

Generally I have quite a healthy diet i believe.
Cereal (corkflakes / weetabix) most mornings for breakfast.
Soup / Sandwich for lunch. Usually have white bread but have been trying to substitute that with wholemeal bread lately.
Dinner most evening with a mixture of potatoes / rice / pasta with meat (eat a variety of meat) and vegetables.
Have been trying to include a lot more fruit in my diet lately also as snacks instead of chocolate, etc.

I know this is quite high level but is there any foods in particular that i should avoid?
Or any foods that i should try to increase my intake of (currently increasing the amount of vegetables and fruit that I eat).

Is alcohol a big factor here - presumably yes??

By the way - I am a guy.

Is exercise still valuable to lose some weight?

Unfortunately your diet is really contributing towards your belly. Cornflakes, white bread, white rice, white pasta are all highly refined processed foods which can leave you feeling bloated. The body breaks them down really easliy leaving you hungry quite soon after eating them

For breakfast try porridge (I put a low-fat fruit yoghurt in mine to make it nice and creamy). Low in fat, high in fibre, keeps you full longer. Cereals, in general, are high in sugar and salt, and most of us eat bowls that are far too big.

In sandwiches hav brown bread or wholemeal, no butter, no mayo, plenty of salad and lean white meats. Or have homemade wegetable soup.

At dinner make sure the biggest helping on your plate is vegetables, steamed preferably, the best being broccoli, beans, cauliflower, carrots. Have brown rice and wholemeal pasta instead of white and they should be small servings. Trim fat off any meat. Have a mid-morning and mid-afternoon snack to keep your metabolism ticking over (fruit or yoghurt, cottage cheese, veggie sticks).

Especially cut out take-aways (loaded with nastiness) and keep alcohol to a minimum.

Yes it sounds like pants but trust me, eating well shoots your energy levels through teh roof, your waistline will improve quickly, your general well-being will be much improved, and there's no harm in treating yourself to some 'bad' foods once in a while.

Don't stop excercising, losing weight comes from a combination of diet and working out and search this thread for diet advise there's oodles of it out there.

amazingemmet

Cereal (corkflakes / weetabix) most mornings for breakfast.
>Swap these for porridge or special k

Soup / Sandwich for lunch. Usually have white bread but have been trying to substitute that with wholemeal bread lately.
> Cut the white bread out

Dinner most evening with a mixture of potatoes / rice / pasta with meat (eat a variety of meat) and vegetables.
>I'd cut the carbs down at this stage try to keep yuor carbs to the first half of the day
Have been trying to include a lot more fruit in my diet lately also as snacks instead of chocolate, etc.

I know this is quite high level but is there any foods in particular that i should avoid?
>any processed foods
Or any foods that i should try to increase my intake of (currently increasing the amount of vegetables and fruit that I eat).
> seem like you could do with some more protein

Is alcohol a big factor here - presumably yes??
> yes

By the way - I am a guy.
> me too

Is exercise still valuable to lose some weight?
> Yes but gotta be the right sort of exercise do you do much cardio?

michaelanthony

Stop eating. It will be a good bit smaller in a week.

rubadub

I am loosing weight fairly steadily and still drink like a fish. I used to always get a chinese after a nights drinking, not just because of hunger but I need something to digest or I wake up with a stomach full of acid the next day. I have now swopped the chinese for a tin of beans or peas. Also since I have lost weight I drink less to get to the same drunken level, I also try to eat less before going drinking. It is not recommended but drinking on an empty stomach gives gets you to the same level with FAR less drink. People usually advise against drinking on an empty stomach because you will get so drunk (not sure if there are other reasons, probably irritates the lining more), so just be careful and drink less. Saves money too.

TouchingVirus

Here's some info that'll help you on your way - Nutrition/BodyChem 101 style

*note - may be convoluted since im writing this as it comes to me*

Exercise & Facts

It always comes down to energy-in vs. energy-out. Too much in and not enough out results in fat gain. Your metabolism is the key to losing weight. People with faster BMR (Basic Metabolic Rates) burn energy even when sitting around doing nothing. These are the type of people that dont exercise and are still thin. The way you make your BMR higher is through developing more muscle. Whilst your developing more muscle on your abs, this wont affect abdominal fat. Fat is reduced as a whole, or not at all

You also need to "Burn the fat". Burn the fat mean's exercising....

If i work out i'm burning up energy, i will increase the amount of calories grabbed from fat. In addition, i'll be increasing my muscle mass (which may negate the weight-loss) which will increase my BMR so i'll burn more when resting...

Burning fat is done with good old cardio. 30 minutes of continuous cardio at an intensity level of med-high 4-5 days per week will burn that crap right off ya!

A med-high level is 60-70% of your MHR (Found Here). Mine is 195. So almost for the entire 30 minutes i want to be around 135bpm for optimum fat-burning...


You'll probably be banjanxed for a while after that. Plenty of water will help rehydrate ya and then time for munch...

Food

Food is for feeding muscle you've gained from your workout. This raises you BMR (because you hold onto the muscle you've gained). Protein is the saviour. Eating a high-protein diet is one of the best things you can do. It's the muscle-builder for your body among other things.

The only thing about a high-protein diet is that you gotta drink a good bit of water. It puts extra stress on the kidneys and you need to drink more water to combat this - should be no bother to ya at all if you're looking for a nice body!

Eating 5-6 meals a day is what you should aim for. Im not talking heaped plates here, something small-medium is just ideal.

Find out your Calorie needs - adjust them to weight loss (deficit of ~20%) and thats how much you should eat per day. Divide that up into 5-6 meals. Maybe have more for breakfast and dinner than lunch (not too much) - you decide. Then split it up into macro-nutrients (50% protein, 35% carbs, 15% fats for example). So thats 50% of every meal's calories should be protein, 35% carbs and 15% fats.

The trick is to eat 5-6 times a day. This keeps yout metabolism steady instead of peaks/troughs. After 3-4 hours have passed since a meal, your body will start to become catabolic. It will eat your newly-made muscle for energy before it goes to the fat stores.. so eat your meals with 3-4 hours in between and you'll prevent this from hindering yourself.

Protein has a high thermic-effect (30%). This means 30% of the calories from protein are burned off by simply digesting it. Fat/Carbs have low thermic effect. By eating a protein with each meal you make the overall thermic effect higher, so always eat a protein with meals.

You cannot avoid simple-carbs the whole time. So try eat them early in the day, so your body has time to process them and excrete them. Keep the spuds and stuff for lunch-dinner (say before 5pm) and the complex carbs after that..

Never trust the info/100g you see on food labels - Something with 3g/100 of fat doesnt seem too bad.. 3% fat you say - wrong!

If that bit of munch provides 30calories/100g and 3g fat, then 27calories is fat. which is 27/30 = 90% fat... and here was you thinking 3%...

Fat - 9 Calories/Gram
Alcohol - 7 Calories/Gram
Protein/Carbs - 4 Calories/Gram

Do the calculations yourself on the stuff you buy - you'll be amazed at the crap you're throwing into ya...just remember, keep it low on the saturated fat and Carbs (Of Which Sugars) and you should be fine..

Also keep away from "Hydrogenated Vegetable Oil" ..its Trans-Fat and its worse that the real fat


No-No's
All white bread's/rice etc are high in refined sugars & flour/simple carbs and cause a fast increase in blood sugar because of the bodies ability to digest them so rapidly. Its why they leave ya bloated for an hour and then you're all hungry again. This rapid rise in blood sugar leads to your pancreas going overkill on the insulin. Insulin has "fat-storing" properties, so rapid rises in this tend to store excess energy as fat - not what you want.

You need something thats slow to digest, like wholemeal bread or wholegrain rice. These keep you full for longer and also keep your insulin levels steady.

Cornflakes and other commercial cereal is the same, laced with sugars and simple carbs. Try some porridge, it really is the best thing since "sliced bread" (pardon the awful pun). It's filling, yum and does the job nicely.


Some Other Points

If you really want teh body, you'll make a lifestyle change. It isn't hard to get used to the new habits, but it's hard to keep them. Reinforcing them by doing it religiously helps in the beginning.

Treat yourself to a cheat meal every once in a while. Splash out..but adjust your other meal's sizes so that you dont excede calorie intake. If you excede by say 1000 calories, then you've just undone 2 days worth of exercise (which is a real downer)

Alcohol - Ahh, the poison. Contrary to what most people believe, and somebody said in this thread, you can still drink alcohol. Problem is (and there is a problem) it is empty calories. There is no nutritional benfit from drinking alcohol. None. If you skip a meal (eat 4 meals with 4 hours between them) then you'll be 1 meal short in the day (around 500 calories for me). That enables you to have 2 pints (1 pint of Bulmers is ~240cal)

Its not advisable to do it often, but to cut it out completely isnt an option for anyone but the most dedicated people.

You could eat 8 Mars Bars (say 350 cals each) a day, take a multivitamin to keep your levels up and you wont gain fat - which is 100% correct. However, your body will eat the muscle and your BMR will lower. With a lower BMR you wont need to eat as many calories. So soon you'll find eating 8 mars bars will put on fat... a vicious cycle


Protein Shakes - Zero-Thermic Effect. You'll reach your protein needs with them, but they are a drink, so you dont burn no calories off by digesting it. A protein shake with a 100% fat meal means thermic effect is still 3% (Thermic Effect of Fat).. but if you dont have time for a meal, dont skip the protein, even grabbing a shake is better than doing without!

End

So to end, eat little but often, plenty of protein and vegetables. Relax on the simple carbs/sugar/sweets. Drink water. Exercise.

And soon you'll look like Peter Andre in his hay-day


*looks back a post..wow took a while*

Tony Danza

Even though I didn't start this thread, thanks TouchingVirus for that post.

ronbyrne2005

michaelanthony wrote:

Stop eating. It will be a good bit smaller in a week.

nonsense ,when you fast your body goes into starvation mode and desperately tries to hold onto body fat and uses bodys glycogen stores and starts burning muscle for energy.

TouchingVirus

Tony Danza wrote:

Even though I didn't start this thread, thanks TouchingVirus for that post.

You're welcome - just hope it helps ya out a little.

BTW, all you should aim for is toned. Never aim for a "lighter" body.

I know folk who are 7% body fat, 5'10" and still weigh in approximation of 16-17 stone. By all BMI standards etc, these people are about to drop dead of a co-morbidity associated with Obese people. These are not people who have high cholesterol or anything like "proper fat" people do (for lack of a better term). These are fit as a fiddle and healthy as olympic athletes...

In contrast, i could point out the skinny male. Most of which, are skinny-fat people. Their body fat is still high (30%+) yet they are skinny because they have a small-frame (ectomorph body type) and no real, definitive muscle..

So the sooner you get over your weight-obsession and scales-obsession the sooner you'll look tha-shiznit

TerrorFirmer

ronbyrne2005 wrote:

nonsense ,when you fast your body goes into starvation mode and desperately tries to hold onto body fat and uses bodys glycogen stores and starts burning muscle for energy.

Wll, that depends on how heavy you are to begin with. Obviously it's not going to work hugely for a relatively slim person trying to loose a bit of fat. For someone who is quite fat, the above will make a large bulk of the excess weight drop off in a fairly short period of time...

Great post touchingvirus btw.

TouchingVirus

ronbyrne2005 wrote:

nonsense ,when you fast your body goes into starvation mode and desperately tries to hold onto body fat and uses bodys glycogen stores and starts burning muscle for energy.

Your body will attempt to do this anyways, it will only become top-priority in the case of starvation.

Your body will attempt to chew into muscle before it touches it's fat stores even when eating normally, It's an unfortunate part of our makeup..

Either way, starving isnt the answer, you'll lose muscle, lower your daily calorie needs and then you go back to eating the same amount and you pile on the fat.... (it's the same with yo-yo dieting...)

TouchingVirus

MobileInfantry wrote:

Wll, that depends on how heavy you are to begin with. Obviously it's not going to work hugely for a relatively slim person trying to loose a bit of fat. For someone who is quite fat, the above will make a large bulk of the excess weight drop off in a fairly short period of time...

You're spot on, it will help a fat person lose a lot of the bulk quickly.

The problem is that same person will have already lost a great portion of muscle before the fat drops off. This means when they resume eating they will be in extreme-overload and that fat will come right back on just as quickly as it left them..if this didnt happen i'd sew my mouth shut and so would about a billion other people

MobileInfantry wrote:

Great post touchingvirus btw.

Thanks - glad to help

Butty

Cheers for all the replies guys.

I'm off to the supermarket this evening to tidy up the diet

Also one more quick question. Does eating late at night contribute to excess fat? I often find i'm quite hungry at night time and often have some fruit before bed

TouchingVirus

Butty wrote:

Cheers for all the replies guys.

I'm off to the supermarket this evening to tidy up the diet

Slowly dude...slowly

Make no drastic changes except perhaps the bread/rice/pasta ones. Then concentrate on keeping 5-6 meals per day down and eating at regular intervals

For the beginning its good to do the cardio/weight lifting - it's easier to get used to. But dont ever forget the diet, move slowly towards the perfect diet and you'll be able to wash a tshirt of your stomach soon enough - thats another thing, patience

Fatloss of 1lb/2lb maybe 3lb a week if your working hard is great..anything else and its probably muscle and ya dont wanna lose that


Eating late at night does affect weight loss (if you go over calorie budget). You cant burn it off if you're sleeping. Keep fruit & a protein for before bed to fill you up and negate catabolism (eating of muscle). You shouldn't be too hungry if you've eating 5-6 meals a day, with 3 hours in between thats like 15-18 hours

ronbyrne2005

eating late at night makes no difference its another myth.excess calories whether consumed in daytime or nighttime make you gain fat. if your hungry eat some wholewheat cereal or the like.fruit is ok in moderation but contains mainly sugar so avoid eating too much of it.

TerrorFirmer

I've lost a stone the last while purely by cutting out junk.

I aim to follow this up intensely with good exercise and diet, but it's amazingly the amount of work involved that you'd never normally take into play.

Touchingvirus, given a lifestyle of work with little opportunity for exercise outside of this, how would someone who is a few stone overweight set about reducing fat and increasing muscle with regards to both exercise and daily diet? Exercise is no problem within the home, but outside is difficult....just my circumstances.

TouchingVirus

MobileInfantry wrote:

I've lost a stone the last while purely by cutting out junk.

Good stuff, you're already halfway there

MobileInfantry wrote:

Touchingvirus, given a lifestyle of work with little opportunity for exercise outside of this, how would someone who is a few stone overweight set about reducing fat and increasing muscle with regards to both exercise and daily diet? Exercise is no problem within the home, but outside is difficult....just my circumstances.

Ah, that familiar abismal phrase has reared it's head. Weight orientation isn't the way to be. It doesnt matter how many stone overweight you are, as much as it matters what this supposed excess weight is made up of... At my peak I was 21 stone @ 5'11". Thing is, i have a big frame, big chest and I do have an endomorphic body-type. I was still fit at 21 stone and could run and play 1 hour games of squash and handball, but i had my pudgy spots (abdomen and thighs) and was above average-body-fat. Im now down to about 18.5 stone since September 1st but i look & feel a whole lot better about myself and thats what it's about. Being 20 stone is nothing if you arnt 50% fat. If your 17% body fat at 20 stone then ignore the crap the doctors say about your weight, you're no more prone to a heart attack than the other guy who's 12 stone and 18% body fat - its utter ****e!

Training in the home is what i do. Just can't beat the privacy. I hate the sight of people who are ectomorphic in the gym on the cardio machine. They need no cardio...and it sometimes results to me wimping out and saying "I'll never be like them" and other self-defeating thoughts...

Exercising early is the key in the working-man's world - we can all get up an extra 40 minutes in the morning and go to bed 40 minutes early if need be...

Exercising early heightens your mood when endorphins are released into your body - the feelgood factor is brilliant! Also, the increase in metabolism lasts all day (ok, it comes down like a hill throughout the day), whereas if you do it at night, and go to bed, it drops like a cliff when you sleep, so you dont feel the full benefit of it...

I love to cycle. Only after i plateau (your body get's used to things, so shake it up a little) do i change to running or something for a while. I cycle on a stationary bike for 30 minutes-40 minutes keeping my HR in the "zone". Thats exercise done, and i do be fairly whacked. I usually keep pace steady though some days i do interval training (5 minutes at utra-hard and 2 and resting) leaving my average HR in the zone. This is way more intense so i dont do it too often, i prefer the so-called easy life

Doing a 2-day split workout with weights (free-weights) is the way to go too. There are many examples of a 2-day split routine on the internet. It's basis is along the lines of dont-work-2-main-muscle-groups in the same workout. Its great for a beginner and not too stressful on the 'aul body either. If you must do cardio on the same day as weights, then do cardio first, put all your effort into burning that fat!!!

Your muscle mass will increase just by cardio, especially in your legs if you cycle like i do. Dont end up with massive-Lomu-legs and sticks for arms though, keep it all in proportion

Make your meals in advance. Each night, make your meals for the following day. Or prepare them if you dont wish to make them. It stops you wimping out the next day for a Chinese or whatever.

Weight Training is an entirely different subject that nutrition, but they complement each other spectacularly. Most fat-loss is done by exercise...hence the burn the fat. Nutrition works exponentially with Weight Training to produce awesome results.

You might have a look at www.fitren.com for more articles on weight training and general fitness.

If you're looking for more specific advice i'll help you as best as i can via pm

amazingemmet

TouchingVirus wrote:

Fatloss of 1lb/2lb maybe 3lb a month if your working hard is great..anything else and its probably muscle and ya dont wanna lose that

2lb a week is acceptable fat loss

TouchingVirus

amazingemmet wrote:

2lb a week is acceptable fat loss

I suppose i did say month... oopsie