Best Exercises To Lose Belly Fat

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Exercise is always a good part of any weight loss protocol. But are there better exercises to help get rid of belly fat?

In figuring out the best exercises that might be able to help burn abdominal fat, it may be a good idea to begin with a basic understanding of how our muscles use energy.

So in Part 2, let’s talk about muscle use, and exercises for burning fat.

I suggest reading Part 1 of this series first if you haven’t, since it lays down basic knowledge about fat metabolism that will help put the information of this article into perspective.

How muscles use energy

Muscle can get its energy from 2 major sources, glucose, and ketone bodies.

Glycogen is a storage form of glucose, which is a form of carbohydrate. This form of carbohydrate is the preferred source of energy for your muscles to use, it’s very easy to access and convert into energy.

Ketone bodies come from fat that’s being burned for energy. Your muscles don’t like it as much, it’s harder to access, and takes forever to convert into energy.

As a result, fat is burned by your muscles, mostly only in the absence of glycogen.

In other words, if your muscles were presented with both carbohydrate and fat, it would much prefer to burn carbohydrates.

It would only begin to significantly burn fat once the carbohydrate is depleted.

Exercising to lose belly fat

To have your exercises significantly burn more fat, you’d want to minimize the amount of carbohydrate it uses, and maximize the amount of fat it uses. In this respect, there are two main things you could do:

1.) Burn more energy

You could exercise long and intensely enough to burn through all the available carbohydrates. It could take over 2 hours of moderately intense exercise to burn away most of your glycogen.

So to reduce the amount of exercise required, I would suggest combining it with the second thing you can do.

2.) Eat less energy

You could reduce the amount of carbohydrate available to your body during your workouts. You would do this by reducing the amount of carbs in your diet, preworkout meals, or snacks.

You could even consider fasting workouts, basically you’re working out on an empty stomach. You can do this by strictly fasting for around 12 hours before working out, or just exercising in the mornings, before you eat breakfast.

Keep in mind that exercises done during carbohydrate depletion will result in a reduction in exercise capacity.

Don’t be surprised if you’re unable to push yourself as intensely as you’d like, or your workout leaves your feeling more sore than normal.

Types of exercises to lose belly fat

Here’s a commonly cited tip, to do more sit-ups, crunches, or planks, or whatever core abdominal exercises to burn abdominal fat.

While there is nothing intrinsically wrong with this, and it does work, understanding the specifics as to why it works is important to figuring out the most effective way to use it.

Essentially, there is nothing particularly special about abdominal or core exercises that will cause more abdominal fat to be lost.

Any sort of exercise will burn fat.

Abdominal exercises are expected to burn abdominal fat in the very same way leg, chest or arm exercises would.

Working your abdomen is not going to specifically target abdominal fat, but rather fat all over your body… including abdominal fat.

That being said, abdominal exercises will also build abdominal muscle, and the increase in muscle can help build definition, and make it seem like your abdomen is flatter or more sculpted.

Similarly, doing leg or arm exercises are not expected to specifically target leg or arm fat, but can increase the leg or arm muscle size and definition to make them appear less flabby.

So if you’re looking for definition, or for an area to look less flabby, definitely consider workouts that focus on muscles in that area, but understand that while increasing that area’s muscle size and tone can be controlled, fat loss in that specific area cannot be.

With that being said, increasing the overall energy and fat burnt in all of your exercises is a great way to target stubborn fat stores everywhere on your body, including your belly, face, or wherever else.

1.) Exercise larger muscles

Firstly, you can work out larger muscles, like the muscles in your legs and buttocks, by doing things like squats or cycling.

Larger muscles consume more energy when used, simply due to the greater number of energy hungry muscle cells being engaged.

2.) Exercise multiple muscles

Secondly, consider workouts that exercise multiple muscles or muscle groups. These exercises are known as compound exercises, meaning they engage and use many different muscles at once.

Whole body exercises like pushups, cycling, swimming, or zumba, and compound lifts like squats, deadlifts, or dumbbell presses are all great ideas.

There’s absolutely no problem with isolated, single muscle exercises like bicep curls, just remember that working multiple muscles at once is expected to burn more energy and fat.

3.) Exercise with higher intensity

Thirdly, it’s important to remember that if you plan to do exercises, that you exercise effectively to burn fat.

This usually requires higher intensity exercises, ones that will increase your heart rate significantly, and for longer periods of time. Take a look at the info card for more information.

Best exercises for weight loss

Here are some examples of exercises that work larger muscle groups and are likely to burn larger amounts of calories. Whether or not you should use weights or not is entirely up to you and your comfort level, however, heavier weights will mean more calories burned.

Machines/weights

• Deadlifts – Deadlifts are a compound exercise that works the muscles of the back, including the lats and traps, as well as the muscles of the legs, including the quadriceps, hamstrings, and glutes.
• Bench press – The bench press is a compound exercise that works the muscles of the chest, triceps, and shoulders.
• Overhead press – The overhead press is a compound exercise that works the muscles of the shoulders, triceps, and upper back.
• Rows – Rows are a compound exercise that work the muscles of the back, including the lats and traps, as well as the muscles of the arms, including the biceps and forearms.
• Barbell squats – Barbell squats are a compound exercise that work the muscles of the legs, including the quadriceps, hamstrings, and glutes. They use a barbell weight to increase the resistance.
• Leg press – The leg press is a compound exercise that works the muscles of the legs, including the quadriceps, hamstrings, and glutes. It is performed on a leg press machine, which uses weights to increase the resistance.

No weights required

• Squats – Squats are a compound exercise that works the muscles of the legs, including the quadriceps, hamstrings, and glutes.
• Pull-ups – Pull-ups are a compound exercise that works the muscles of the back, including the lats and traps, as well as the muscles of the arms, including the biceps and forearms.
• Lunges – Lunges are a compound exercise that works the muscles of the legs, including the quadriceps, hamstrings, and glutes.
• Burpees – Burpees are a full-body compound exercise that works the muscles of the chest, shoulders, triceps, legs, and core.
• Push-ups – Push-ups are a compound exercise that works the muscles of the chest, triceps, and shoulders.
• Dips – Dips are a compound exercise that work the muscles of the chest, triceps, and shoulders.
• Step-ups – Step-ups are a compound exercise that work the muscles of the legs, including the quadriceps, hamstrings, and glutes.
• Planks – Planks are a compound exercise that work the muscles of the core, as well as the muscles of the arms, legs, and back.
• Jumping jacks – Jumping jacks are a compound exercise that work the muscles of the legs, including the quadriceps, hamstrings, and glutes, as well as the muscles of the arms, shoulders, and core.
• High knees – High knees are a compound exercise that work the muscles of the legs, including the quadriceps, hamstrings, and glutes, as well as the muscles of the core.
• Squat jumps – Squat jumps are a compound exercise that work the muscles of the legs, including the quadriceps, hamstrings, and glutes, as well as the muscles of the core.
• Box jumps – Box jumps are a compound exercise that work the muscles of the legs, including the quadriceps, hamstrings, and glutes, as well as the muscles of the core.
• Mountain climbers – Mountain climbers are a compound exercise that work the muscles of the legs, including the quadriceps, hamstrings, and glutes, as well as the muscles of the core.

Summary

To sum it up, choose any exercise that you will be able to do safely, consistently, and with enough physical intensity to get your heart rate up high enough to effectively burn fat.

You can look for compound workouts to get the best bang for your buck.

Also, consider reducing the amounts of dietary carbohydrates you consume in and around your workouts.

Unless you’re trying to add muscle to certain areas, don’t worry too much about which exercises might be better for belly fat or buttock fat.

Any exercise that helps burn fat, will burn fat stores everywhere.

In our next article of this series, we’ll take a look at what foods to avoid if you’re trying to burn fat.

Learn more about

• Exercising for Weight Loss

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