The women's fitness blog

Labels: thighs, toning

Is it possible to lose weight by drinking more water?

Yes, certainly.

The main reason behind this assertion is that water contains no calories. If you substitute any other fluid you normally drink during a day for water, then you’ll automatically reduce your intake of calories. Water also partly fills the stomach before eating, so drinking water before a meal may help you to eat less of your meal and thus take in fewer calories.

A feeling of lethargy may actually be the reason some dieters don’t feel like exercising and burning off extra calories. In many cases, a lack of energy can be due to a state of dehydration therefore, another positive point of drinking more water is to help increase energy llevels. In fact, there are some people who have lost weight by just drinking more water without any dieting or exercise help. Following this idea won’t make you lose huge amounts of weight, but I really believe it is a good way to start getting into shape, especially by those who don’t have much time to get out and exercise much. The initial results could help boost motivation to continue towards a new exercise program coupled with a healthy eating regime.

How Much Water Should I Be Drinking to Lose Weight?

Our body needs water for all health functions; flushing out toxins, lubricating joints, producing energy and chemical reactions are just a few. If you do not provide the body with enough water, it will take it from other areas of the body causing some common health complaints; headache, joint pains, constipation, lethargy and poor concentration. Although, in some cases these could have alternative explanations, it is worth thinking about drinking more water to eliminate this as a possible cause. With this in mind, it’s hard to drink too much water. So ideally you should drink regularly enough that you are never thirsty.

Obviously, check with your doctor before any dramatic increase in fluid intake. If you have any unusual medical condition, or you need to take certain medications, then drinking more water may affect your condition, so best to be safe and check first!!

Labels: health, nutrition, water

How do I get a flat tummy with some nice firm abs? This post will give you some easy to use and very simple tips that will help you out.

These are some very general tips. You can implement them all at once or take what you like and leave the rest. It is a good idea to collect as many useful abs tips as possible as you never know when they might be useful.

1. Train your lower abs first

The lower abs are smaller, weaker and usually less developed than their upper counter-parts. It is for this reason that you need to train them first. If you train the upper abs first the lower abs will be too tired to perform at their peak when it comes time to train them and as such won’t develop as fast.

The best lower abs exercises are one that use the legs. For exampl, leg raises and reverse crunches.

2. Diet, Diet, Diet

When I say diet I do NOT mean go on a crazy low carb, low fat diet that lasts for a month and makes you really unwell. What I mean is that diet is the most important thing when it comes to getting a flatter tummy and firmer abs. You need to remove the layer of fat on the abs to let the muscles show through. The best way to control that fat is through your diet.

Eating little but often and eating healthy meals is the best way to do this.

3. Constantly increase your intensity/work rate

When training the abs it is important not to do the same thing day in, day out for months at a time. At the gym I see scores of women doing the same abs workouts everytime they are there. Do they make progress? No. When you train your abs you should be constantly thinking of new ways to shock and push your abs muscles to grow, as well as your cardio which helps you burn more fat. Add weight, change the speed, add a twist - anything to make it a little different.

This also makes it fun and keeps you interested.

4. Don’t over work the abs

If you workout your abs too often the muscles will have no chance to rebuild. Muscle growth only occurs when the abs are worked and then have time to rebuild. If you work them too often you are really only being counter-productive. Three times a week should be the max.

Conclusion
Abs training should be fun. Try to mix it up and not let yourself do the same thing too often. This is always a big help on the road to getting a flatter tummy with better looking abs.

Labels: abs

Where is the Butt (Gluteus Maximus)? The scientific name for the butt is the gluteus maximus or "glutes" for short. It is the round muscle below the back and hips that is involved with almost any motion that the leg makes in case there is someone out there who doesn’t know where their butt is!

The Glutes are made up of several muscles that are termed the Gluteal muscles of which the maximus is the most powerful. It is this muscle that we need to target when working on shaping and achieving a sexy, firm butt.

Working Out the Butt

Working out the butt isn’t that hard. It is worked almost anytime we use our legs and as such the way to make muscle gains is to intensify what you do normally.

The following motions and exercises work the glutes really well:

• Stair Climbing
• Hill running
• Bike Riding
• Sprinting
• Lunges
• Squats

Now, we are never going to shape and tone our butt if we just do normal squats, just going through the motions. Likewise, we are not going to make any progress by just wandering up some stairs. Like any muscle, in order to make it grow we need to add resistance by adding weight or intensity. The best and most traditional way to shape the butt is with weights at the gym. I will go over some of the simple ways later.

Getting a Toned Butt...

Getting a toned butt is an emotional task. It can take a very long time and the results can be painfully slow. However, with the information contained in this post and this blog losing that fat butt will be as painless as possible. Here are the important aspects that you MUST DO if you want to lose your fat butt as fast as possible:

1 - All over weight loss
You guessed it! If you want to have a good looking and shapely butt you need to lose the fat that is covering it. It is like any muscle, if you want people to be able to see the definition and tone you need to remove the layer of fat that is covering it.

Now, I don’t want to get into an argument about whether a big booty is better than a small one. I like them both! This post is for women who want to lose weight off their butt and as such will focus solely on that.

The fact of the matter is you cannot lose fat off of only one area of your body. If you want a toned and firm butt you need to lose fat off of your entire body.

In order to lose weight quickly you need to use three things well:

1. Diet;
2. Weight Training; and
3. Cardio

This post will look at all three things briefly. In order to lose weight you need to, very simply, burn more calores than you take in. You do this by boosting your metabolism with the right foods and the right types and amounts of cardio.

2 - Cardio Hard!
Have you ever seen a footballer or a runner or a bike rider with a bad butt? I haven’t. They do so much running and lunging and all sorts of movements that work the glutes. If you want to tone and shape your butt then you should do like they do.

The types of cardio that are best for the butt are the hard ones! Sprinting up hills, lunging, jumping squats and all that kind of stuff. You see, if you increase the elevation of the surface or do cardio that makes you bend over more then your butt will get more use. So, if you wan to shape and tone your butt while you are doing cardio, pick a hard one.

3 - Weight Training
Weight training for the butt isn’t that hard. It is essential. Not only does weight training shape your butt muscles, it makes your metabolism speed up and as such you will burn more fat and absorb less calories as fat during the day. All of these are the perfect ingredients for toning a muscle!

The Best Weight Training Exercises for the Butt

As I have mentioned, adding resistance to natural movements is the best idea. Here are the best butt exercises:

1. The Jumping Squat
   I have mentioned this baby before. It will leave your whole lower body burning and begging that you never do it again. Fast results with this one.
2. Weighted Lunge
   Careful if you have bad knees, otherwise a perfect exercise.
3. Step Ups
   Start with a light weight and gradually increase.
4. Hill Sprints
   One of my all time favourites!
5. Leg Press Machine
   One of the few machines that I use at the gym. Keep a wider stance on this one with some heavy weights to really work your butt.

These are just some of the best exercises. These five are more than enough to do the job if you do them well. Does anyone have any others they love to use?

Labels: butt, fat loss, glutes

Your resting heart rate is how many times your heart beats per minute. The measurement should be taken when you are laying down and breathing normally and most health professionals say it is best to check it in the morning after a good nights sleep.

The heart rate is often used as a measure of a persons physical fitness and as such it is good to measure it now and again.

A resting heart rate for women is considered “normal” if it is between about 70-80 beats per minute.

What affects your resting heart rate?

The resting heart rate is affected by:

• age
• sex (men are lower usually)
• physical fitness
• some drugs/medication
• genetics
• anxiety

Some people simply have a higher/lower resting heart rate that cannot be attributed to any specific cause. Many scientific studies have shown that a resting heart rate really isn’t an effective way of measuring the health of a person although they say anything above about 84 beats per minute is erring on dangerous.

A better measurement of physical fitness

I would like to argue, however, that a much better method of checking your physical fitness is to measure your heart rate after exercise and see how long it takes to get back to resting rate. This is called the recovery rate and is much more important when looking at how fit you are.

Target heart rate

When exercising some people like to know how fast their heart should be beating to maximize their weight loss or fitness potential. I have never really been interested in all that though as it seems like an overly complicated exercise. I know when I’m making progress.

Lowering Blood Pressure

Blood pressure is also an indication of a healthy heart and something older people should pay attention to. A lot of people want to know how to lower their blood pressure and this clinically proven device is one such way. Doctors recommend the Respirate Duo blood pressure lowering device as one of the best methods on the market.

Prevent and Reverse Heart Disease

Finally I would like to suggest some further reading. There are many books about the heart but Prevent and Reverse Heart Disease is the most important. Dr. Esselstyn conducted the biggest research and came up with the most accurate results. If you want to learn about how the heart works and what you can do to lengthen your life by protecting the heart then this book is for you. I suggest anyone who is over 40 reads it