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March 18, 2017

Listen To This To Find Secrets To How Spot Reducing Fat From Your Stomach, Hips and Thighs

Fitness, Nutrition, Exercise, Weight loss, Body Fat, Podcast


Nathan: Hi, I’m Nathan from the DVCC and today I’m here with Josh Stapleton. Josh, how are you?

Josh: I’m very good.

Nathan: Welcome to the show; I just wanted to talk to you today about how to reduce body fat, or spot reduce body fat; it is something that I get asked quite often and I am sure you do as well, so I just wanted to shed some light on the subject.

belly-fat-fastFirst of all, can you spot reduce body fat by targeting it via exercise?

Josh: There have been numerous studies that have tested this and it’s been shown that you actually can but the effect is so negligible that it’s essentially not worth it.

Nathan: So for somebody who wants to spot reduce or wants to reduce fat from around their stomach, doing hundreds and hundreds of …

Josh: Thousands and thousands of crunches a day is not going to do anything.

Nathan: Ok. I suppose one of the main reasons behind that is because when you do crunches you’re actually working a muscle, you’re not actually targeting the fat, correct?

Josh: Yes, so you could hypertrophy the muscle, which means you could develop the size and strength of your abs by doing crunches, but in terms of reducing any fat to the area – no.

Nathan: So in terms of ways that you can burn fat – a lot of people have spoken to me about them and you see them everywhere – tablets in the form of fat burners. In your experience – although I suppose you’ve never really tried fat burners – can you explain to me what your thoughts are about fat burners?

Josh: Actually, years and years ago I did try them – I make a point of trying a lot of things just to see whether they work – and for me, no. I actually found it quite an unpleasant experience. I’m quite sensitive to stimulants and a lot of these fat burners are just mainly caffeine with a lot of other nasty things in there. I found I was getting the shakes, I felt very hot all the time and was sweating more often. Sometimes it can suppress your appetite, which is obviously not a long term solution to the problem. They are all quick fixes. What you really want to do is address the nutrition.

Nathan: So just changing up the things that you eat.

Josh: Yes.

motivationat531Nathan: Charles Poliquin, a very renowned strength conditioning trainer and coach, says that by changing your nutritional habits and by targeting areas in the body by affecting the way that hormones are produced, you can burn fat from certain areas. For example, fat storage on the stomach is to do with cortisol, correct?

Josh: Correct.

Nathan: So what could somebody do to reduce cortisol levels and target fat stores on their stomach?

Josh: To explain a little bit more about what a bio signature is, this is based on Poliquin’s study of his own athletes, of which there have been many over 20+ years. This is what he has found to be true and it has been backed up by other studies since. Essentially, body fat can be stored in certain areas around the body, depending on whether hormones are high, low or just out of balance.

There are a few areas around the body; one of those you mentioned which is a really popular one, is fat storage around the belly button area, which is due to elevated cortisol.

Cortisol, which some of you might know, is your body’s stress hormone. This is being produced any time you get stressed; it could be environmental stress, it could be that you have had a stressful day at work or you have had an argument, it could be that you are late for a meeting - any time you are stressed. Eating foods that you are intolerant to could also produce cortisol. Some of the things that you can do to reduce fat around your belly button by reducing cortisol include: cutting out a lot of the common food intolerances, so things like wheat, gluten, dairy, soy; eggs can be another one. Cutting out anything that you are intolerant to will reduce cortisol and therefore reduce body fat around your stomach. In terms of other things you can do, magnesium supplementation has been shown to have a very good effect on the way your body deals with cortisol and will effectively reduce your belly fat.

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Nathan: Awesome. That’s magnesium bisglycinate, specifically.

Josh: Yes, with supplements you get what you pay for; if you go to a supermarket you’re going to get magnesium oxide. It’s not bad as a laxative but for anything else it’s not so good. If you go to Holland and Barrett you might get magnesium citrate which is one step up, but still not the best. Magnesium bisglycinate is really what you would be after if you were looking to optimise belly fat reduction.

Nathan: Apart from storing belly fat, what would be another sign of having high stress levels or a high amount of cortisol?

Josh: Probably the main one that comes to mind is lack of sleep. What is meant to happen is at the end of the day, our cortisol levels are meant to be really low, so you drift off to sleep really easily, have a really good night’s unbroken sleep – so from the moment your head hits the pillow until the moment your alarm wakes you up you should be asleep, not getting up to go to the toilet or anything like that.

And then, consequently, when you wake up in the morning your cortisol level is meant to be very high and you wake up easily; you don’t need to press snooze on your alarm and you are ready to “seize the day”.

sleepdeprivationNathan: Seize the day, awesome.

Josh: But actually these days it’s been proven that we are 100 times more stressed than we were 100 years ago, so with the stresses of jobs etc., people’s cortisol tends to be very high when they get to bed.

I know a lot of people who struggle to sleep, so there’s another area where reducing cortisol will have a benefit. Magnesium again is shown to have very positive effects on having a good night’s sleep, so when you wake up you feel rested and rejuvenated.

Nathan: That sleep is very good for fat loss, because when you are asleep you produce one of the most powerful hormones, growth hormone.

Josh: Exactly.

Nathan: Sleep is more powerful than you think.

What about if somebody was storing body fat around the thighs and glute area?

Josh: Thighs and glutes is oestrogen, so it tends to be more of a problem for females. One of the best things you could do would be to increase the amount of fibrous vegetables that you eat: things like broccoli, cauliflower and cabbage, etc: they are called cruciferous vegetables. This would be the best to change that.

Nathan: I have read that watercress is also a superfood and is also very good for lowering oestrogen. Another thing you could do is stop microwaving Tupperware, that’s not ideal as it increases your oestrogen; also drinking out of reusable sports bottles, things like that.

Josh: Yes, don’t reuse water bottles, things like that; keep them out of the sun. If you are going to get a water bottle, BPA free would be the way to go.

Nathan: Anything else you want to talk about today, Josh? Anything else you want to recap on?

Josh: One other thing I think people about there will want to know a little bit about – the whole muffin top thing, because it is a common problem. That’s to do with insulin; so insulin is secreted any time your body will have anything sweet, sugar. Eating more sugar leads to eating sugar again down the line, so it’s a vicious circle.

One of the best things you can do, aside from obviously stopping eating sweet things, is increase the amount of oily fish you eat, so wild Alaskan salmon or sardines, things like that, or just taking a fish oil supplement would be a really beneficial thing there.

Nathan: And if you were having a high level of insulin, it would be storing around the hips – is that what you’re saying?

Josh: Yes: hips - and another area is your back and on your shoulders; so if you do find that you store fat around there, then definitely look into taking fish oil supplements or eating more oily fish in your weekly nutrition, this would be a beneficial thing for you to obviously reduce that.

Nathan: And I suppose changing the carbohydrates you’re eating; so for example if you’re eating pasta and potato, a good change would be something like quinoa or sweet potato.

Josh: Yes, anything that has what’s called a lower glycemic load would be very beneficial. But just in general, eating much lower carbohydrates, so increasing the amount of protein and healthy fats you have and generally sticking to fibrous vegetables would be a really beneficial thing to reduce fat.

Nathan: I think a lot of people worry when they are going to cut their carbs out that they are going to have less energy; but it has been proven that when you eat a higher percentage of fat and protein and a smaller amount of carbs, you have more energy.

Josh: Yes, personally I feel a lot better and it is why I’ve done it for so many years because I feel so much better doing it this way; it’s only through trying it that I’ve found that out – so if you’re curious, give it a go.

Nathan: Awesome. Josh, it’s been a pleasure speaking to you today.

Josh: You too, Nathan.

Nathan: If you’ve been listening to this Podcast, I hope you have enjoyed it – have a very good day.

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