What is Belly Fat and How to Lose It
How to Lose Belly Fat
Understanding how to lose belly fat is a growing concern nowadays as more and more people are becoming more aware of the health dangers involved with having those extra fat layers in the midsection. Excess belly fat is linked to a higher risk of developing cardiovascular diseases, diabetes, and other diseases that can eventually lead to other serious conditions, or even death.
How we get fat
Before we know how to lose belly fat, we should try to understand where it comes from. As people reach the age of 40 – 45, fats start to replace the muscles in our bodies, especially in the abdomen area. The hormones, estrogen for women and testosterone for men, responsible for regulating the flow of fat and its spread in the different parts of the body generally stop being produced as people advance in years, thus causing the “spare tires” to appear in the belly.
Studies show that the risk of heart diseases and diabetes can be reduced to as much as 60% if the abdominal fat can be reduced by even 5% to 10% only. This is why it’s so important to seriously think about how to lose belly fat as fast as you possibly can.
What can we do to lose belly fat?
Learning how to lose belly fat is not that simple and actually entails a lot of discipline and control. The good news however, is that abdominal fat is the first fat to go when you do start losing weight. This is because most of our belly fat is visceral fat, and it’s much easier to metabolize than the fat under the skin called subcutaneous fat.
To get rid of our ‘love handles’ requires a combination of eating the right food and doing the appropriate exercises. Exercise is very important of course, especially cardio and strength training, but first of all we are going to look at the importance of diet.
How to lose belly fat by dieting
Diet plays a very important role in your goal to throw off that excess fat around your waist. The first thing to remember on when trying to work out how to lose belly fat is to eliminate the “five c’s” that would include: chips, cookies, cola, candy, and cake.
In recent published articles, it is suggested that you need to eat 1,600-calorie meals rich in MUFA or Mono Unsaturated Fatty Acid, which is the kind of fat that is regarded as “good” fat. MUFA can be found in nuts, avocados, chocolate, soybeans, olives, seeds and cooking oils such as canola, olive, sesame, and the like.
Studies also indicate that the extra fat in the waistline can be trimmed by eating whole grains enriched food that are higher in fiber content rather than choosing meals with refined grains. Refined foods such as white bread causes your body to have elevated blood sugar levels triggering an increased insulin response that deposits fat more readily.
Eating 5 to 6 small fat-friendly meals is also recommended over 3 large meals per day as these mini meals boost metabolism, thus, your body will use up more energy as it digests more frequently.
It’s important to know what to drink as well if you want to know how to lose belly fat. Water will always be the best, most essential drink as your body needs water to function properly especially in burning that fat. However, fresh fruit juices are a great tasting alternative. Things to avoid include non-healthy drinks like full-fat dairy drinks and softdrinks.
In general, how to lose belly fat is dependent upon your choice of food. Refrain from eating fatty foods and have that strong will power to shy away from the tempting, mouth-watering sinful foods.
How to lose belly fat through exercise
We need to take exercise as seriously as we take eating the right foods. Dieting will not work if you simply sit on your backside all day long!
By regularly exercising, we can reduce belly fat by as much as 10% to 15% in just a few short months. Start working out slowly until you are fit enough to begin intensive exercises. Do not rush straight into intensive exercise as doing so could be dangerous. The idea is to get fit, through regular jogging and light cardio, and then once you are ready for it, combine your diet with intensive work outs for maximum impact and belly fat loss.
Knowing how to lose belly fat is all about knowing the right kind of exercises to do. You need to do two things: Strength training, as this will increase your metabolism and burn the belly fat off faster, and you should also do regular cardio, as this is a quick way of burning off fat as well.
