With the advances in the production of fast and convenient gastronomic fare, it has become a real challenge for people to keep their weight down. Believe it or not, recent CDCP figures say 66% of Americans are above their ideal weight. Perhaps that’s why people with highly-defined midsections are becoming harder to run into at the beach.
It’s not that we’re not trying- the market is chock-full of diet products and exercise gadgets that are flying off shelves. Fad diets and workout schemes are also making a killing and this just shows how desperate people are to get lose weight and get six pack abs.
Contrary to the perception of the general public, the path to six pack abs doesn’t rely on countless sit-ups and crunches. In fact, focusing too much on the abdominal muscles can even lead to strain on the lower back. Expensive, gimmicky gadgetry featured on fitness infomercials aren’t the answer either. Diet shakes and low-fat food? Forget it! Studies prove that we tend to eat 75% more when we’re eating diet food.
Developing six pack abs is all about having a low body fat percentage. Muscle definition, especially around the abdomen will be non-existent if we still have a substantial amount of subcutaneous fat- no matter how many sit-ups and leg raises we perform each day.
Since most of the food modern urbanites dine on have a high caloric content, relying on office work or doing house chores to burn-off excess calories will definitely result in a flabby gut. The only way to make sure we’re losing fat is by using-up more calories than we’re eating and that is through daily intense physical activity.
Intense total body exercise maximizes the amount of calories we burn per workout session. Only by getting as much muscle groups working can we hope to get lean enough to get the 10% body fat index required to bring out a well-defined abdomen and improve joint strength.
Working-out consistently also strengthens and develops muscle tissue and in turn reinforces the joints of the body- making them last longer as we grow old. Strong connective tissue around our joints prevents injury which can keep us from being consistent with our exercise regimen and prolonging the process to a chiseled abdomen.
There is a definite correlation between high obesity cases and osteoarthritis in the U.S. Maintaining a regular exercise regimen will be the proverbial stone that can help solve both of those problems while paving the way to an attractive, well-defined midsection.