This question is one for the ages. Yesterday, in my Illusion of Health article, I talked about all the crazy infomercial ab gadgets out there that promise you a firm chiseled stomach in just minutes per day and the reasons why they don’t work. Today I want to tackle an even bigger misconception regarding crunches and something called ‘spot reducing’.
The idea behind spot reducing is simply that one can burn fat from a certain area of their body by working that area or part specifically. Examples of this would be doing crunches to lose belly fat or tricep extensions to slim down arms. While the validity of spot reducing is a hot and oft contested topic, common sense should tell us this doesn’t work. Think about it, how many overweight people do you see that are sporting trim waists for all the crunch-a-thons that go on? My guess is none.
That's crunch-tastic!
I’m not alone in my assessment of spot reducing either. Ask virtually any fitness expert or personal trainer out there and they will tell you the same thing. Spot reducing doesn’t work.
This raises the question then whether you should do crunches and sit-ups at all while you’re focusing on fat loss. I would say the answer in most cases is no. Crunches and sit ups just aren’t very effective fat burners because they burn so few calories. They also do very little to rev up your hormones or your metabolism for greater fat loss. Honestly, they have no great benefit at all for weight loss.
So what exercises should you do if your goal is weight loss? Well there are libraries full of books on this very topic. The breadth of possible answers is amazingly vast and different things do work better for different people. However, the one thing I know to never fail if mixed with a proper diet is a good old-fashioned mix of resistance training and cardio. More specifically, compound movement resistance training and cardio. What I mean by compound movements are exercises that work large portions of the body all at once such as a squat or bench press. These movements work large muscles groups and require a huge amount of energy to properly complete.
As an added benefit, compound movements are great at releasing fat burning and muscle building hormones such as testosterone into the body. Don’t worry ladies, you won’t grow a beard or turn into a she hulk but it will help you reach your goals of a trim and toned body. Some other good compound exercises are lunges, dead lifts, rows, pull ups, pushups, military presses, and cleans.
Likewise, if your goal is weight loss, you should avoid wasting much time on isolated exercises such as curls, tricep extensions, front and lateral raises, crunches, shrugs, leg curls and extensions, etc. Anything that works just one muscle or small muscle group should basically be avoided during this phase.
If you set up your workouts around exercises like this, throw in a few days of cardio, and maintain a healthy diet, not only will the fat begin to melt away but the body that begins to shine through will be stronger and more beautiful than ever.
Train hard and expect success,
Kris
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I don't believe this pic! It's Photoshop! Don't you se she as an ass in front?
Posted by: Velform sauna belt | 11 November 2011 at 05:15 PM