matt85

for some reason it seems that i just cant get rid of my belly.

i dont drink much, my diets not too bad (could be better though), and i do loads of exercise and sport. i go to the gym at least twice a week, play squash and swim regularly, as well as football twice a week. it only seems to be my stomach though. im probably not far off as fit as ive ever been and its totally strange. can someone help? its mad.

if anybody could recommend a workout strictly for abs that can work i would be very grateful. because its either that or liposuction

Tiggs

its fat...you need to loose fat. better abbs with a fat belly is like ....err....a pointless thing?

TopBanana

Eat less or exercise more. Sorted

ozzy

The problem is men store excess fat either in their legs or around their stomach. No matter how hard you work the abs, you can't spot reduce fat (with the exception of £2.5K of lipo-suction).

The body needs to burn more fat through general exercise and conditioning as well as the correct diet.

You don't need fancy machines, just simple bodyweight exercises will do the trick. You need to do various types to target the different muscle groups (don't forget the obliques to get rid of those love-handles) and scrutinise your diet getting rid of (or at least cutting down) on sugary food.

Stefan

[Edited by ozzy - 1/24/2004 12:26:00 AM]

scoobypreza

Mr.Scoobypreza had the same prob! Hope he won't mind me sharing that with you lol
He found he was working out at the gym and doing circuit training but like you just couldn't quite get rid of his belly!
His diet could also be better but his downfall turned out to be pepsi! As soon as he cut down on pepsi and coke he found his abs!
It must have been the gas or something.
He uses all the ab type equipment at the gym, that really helped.
I don't know what they are called something like total ab bench or something like that.
They use a gym ball at circuit training.... they do various sit ups and leg raises with it. Sounds like a lot of hard work to me but it does work.

Don't give up, you just need to find what the bu99er is that's going straight to your tum. Maybe you could cut out soft drinks and switch to juice or water might help a bit???
And if you can't get to the six pack maybe your just meant to have a barrel lol

good luck with it
Mrs.Scoobypreza

s6pra

Yep, There's a lot to this!

As said before cutting out on fizzy drinks is a must! In fact, unless you have increased your muscle mass you should cut any fruit drinks too.

STICK TO WATER AND MILK. You're supposed to drink at least 2 litres of water a day (It's actually 2.5lts)

I mentioned increasing your muscle mass because, muscles do burn fat for maintenance purposes. If you get bigger, it will be harder for you to gain fat (this will be used by bigger muscles to generate body heat).

Another issue that you should look out for is eating. This is called diet. And diet doesn't mean a weight loss powder that other people try to sell you. Your diet is what you eat! (regardless of trying to lose weight or not)

Literally, YOU ARE WHAT YOU EAT! Many people still seem to think there is no connection, but it's 100% true!

Drink more water and less brain cells will die! The brain is 95% water, don't keep it topped up and you'll be getting dumb fast. The heart is 85% water. You can go 3 days without eating but you won't last 3 days without drinking! Now, you tell me if water is important?


If you eat fat, you'll gain fat! If you don't eat a balanced diet of veggies and fruit you'll get sick! If you eat cyanide... YOU DIE!

Everything you put in your mouth is what will become you! If you keep that in mind you'll pay more atention to what you eat.

Some people will tell you that if you want to lose weight you have sto skip meals. WRONG! Those starving people in africa skip lots of meals (unfortunately) and they still have big stomachs, so forget about skipping meals.

Now on another note, there's the aspect of personal hygiene. And that means sleep! Yes sleeping is a habit of personal hygiene.

You need at least 8 hours per day of sleep. If you aren't getting this, you can forget your efforts of losing weight. Try to get more sleep if possible, a good target is 9 to 9.5 hours.

And now the obvious one. EXERCISE!

You might say that you don't have time to exercise, well the FACT is, you do need to elevate you cardio vascular rate in order to lose fat. But it's amazing what you can achieve with just 20 minutes a day of exercise!

If you go for a jog, you only need 16 to 20 minutes in order to start burning fat.

But what you do before is very important. If you eat a chocolate bar and then go for a jog, guess what you will be using for energy? Yep, your fat reserves won't even get touched. All that "chocky" you just had will be used negating your every effort.

For best results, you should only go for a jog when it's been one hour and a half after you had a light meal.

If you get hungry keep your stomach busy with water, as this will help tap into your energy reserves.

It's also important to now that, doing abdominal exercises will help a lot. And also, remember to keep a good posture throughout the day. Tucking that stomach in will help "relodge" your internals and reduce the elasticity. (This will in turn reflect itself in many ways)

For example, one thing that helps you is by doing abdominal exercises before a meal. You'll find that you'll feel full with less food. Your abs will be tight and there will be less room for food. (Professional athletes have noticed this many times)

That's also a key point. Eating HAS TO BE DONE EVERY 3.5 HOURS! The ideal is just after 3 hours.

If you keep having light meals every 3 hours, you'll increase your metabolic rate which means your body will get used to getting a regular suppply of food and find no need to build reserves.

Some people make a big error by eating every 5 hours or so. This makes the body go into a sort of "panic mode" where every bit of energy has to be stored.

Look, I hope I'm not telling you anything new, but these little things are often overlooked. And they make a real difference.

I have no belly now and abdminal squares are just showing up. But 2 years ago, I had a job that made me work 16 hours a day and I wasn't getting enough sleep. My body was in shock and I gained weight, to the point I couldn't hide my stomach under a t-shirt.

Things can change! Even if you're 60 years old, you can still go from a lil' fat to buff!

John Travolta is now 55 and he was fat when he filmed Pulp Fiction. But if you watch his latest movie(can't recall the name) he looks buff and I've actually seen an interview where he admits to being surprised at the fact that his body reacted to exercise!

Hope this helps!

Er... Anyone still awake?

All the best,
Peter
(((5 years sports training[collective sports, individual sports, personal training.])))

lightning101

Too many sugary carbs/complex carbohydrates, try 2 weeks on a high protein low carb diet with plenty cardiovascular exercise. You will lose the belly, but will probably collapse from exhaustion/heat stroke or cramp - but hey - no belly.

ALi-B

iTrader: (1)

[Fatman scoop(ish) voice]

BELLY's GONNA GETCH YA
BELLY's GONNA GETCH YA

BELLY BELLY BELLY (sorry, had to do it)

I need to trim up meself, I've crept from 32" waist to 34" I've basically cut down on my overall intake. And I don't eat any chocs or snacks, and stay to a 3 meal routine.

I need to cut down on the beer too, but I'm finding that a little too hard

Still managed to loose 4lbs so it's not too bad. Belly is still there though

akshay67

Exercise on an empty stomach - sounds weird - but once you get into it your body will metabolise on fat rather than short-term carbs.

Thats why it's best to exercise in the morning.

akshay67

Good post, S6pra.

PS - you're not from MKIV.net are you?

astraboy

I say this every time a weightloss thing comes up, but I suppose I can say it again. I'm 27. I do no exercise whatsoever. I eat what I like, drink what I like and most of the time thats pizza, curry, kebabs and my personal favourite, Pie and chips.
However I am 6'2" and weigh 12 stone.
This is because I go raving every weekend and dance non stop for around 9 hours to tunes which start at 160bpm up to 190bpm.
My record is 11 1/2 hours on 2002/2003 NYE. I weighed myself before and after and had gone from 160lbs to 137lbs.
As you can imagine a belly is the least of my problems at the moment.
You should try it. Its deffo better than slogging it out in a gym.
astraboy.

ozzy

Ravin is sooooo 1990's I probably killed one or two brain cells with some dodgy chemicals in the mid-90's

Stefan

astraboy

you wouldnt be saying that if you were in the same warehouse I was last weekend.
Tubby.
astraboy.

King RA

astraboy, I don't suppose whacking 3 grams of speed down your gob and not eating for 3 days has anything to do with this either??

s6pra

MKIV.net?

er... not that I know off :P

yoza

Paint a set of keys on your belly.

Wont be long before you lose it.

matt85

well, ill definately give some of these suggestions a try.

to be honest im pretty sure after reading this thread that it was/is coke/pepsi etc because ive been drinking gallons of it for a while now. i think ill see how long i can go without touching the stuff. im going to make an effort to stick to robinsons orange, water and milk. i knew it didnt help but i wasnt aware of how much of a problem it could be to be honest. also.. i take it that beer/lager gives the same problem? in this case what would you recommend to drink when i go out that could be better?

will try to do a some more abdominal exercises as well. ive bought a stability ball as well so i intend on getting my moneys worth from that.

thanks for all the sensible posts, especially s6pra, much appreciated.

heres hoping that the belly wont get me just yet....

matty01

Eat less - do more. Easily said,doing it's a whole different thing

milo

water.

drinking gallons of pepsi and beer is of course not going to give u a six pack, no matter how much u train and what u eat.

abs are all about diet. no amount of crunches in the world will give u a 6 pack (they will however strengthen your core.. which is a good thing).

fix your diet, drink only water, and you'll be ripped up in no time.

s6pra

6 pack - the elusive goal

It's partly true what was just said. No amount of abdominal crunches will get you a six pack. Fact is, you can develop quite a 6 pack by just doing ab crunches, but who's going to see it when it's buried underneath a lot of flab?

You can tell a bit about what a person eats by just looking at them. People who eat too many sweets will tend to gain a soft kind of "under the skin" type of fat. People who abuse animal fat will develop a deeper build up. Beer belly is one of the symptoms.

And the way your body stores fat is also important in assessing the risk you are under. If your fat is spread all over your body, like arms, stomach, legs, face, then you are less likely to have a heart condition than someone who only stores fat around the stomach area.

But make no mistake, ignoring your fat will get you in a lot of trouble, and in many cases you'll be lucky to make it past 34.

I say this with great concern. John Candy is/was one of my favourite actors but I always knew he wasn't going to make it. He died for the obvious reason, heart attack. Didn't give him any warning either. A sad loss. I know of other people in the same condition who have died prematurely.

All I'm saying is, it's your life, make the best of it!

Everyone knows that white cells in the blood stream are meant to protect us against illness. White cells love muscle because these tissues are full of blood vessels and white cells can go anywhere.

There is little to no blood vessels inside fatty tissues. And white cells can't go there to protect you. Fat is a disease magnet. Just think of it! Lots of energy reserves and no one to patrol them!

Just hoping it helps!

matt85

well, since the 28rd of January ive followed some of the above advise pretty strictly

i havent TOUCHED coke/lemonade since then, just water and orange. my diet hasnt reallychanged THAT much apart from the cutting out of sugary drinks and i still have crap now and again when i feel like it such as most friday nights

ive gone from round about 6'3'' 16 stone to about 14 stone 12. my waist has crept back down to a 'comfortable' 34'' and i look a lot better for it and also now capable of doing 200 press-ups in sets of 50

im also the proud owner of some very tight white t-shirts (LOL)

so, to summarise it appears that coke/pepsi etc was the killer and its done me a world of good by cutting it out (also cut back on the beer as well- sob!)

the six pack hasnt emerged yet but its definately getting there and it should emerge some time in the next few months at this rate. rest assured i will inform you when it does!

carl

No, it's because you're 27. I used to be like that -- could eat/drink whatever I wanted and never put on weight. Then when I hit 30.....

Lord Jeffery Wode esq.

have you tried 'hide and seek'?

ozzy

Age is no excuse. I know people who are 50+ that can still knock out 100's of press-ups and keep a 32" waist.

If you eat too much cr@p, especially sugary foods you'll end up fat.

Some people are just tall skinny runts regardless of age or exercise

milo

good going bro. 2.5 months and you've made a load of progress.

keep the diet clean and get some resistance training in there too.

well done

Dave T-S

I'll be 50 this year. I'm probably the fittest i've ever been. I run three lunchtimes a week, usually to Canary Wharf or Westminster and back, around 10 to 11k (6 to 7 miles) each time in around 49 mins average (normally the fastest in the group I run with).

I also seriously cycle a couple of times a week. I might go out and do a fast 10 miler on my road bike. This morning a couple of mates and I went mountain biking in Thetford Forest and did the black run - about 9 miles pretty much all off road on tracks through the trees - including the Beast of East Anglia section, in about 90 mins total time including rest/drink/pee/post crash recovery Finished covered in mud/water, cold, wet, knackered but totally relaxed and brain freed of all stress and crap

I'm 5' 11", around 70 kg and not a scrap of fat on me - all muscle, more wiry than bulky.

The exercise is obvious, but around a year ago I totally threw my diet in the bin. I cut out ALL dairy produce (milk, butter, cheese etc) and derivatives, ALL processed foods (TV dinners, crisps, biscuits that sort of thing). I try to eat natural whole foods and as much organic as possible.

A typical day will consist of maple wheat flakes and soya milk for breakfast, dried prunes and mixed nuts and raisins for a snack when I get to work, lunch is an apple, banana, two tomatoes, three oranges, 250ml orange juice, a fruit, nut and cereal bar, chicken on stoneground wholemeal bread sandwich, dinner will be a grilled chicken breast with steamed potatoes, broccoli, cauliflower, carrots - as I said as much of this organic as possible.

I drink mostly only water in the day, and loads of it, only one cup of tea a day, and coffee is rare. NO fizzy drinks whatsoever (but I do still drink wine in the evenings ).

I can eat as much of the above stuff as I like and now put no weight on - before I started I was 1.5 stones heavier, mostly round the belly, and it has dropped off and stayed off. Plan is to eat wholefoods, no processed stuff, as little animal fat, no dairy as possible. You have to be highly disciplined to do it but it WORKS

Nick

s6pra

Thanks for your posting - I've printed it for reference!

super_si

Everyone has Ab's its just a layer of fat over them

So just drop the BF, easier said then done i must admit. Id love abs but eating 5000+ cals per day its near impossible to get them anytime soon, just increase the cardio alitte. Im guilty of this, but everyone wants it NOW. Plain and simple, noone wants to work for it

Si

bonkers

Well apart from the dodgy kebab you had after goin' down t'pub the other night - the one that went through faster than Schumacher on a pitstop!

Joking aside, that was an excellent summary mate!

Bonkers.

ChrisB

Dave... I don't see alfalfa in your lunch list there...