What are the best exercises to reduce fat on thighs and stomach?
Well, here’s the bad news. Unfortunately, exercises for a specific area of the body are pretty ineffective for reducing fat in that specific area.
Despite what late night commercials may calim, the only fat that things like Thighmasters separate you from is any excess fat in your wallet. “Spot reducing”—the idea that you can get rid of fat by working the specific area of the body in which frat accumulates—just doesn’t work. Fat won’t come off the belly by doing crunches, no matter how many of them you do.
Does that mean you shouldn’t do crunches? Or thigh exercises? Of course not. Besides supporting your center (core) and helping with your posture, a good ab routine will help ensure that you’ll have some nice muscle tone down there to see once the fat begins to melt away. Ditto with the thighs.
But to get that fat to disappear, you have to do a whole lot more than crunches (or thigh exercises).
See, when you store excess fat on your body, the pattern in which it goes on is pretty much preordained by the manufacturer. As you’ve probably noticed, it usually seems to go off in the reverse order from which it came on (hence the old expression regarding fat: “first on, last off”).
Thigh exercises will firm the muscles under the jiggle, just as crunches will firm the stomach muscles, but neither will get the jiggle off. They will, however, make sure you’ve got some muscle tone to show once that jiggle gets reduced. And they may even help reduce some of the jiggle by making sure that untoned, loose muscles aren’t contributing to the problem.
Here’s what you can do to remove the fat itself:
- Work all your muscles with weights, which will keep your metabolic rate up and make you a more efficient fat-burning machine.
- Change your diet to one built around lean protein and vegetables, like the one we use in Diet Boot Camp. That means no sugar, flour or refined carbohydrates.
- Eat a minimum of starch (and get it from oatmeal, beans and legumes)
- Eat more vegetables
- Eat only low-sugar high-fiber fruit like berries, apples and grapefruit
- Eat double the amount of fiber you think you’re eating! (You can use fiber supplements, in addition to beans and vegetables. You can also sprinkle flaxmeal on everything as well!)
- Be religious about 8-10 glasses of pure water daily
- Don’t eat late at night
Take that list, add rest, relaxation, good thoughts, stress reduction, sunshine, deep breathing and a healthy dose of patience.
You’ll be happy with the results. I promise you.
If you’d like to do more than just spot reduction on your tummy or thighs… and actually want to transform your entire body and outlook on food, then check this out!





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i’d like to point out the fact that most strength coaches are no longer prescribing any types of trunk flexion exercises (sit-ups, crunches) to train the abs as trunk flexion is not really a main function of the abs and according to research by stuart mcgill and many others, crunches can actually be extremely dangerous to the lumbar spine. id recommend checking out his book “ultimate back fitness and performance” as it brings up a very good case against crunches
thanks Zack, that’s great information
warmly
jb
My cousin recommended this blog and she was totally right keep up the fantastic work!
Great article that sets the record straight, when people find out I’m a PT the first question i get asked the most is how to get a 6 pack (guys)/flat stomach (girls) and its very true there are no shortcuts, it takes consistent, good habits!
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