Losing belly fat not only improves your physical fitness and appearance, it may also save your life. Men with large amounts of abdominal fat are at a high health risk for many disease, including cardiovascular ailments and diabetes. Moreover, that same belly fat can also overproduce the female hormone estrogen, which encourages more weight gain and potentially lower testosterone and muscle mass. However, with the proper diet and training, you can lose that belly fat quickly and improve your health and appearance.
Losing Belly Fat
Step 1
Adjust your diet to fit your weight loss goals. Protein is more metabolically active, so eat more of it. Go for 1 gram of protein per pound of body weight, spread out between 5 or 6 smaller meals. Eat only low-glycemic (slow digesting) carbohydrates. Stack your carbs up in the earlier meals, and stick to lean proteins and healthy fats at night. For more info, check out the Abs Diet book by David Zinczenko.
Step 2
Start a weight-training program today, not tomorrow. Weight and/or resistance-training can directly target belly fat, according to the Abs Diet book. The weights do not even need to be that heavy to have a direct and dramatic effect upon your metabolism. Train with weights 3 to 5 days a week for no more than an hour at a time. For a good program, check out the "Muscle Nerd" Jeff Anderson or "Xtreme Lean" by Steve Holman and Jonathan Lawson.
Step 3
Perform cardiovascular exercise regularly to attack body fat stores. Thirty minutes of cardio, 3 days a week is enough to make a dramatic improvement. However, some may benefit from more, depending on his/her current fitness level. Five or 6 days a week is the maximum number of days. Always take at least 1 day off a week from all forms of training.
Step 4
Have a cheat meal once a week to keep your metabolic fire stoked. Metabolism slows down as your body attempts to establish equilibrium, based on your new lower-calorie diet. However, you can trick your body into keeping metabolism going strong by eating anything you desire for one meal a week.
Step 5
Be progressive. Progression is one of the foundational pillars of all forms of training. You will receive some benefit from doing the same diet, weight-lifting, and cardio for an extended period of time. However, to keep your body guessing, you should change the variables every 2 to 4 weeks to keep the belly fat burning off. For example, add more weight as you get stronger, add extra days of cardio, and/or experiment with different caloric and carbohydrate levels, within a healthy range, of course.
Things You'll Need
- Diet
- Training program
- Cardio
- Cheat meals
- Progression
References
- "The Abs Diet," David Zinczenko, 2004
- "Xtreme Lean," Jonathan Lawson and Steve Holman, 2008
- "Combat the Fat," Jeff Anderson, 2009
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