Go from Flab to Fab

With Fitness Expert Susan Ferrari

The dreaded flab!  Flabby arms, flabby legs, flabby stomach….  Who doesn’t battle with one or more of these problem areas?

Let’s look at some causes of flab and ways to combat it:

• High Protein/Low Carb Diets—Low carb diets deplete the healthy glycogen (the storage form of glucose) stored in your muscle and liver.  If you eat protein without enough fuel calories coming from fats & carbs you will convert dietary protein to fuel (energy) leaving no protein for cellular needs.  This in turn will force the body to attack its own lean muscle tissue causing loose skin as well as dehydration.  That’s why people on these types of diets see a significant amount of weight loss.  It’s a combination of body fat, muscle tissue and water loss.  You might be thinking what’s wrong with that?  The problem is that most people don’t last long on these types of diets.  Because of the loss of muscle tissue your body’s metabolism will slow down in turn causing you to gain more body fat then when you started.  Instead, preserve your muscle tissue & the elasticity of your skin by eating a well balanced diet.  Include a variety of low fat protein choices, complex carbohydrates, low fat dairy, fruits & vegetables.  And don’t be hard on yourself if you cheat here and there.  Brush it off and get back on track!
• Lack of Water—Minimal water intake causes dehydration of the skin which in turn loses its elasticity.  Drink at least half your body weight in ounces.  (EX:  150 pounds = 75 ounces of water).  Don’t like plain water then try flavored water or add lemon or any kind of other fruit to your water.  Stay well hydrated daily and your skin will love you for it.
  • Smoking—Smoking damages the elasticity of the skin making it more difficult to tighten flabby skin after weight loss because it deprives the skin of oxygen & nutrients. With a good diet, skin supplements and great skin care you can do a lot to get your youthful skin back.
  • Age—Skin elasticity decreases with age.  If you lose a considerable amount of weight when you’re older it may be harder for the skins elasticity to bounce back to normal.  Give your skin that extra lift with a firming cream.  As we age our skin loses essential skin proteins such as collagen and elastin.  A good skin firming cream may increase the store of collagen & elastin thereby improving skin elasticity.
  • Lack of or Minimal Exercise—We can start to lose muscle tissue at a slow rate as early as the age of 25.  By the time were 35 though we can lose an average of 5 % of our muscle mass every 10 years.  Muscle loss due to lack of exercise will lead to flab. If your already weight training good for you!  But if you still see signs of flabby skin try increasing your weight and dropping the reps.  You may also need to change up your program to shock the muscle into new growth.  And if you have never weight trained before then it’s time to get started.  It’s never too late to build lean muscle tissue.  If your goal is weight loss then make sure you weight train along with doing cardio and eating healthy.  Don’t go with the myth that you should weight train after you lose all the weight.  If you lose weight through cardio and/or diet alone the elasticity of your skin may not go back to normal resulting in flabby skin.  Weight training also increases your metabolism adding in weight loss.  With your cardio workouts you can tone your upper and lower body.  Instead of walking try jogging or walking uphill to tone your legs.  Add some hand weights and you can tone your arms at the same time.  If you use an elliptical or cross trainer increase the incline or intensity level to shape up your legs.

If you need help getting started with an exercise program and healthy eating plan, visit my website at www.myaudibletrainer.com   “My Audible Trainer” is a hot new fitness product that takes the guesswork out of exercising & eating right and gets you results!

Quick Tip:

Tone up a flabby butt while walking up stairs.  Instead of pushing off with the ball of your foot, instead push off with your heels.  By pushing off with your heels you will activate your glute muscles (AKA:  Butt)

GET RID OF THE FLAB ON MY ARMS HELP IS HERE

Many of my female clients in the gym I manage tell me that they hate the flab on the back of their arms and want to know what are the best exercises to make there arms more lean and trim. It is not that simple, the flab on the arms is body fat, no different then the flab around the belly. Getting rid of that extra meat on your arms require, obviouslyarm exercises but more importantly you must reduce your body fat with calorie reduction and cardiovascular exercise. If you reduce your body fat with diet and do the proper arm exercises you’ll see your arms develop into the arms you really want. The muscles will develop slowly from your workouts, and the reduction in your body fat will then create sleek arm muscles. But let’s take this a step further, what are some good arm exercises ?

Try The Antagonist Workouts..What is an Antagonist workout ? Antagonist training means working out different muscle groups during the same workout. There are many ways to manipulate a workout and get the most out of it, but many women have had great success by performing a biceps exercise such as the curl, immediately followed by a triceps exercise, such as the triceps pull down.

Lets Look At The Antagonist Workout A Little Closer, here’s a great example, try performing 3 sets of barbell curls followed by 3 sets of triceps extensions, you would perform the curls, and after completing the reps, immediately go right to the triceps extension exercise. Wait a little while maybe 1 to 2 minutes and then continue the workout cycle (biceps curl followed by triceps extension). Workouts like this will allow you to use more weight because the opposing muscle group is resting as you work the other muscle. If you want to sculpt your arms and get rid of the flab on the back area simply reduce your body fat and try this form of exercise you should see results in no time.

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