Thursday, September 25, 2014

Survival Fitness, Ab Workout Ineffective? - How to Fix It





In a survival situation a certain amount of body fat might be beneficial. It would provide extra energy for your body to pull from. Too much fat would be a very big problem. With the increased work demands there is potential for heart attack and with all that fat movement would be a problem.

I have been an athlete all my life in multiple sports but I have always had a "pooch" on my lower stomach area. When I was training to play Olympic Ice Hockey I did over a thousand reps of different types of ab workouts targeting my tummy. The "pooch" still remained and I had to ask why?

I came across an article in the Huffington Post by Joe Vennare that attempts to answer this question. He says that selectively targeting one area of the body for fat loss in ineffective because your body will burn fat from all over no matter what area you target. If you try to just pump your abs it might be burning fat off your thighs instead.

So what can be done? He says you need to target the whole body with a balanced regiment of strength training, cardio training, and good nutrition. 

While strength training you should be using compound movements. He gives the examples of barbell squats and dead lifts. These exercises target multiple muscles at once. He also says that you should mix in cardio exercises into your strength training, like sprints and sled pushes.

When doing your cardio exercises he uses Ben Greenfield's reference and indicates that you should be doing "long slow sessions on an empty stomach and high intensity cardio vascular intervals." He suggests doing it on an empty stomach because the body will tap into fat reserves rather than using calories you just put in your body. Also he advices that periods of all out effort with a brief recovery period blasts fat and increases your metabolism. This allows the body to continue the fat burning for up to a 24 hour period.

Of course nutrition is also important. Joe suggests a diet that is high in protein. This diet should also include fresh vegetables, fruit, and a healthy fat source like almonds and avocadoe.

Thanks to Joe Vennare for bringing this information to light. You can find his full article at www.huffingtonpost.com.
























Sara F. Hathaway
Sara F. Hathaway is the author of the The Changing Earth Series: Day After Disaster and Without Land. She also hosts The Changing Earth Podcast which blends her fictional stories with educational survival tips. Sara grew up in the country where she developed a profound interest in the natural world around her. After graduating with honors from The California State University of Sacramento with a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration, she launched into a career in business management. In her fictional novels her research and experience with survival techniques and forgotten life-sustaining methods of the generations past come to the forefront in a action packed adventures. She has used her background in business management to pave new roads for fictional authors to follow and she delights in helping other achieve the same success. She currently lives with her husband and two sons in California where she is at work on the sequel to her first two novels. For more information and a free copy of “The Go-Bag Essentials” featuring everything you need to have to leave your home in a disaster visit: www.authorsarafhathaway.com
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