Archive for April, 2009
Unleash Your Abs Now

It’s that time of year to sear off belly fat for razor-sharp abs. You see, it didn’t take too many weight-room visits for your muscles to start bulging. But maybe your jelly-belly is still nursing some leftover fat. So the question is. How can I uncover my abs faster?
Now, in order to uncover your abs in a hurry, you have to pull off multiple exercises in one sweat session.
The reason you’re hesitant to take your shirt off is because your belly harbors the junk you’ve fueled your body with—and you can’t get rid of it with just abs moves.
To create suspense for your big reveal, you’ll need to work your middle twice a week with an advanced workout. Cycling through three to four moves heats up those calories—but cramming in six will toast fat.
To blast the last bits of lard, keep on filling your clothes with fat-incinerating muscle. Add occasional high-intensity cardio to your weekly workout plan for calorie-burning boosts, and you’ll be ready to peel off your shirt by summer.
Just One “SET” for Stronger, Longer Sex
Developing a leaner, stronger core will not only keep your lower back pain-free and help you look great by the pool this summer, it is one of the most effective ways to boost your pleasure and performance in the bedroom.
We have the perfect abs exercise for better sex, one that bombs your hip flexors, the muscles that support your spine, and the smaller, ancillary muscles that you call upon when things get really wild. Best of all, this core move doesn’t involve the dreaded crunch! And you only have to do one set!
The Plank with Leg Twist
Get into a plank position. Lie face down on the floor and prop yourself up on your forearms. Your elbows should be directly under your shoulders and your hands flat on the floor. Rise up on your toes, then drop your shoulders back toward your feet so that your forearms and upper arms form a right angle. Keep your back and legs straight from shoulders to your heels. That’s the classic plank position. Tighten your abs and hold this position for 10 seconds.
Now, keeping your toes on the floor and back straight, twist one knee in toward your opposite hip, return, then twist the other knee and keep alternating this way, quickly, for 20 repetitions. (You’ll feel it in your hip flexors, obliques and lower abs—all prime pumping, twisting sex muscles!) When you get proficient, add a deeper twist.
“CHANGE” Your Muscles can Believe in
You can change your workout, blast through plateaus, and enjoy new strength and muscle gains without learning new exercises or dumping your normal routine completely. Use these tips to tweak your workout to get more from your next trip to the gym.
Flip your sets and reps. If you usually do three sets of eight reps, switch it up: Grab heavier weight and do eight sets of three reps each. You’ll build serious strength to break through plateaus and make your next set of 8 better than ever.
Change speeds. Do you rest between exercises? If you’re doing circuits, try longer rest periods in your workout to build deeper strength and carve your six-pack. In weight training do you lift slow? Try moving faster through your reps to build power.
Turn it all on its head. Do your entire workout in reverse order—you’ll be stronger in your first exercise (usually your last), and you’ll have to work harder during your final exercise, for which you’re usually fresh. If you do forward lunges, turn them around and do reverse lunges—you’ll challenge your legs in a new way. Work in some reverse crunches to build deeper strength in your core. And flip one of your hands when you deadlift or do pull-ups to do more reps and build more muscle than ever before.
Drink lots of Water to Help Lose Weight
Research does suggest that drinking plenty of water may help you lose weight. These researches show that people who drank two glasses of water 20 to 30 minutes before every meal lost weight more quickly initially and lost significantly more weight than those who didn’t.
In another study it was found that people who drank water before meals ate an average of 75 fewer calories at that meal. This may not seem like much, but if you ate 75 fewer calories at lunch and dinner for the next year, you could lose about 14½ pounds! In addition, being even 1 percent dehydrated can cause a significant drop in metabolism, which can also interfere with weight loss.
Finally, it is very difficult for the body to differentiate hunger from thirst. If you don’t drink enough water throughout the day, you may mistake thirst for hunger and eat more than you really need, which can also impair weight loss. So staying well hydrated is important, particularly if you are trying to lose weight. And don’t forget to eat lots of water-based foods like soups, vegetables and low-fat dairy, which are equally important for weight loss, as they lower the calorie density of meals. That can help you reduce calories without reducing portions.
However, drinking massive amounts of water can cause a dangerous condition which can lead to confusion, irritability and seizures and may even lead to a coma.
This condition is very rare in healthy people but can sometimes be seen in the elderly or in endurance athletes who sweat significantly and drink water only to replace lost fluids. Most people should be far more concerned with not drinking enough water versus drinking too much.
8 Proven Weight Loss Tips
There are “crash diets” out there that promise you’ll drop a considerable amount of weight in just a few days.
However, the weight always comes back just as quickly, since those tips given are not something that will work with your body. And one thing you don’t want to do if you are serious about losing unwanted fat, is to follow these fad diets and their ridiculous weight loss claims.
To lose weight permanently and effectively should be a slow progress, all depending on your metabolic rate and how much you need to lose. There are, however, some proven tried and true weight loss tips for aiding in the weight loss process.
Tip 1: Don’t skip breakfast. Whatever you do follow this advice, because otherwise you are much more likely, in fact, prone to binge later in the day.
Tip 2: Don’t eat anything for at least an hour before going to bed.
Tip 3: Don’t snack while watching TV. It’s acceptable to eat a meal while watching television, but never is snacking at this time acceptable.
Tip 4: Substitute fruits like; bananas, watermelon, plums, peaches, and oranges for sugary treats like; cookies and candy.
Tip 5: Substitute honey for sugar and carob powder for chocolate in all recipes. These taste just as good if not better when used properly.
Tip 6: Eat more vegetables.
Tip 7: Avoid unnecessary high calorie foods. Instead of a high calorie salad dressing for instance, try cottage cheese or yogurt to improve the salads taste and peel of the pounds.
Tip 8: Exercise at least a half hour each day for five days out of the week.
There is nothing stopping you from losing weight except yourself. So start dropping unwanted fat today!
Healthy Weight Loss Tips for Baby Boomers
For baby boomers, it is important that they eat right and develop a healthy lifestyle. Here are some healthy weight loss tips specifically targeted towards baby boomers. It’s believed that the right diet and lifestyle can help baby boomers improve their overall health and fitness levels.
Gone are the days when baby boomers could eat what they want and not gain any weight. There are tips for healthy weight loss that provide baby boomers with some very easy and basic guidelines on how to maintain good health and lose weight in the process.
The basics of all healthy weight loss tips include eating the right foods and incorporating some form of an exercise routine. Here are a few:
1) Drink at least 8-10 glasses of water a day. This is easily one of the best tips for healthy weight loss.
2) Almost all healthy weight loss tips gave exercise some form of importance. Include some form of light to moderate exercise like walking to begin with.
3) Increase your intake of fruits and vegetables. Aim for about 4-5 servings of fruits and vegetables in a day. Loading up on fruits and vegetables is another important tip for healthy weight loss which one cannot ignore.
4) Aim to eat small meals more frequently about 5-6 times a day. Eating smaller portions makes it easier to digest the food and also provides the body with regular energy to stay fit and alert through the day.
A structured diet and exercise plan combined with some simple healthy weight loss tips will help baby boomers improve their overall health and lifestyles.
Avoid Weight Loss Plateaus
The basic equation for weight loss, as we all know, is to burn off more calories in a day than we take in. Even though the math seems easy to understand, losing unwanted fat is still difficult.
One common issue for people, even when they eat right and exercise, is hitting a weight loss plateau. When this happens the exercise and nutrition program that had been working for you to take pounds off is now only sufficient to maintain the weight.
So, by going back to the basic equation, you know you either need to ramp up your workouts or tone down your eating. But if you have already cut your calories to a minimum, by reducing your intake further this can actually backfire on you by slowing down your metabolism.
You MUST eat to lose weight; it’s just about eating smart, eating frequently, and convincing your body that you are not starving it. Many studies show that people who eat regularly and take in sufficient calories lose more weight than those who cut out meals.
If you feel your nutritional intake is appropriate and has hit a plateau, try changing up your fitness routine.
Interval training is a great tool for pushing past plateaus. It burns a ton of calories in a short amount of time and can improve your overall cardiovascular fitness. A regular and sufficiently intense strength training routine is also vital for jumpstarting metabolism and getting your weight loss back on track.
So while it is true that you need to take in fewer calories than you burn in a day to lose weight, there are limits to how low you should go for your caloric intake. Push yourself harder and smarter in your workouts and you’ll likely push past that plateau.
Diets Should Focus on Being Healthy
If you’re unhappy with your appearance, it can lead to a lot of serious issues with self esteem. After all, it can create a very unhealthy sense of self worth if you don’t like what you see every time you look in the mirror. But the answer is not all about changing your appearance. If you’re unhappy because you think you have fat arms or a fat belly, you shouldn’t lose the weight solely for your appearance. Diets and exercise programs are much more successful when the goal is overall health.
After all, people who lose a great deal of weight simply to look like some model on a magazine cover or actress on the big screen are more likely to never be happy with their appearance. This is because they set unrealistic and unhealthy goals. Striving to look like the recently skeletal Mischa Barton can, in some people, even lead to eating disorders. Rather than having an unhealthy obsession with weight loss, make healthy living a part of your everyday life. You’ll get better results and feel happier.
Goal-setting and Weight Loss
One of the biggest problems with weight loss and exercise is that we want maximum results with minimum effort. Quick fixes often result in less than optimal results, making it important to be smart about our purpose.
To start, make sure that you are specific when creating a goal. Often, people are too vague about what they are trying to accomplish. For example, “I want to lose weight” is a great goal, but specify how much as in a number of pounds, inches or clothing sizes. If you are exercising solely for better health, set a goal based on completing a certain task, such as a marathon or 7 minute mile.
Second, set a goal that is measurable. Similar to being specific, goals that can be measured make it possible to track progress. A good rule of thumb for fitness goals is that measurable goals are manageable goals. When we don’t have any means of following our advancement, we aren’t able to tell if we are moving forward, backward or stagnating.
Set goals that are attainable. If you have 2 weeks before a trip to the beach and want to lose 30 lbs., you are not setting a goal that is attainable. On the other hand, you are setting an achievable goal if you want to lose that same amount of weight for a wedding that is a year away. If you set the bar too high for yourself, you’ll either resort to unhealthy means of achieving your goal or will be disappointed when you miss the mark.
Finally, give yourself a time frame to meet your goal. By giving yourself a deadline and following the steps above, you know exactly what you have to do and how much time that you have to do it. If your goal is substantial, set smaller milestones in between to track progress and maintain timeliness.
Good luck and get planning!
Earth Day 2009
As we once again take time off to acknowledge EARTH DAY today, it is appropriate for me to pause my usual posts on WEIGHT LOSS and join the rest of the world.
Whether you are religious and believe in the glory of God’s great work, or gaze in awe at the power of nature, the fact remains that we mess with our planet at our own peril. Bees, which we need for many of our food crops, are dying off in unprecedented numbers. Overweight and obesity are at epidemic levels in the world at large. And clean water is of major concern around the world.
So, should we celebrate Earth Day? Absolutely. Do we need to do more to protect ourselves from things that might be harder to see? Well, that depends. In the early days of the environmental movement, you often saw people with signs that said “Save the Planet” at the Earth Day rallies. However, we need to realize that no matter what we do, the planet Earth will go on. The ability of the human race to live here is what we really need to be concerned about.