Waist size can be an indicator of your overall health. Excess fat accumulation around your waist increases your risk of developing heart disease, type 2 diabetes and cancer. The National Health Service warns that women with a waist circumference exceeding 34-1/2 inches and men with a waist circumference exceeding 40 inches are at a higher risk of developing health problems. Reduce your waist circumference with exercise.
Spot Reduction
Only doing situps or other exercises to strengthen the muscles around your waist will not reduce your waist circumference. Spot reduction does not work. When you exercise and burn enough calories to create a caloric deficit, your body chooses which areas of your body the fat comes from.
Weight Change
Significantly reduce the size of your waist with exercise even if you don't lose weight, according to a study by researchers from the Pennington Biomedical Research Center at Louisiana State University and published in a 2009 issue of the journal PLoS One. More than 300 previously sedentary, overweight or obese, postmenopausal women participated in the study and participated in supervised exercise classes that burned 4,000 to 12,000 calories per week. The data showed all the women had a significant reduction in waist circumference independent of weight change.
Mood
Your mood affects how much exercise reduces your waist circumference, according to a study by the Wellness Department at the YMCA of Metropolitan Atlanta and reported in the June 2010 issue of the Southern Medical Journal. In the study, obese women with anxiety, depression or total mood disturbance were split into three groups that completed a six-month exercise protocol. Fifty-three women followed the Coach Approach. Sixty-six women received a personal exercise demonstration and exercise methods. The third group of 60 women only received written information. The Coach Approach is an exercise-support program administered through monthly meetings and a computer program. It is associated with increased adherence to new exercise programs and emphasizes self-management and incremental progress toward goals. The data show that regardless of which program used, normalized mood scores were a predictor of greater reduction in waist circumference.
Take a Break
Taking more breaks from sitting down at home or in the office can help shrink your waistline, according to a study by researchers at the University of Queensland in Australia that was published in the January 2011 issue of the European Heart Journal. The data showed sitting for prolonged periods, even if you take part in moderate-to-vigorous exercise, was an indicator of larger waist circumferences. Sedentary people who took more breaks to stretch and walk around had smaller waistlines than those who didn't.
References
- ""PLoS One"; Changes in Weight, Waist Circumference and Compensatory Responses with Different Doses of Exercise among Sedentary, Overweight Postmenopausal Women; T.S. Church, et al.; 2009
- "Southern Medical Journal"; Association of Reduction in Waist Circumference with Normalization of Mood in Obese Women Initiating Exercise Supported by the Coach Approach Protocol; J.J. Annesi; June 2010
- American Council on Exercise; Why is the Concept of Spot Reduction Considered a Myth; Jessica Matthews
- "European Heart Journal"; Study Finds More Breaks From Sittng are Good for Waistlines and Hearts; January 2011
- National Health Service; Why is My Waist Size Important?; 2010
- "The Permenante Journal"; Weight Loss and Psychologic Gain in Obese Women--Participants in a Supported Exercise Intervention; James J. Annesi, et al.; 2008
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