SolveYourProblem Article Series: Exercise & Fitness
What Are The Most Effective Ways
To Exercise & Get Into Shape?

Shape and Tone Your Waistline

Shaping and toning the waistline is one of the top areas of concern for both men and women of all ages. Go to any gym and you’ll see dozens of people lining up for belly dancing, crunch classes, and anything else that promises to shrink your waistline fast. The fact is that shaping and strengthening any part of the body always takes time and you typically have to wait two to three weeks before you can tell any real difference. The waistline in particular can be a challenging area to tone, but if you stick with it you will see results.

Most people want their waistlines to be slimmer for appearances’ sake, but the government is concerned about waistlines for an entirely different reason. Several independent scientific studies over the past few years have shown that men with a waist measurement greater than 40 inches and women with a measurement greater than 35 inches are at increased risk for heart disease and stroke. Think about it that way and it becomes even more important to slim the waistline down and keep it toned.

Shrinking your waistline should be addressed with a two-pronged plan: diet and exercise. It’s not much use to spend hours working on the waist if you go out and eat a burger and fries afterward. The most successful programs to shape up the body address both exercise and food intake to increase the odds of success. When you’re talking about slimming the waist, there will be some measure of fat reduction involved and that requires exercise as well as the proper diet to fuel your body and avoid empty calories that lead to more fat. You can see that in order to get the best results you need address more than one area; hence the exercise and diet approach.

Thinking about diet, there’s not really a need to go on any specific diet to see results. Simply maintain a healthy diet that incorporates plenty of vegetables and fresh fruit as well as adequate protein and unsaturated fat. Keep a food journal to track your meals and exactly what is going in your mouth and body every day. This can be a powerful tool to identify problem areas and cravings. One thing you may want to avoid while working on the waistline is too much fiber. Since fiber is bulky, it fills the stomach up faster but it can also lead to bloating. To have the flattest stomach possible, avoid eating too much fiber without pairing it with plenty of water or fresh fruit to help move it through the system. Also cut back on sodium to avoid bloating from water retention. The typical adult diet contains more than 3500 mg of sodium – over one thousand milligrams more than the recommended daily allowance. Smart people will cut back on sodium not just to avoid bloat but to decrease risk of high blood pressure and kidney disease.

You’re eating healthy and keeping a daily journal to track your food intake. Now what? It’s time to think about cardiovascular exercise! There are some cardio exercises that are better than others for toning, but if you have fat around the middle you need to lose that first before concentrating on toning and shaping the muscles of the middle. Excellent activities that promote weight loss are swimming, brisk walking, and interval training. Swimming is among the highest calorie-burning activities because of the way the water supports your body. Since your muscles don’t have to split attention between keeping your frame upright and moving you forward, they will expend more effort (calories) in propelling you through the water. Swimming is also great because water requires a greater effort to push against it and move forward, requiring greater effort from muscles. Thus you burn a larger amount of calories and fat.

Brisk walking is also good for burning calories but try to stay away from flat surfaces and instead walk in hilly areas that will surprise and challenge your muscles. You duplicate that effect by using a treadmill that has an adjustable incline. Some treadmills have programs that replicate walking in a hilly area and adjust the incline throughout the workout to strengthen and tone more than one area. Include arm movements with your walk and you boost your heart rate and metabolism, firing more calories in the process. Interval training is a good choice as well because of the amount of calories you can burn during a workout. It can incorporated with brisk walking whether you’re at the gym or on the street; simply make sure your strength training equipment is nearby so you can switch from cardio to strength training quickly and easily.

Burn the fat away from your middle and you’re halfway to having the waistline of your dreams. The last step of the successful waistline shrinkage program is to work the waist with toning exercises. Performing sit-ups is a time-honored method of firming the stomach but won’t really make your waistline any smaller. Instead, try a hula-hoop (seriously!) or take a waistline-focused class from your gym. Belly dancing is also great for slimming the sides and can burn a fair amount of calories, but don’t let it take the place of your regular cardio workout. Cover all your bases with diet, exercise and toning, and before you know it your waistline will be slim and trim!

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by SolveYourProblem.com : 2005