Muscles, Fat, Bones, Water, Organs, Food – they are all measured the same way on a weighing machine. So, if you are doing cardio and strength training – you may even build lean muscle tissues while you are simultaneously losing fat. However, the scale cannot change, despite the bodily changes happening to you – getting leaner and slimmer.
Gaining weight around the waist is extremely dangerous and can even lead to heart disease, certain types of cancer or even type 2 diabetes. Sadly, you are not in charge of where you gain or even lose weight! While you may be genetically pre-dispositioned to first lose weight from the hips, belly area or any other part of the body; you really have to focus on your entire body weight loss (holistic) through a healthy diet and exercise to ensure that you get results in all areas.
Its very important to ‘weigh yourself’ as part of your process of trying to lose weight. Its very important to track your body fat with a fat caliper. However, its very important to focus on slimming down while you want to lose weight. There’s weight to be lost around the hips, the thighs, belly and arms but the funny ironic thing about slimming down is that it doesn’t always have to mean losing actual weight loss.
Its very important to prioritise strength training. These include physical exercises that specialise in the use of resistance so as to induce muscular contraction and build strength, size of skeletal muscles and anaerobic endurance. Some of the best strength exercises include goblet squat, dum-bell row, Pall-of press, push-up, Lateral squat, hip extension (glute bridges/hip thrusts), Split squat.
Other exercises include lifting weights, using resistance bands, using weight machines at a gym and making use of your body weight for resistance, by doing push-ups, pull-ups, leg squats, crunches or push-ups against a wall.
In addition to this, some exercises for strength training include 10 push ups, 20 walking lunges, 20 body weight squats, 10 dumbbell rows (using a gallon milk jug), 30 jumping jacks, 15 second plank – Repeat this entire round 3 times.
These exercises should be done at least for two sessions a week and after three months of consistent training increase it to three to four times a week.
What is Strength Training actually Good for?
These exercises are good for building a stronger heart, increasing bone density, improving blood flow, reducing blood pressure, halting muscle loss, improving cholesterol levels, improving your balance and coordination.
5 Benefits of Strength Training
Strength Training has got plenty benefits to shape you up. Besides totally toning your body, the following are some additional benefits:
- It lowers your blood pressure.
- It increases your bone strength.
- It improves Muscle mass. The weight lifting also helps to reduce the speed of muscle loss (sarcopenia) , an inevitable occurrence as you age.
- It improves daily activities
- It give you better stability.
Strength Training plays a strong role on your health
- It makes you stronger and fitter
- It helps you develop better body mechanics
- It protects bone health and muscle mass
- It helps keep the weight off for good.
- It helps you develop better body mechanics.
Exercises to reduce Belly Fat
- Stomach Crunches
- Side Crunch
- Twist Crunch
- Reverse Crunch
- Bicycle Crunch
- Lunge Twist
- Rolling Plank Exercise
It is very, very important to prioritise strength training and all the compound exercises such as squats, bench press, dead lift and rows.
One major concern in weight loss is whether cardio is required or not. The answer is simply 100% unnecessary!
In order to really lose weight, what is needed is a calorie deficit! You need to eat few calories than you burn. Weight loss will NEVER happen without a calorie deficit, no matter how much cardio you do or how many weights you lift in the gym.
This calorie deficit is completely a personal preference and while some people may want to eat more and exercise more; there are others who eat just a little but cut back on the cardio. What strength training will do for you is build up the muscles and burn calories
Remember, weighing yourself is not just a number but its also a key determinant about how you feel about yourself. So although, it may sound a bit strange it is POSSIBLE to get slimmer/thinner without having seen any change in your weight!
Losing fat is very crucial as they are permanent changes to your body, where your body composition changes –decreasing the amount of fat and increasing the amount of muscle. You could be losing muscle or even water when you lose weight; its not even possible to find out. All you can find out is the product of hormonal shifts, product of your daily habits and changing hydration levels.
