Gym Rat Fitness Personal Training Magazine

If you’re ready to get serious about fat loss, do yourself a favour and steer clear of fad diets and calorie restricting. Instead, try these super-easy tips and tricks to help you become the best version of you!

Refuelling hazard

Ever felt ravenous after a workout? Make sure you come prepared – bring a protein shake or healthy snack to consume post-workout. I’ll save you from making decisions that will hamper your results.

Ditch the boyfriend

Don’t panic – it’s only for the workout. Men usually burn more calories than women in the same workout due to being heavier, in addition to which Mother Nature acts to protect women’s role as child bearer, which means we maintain adequate body fat for nourishing healthy babies. Doing your partner’s workout, then, might end up with him shedding pounds but you only shedding tears. Go solo, girl!

Turn on the afterburners

Excess post-exercise oxygen consumption (EPOC) is the term given to the body’s attempts to recharge and restore itself immediately after a workout, a process that results in additional calorie burn. Research has shown that high-intensity interval training leads to greater EPOC than steady cardio workouts, so turn up the dial with alternate bouts of maximum effort and rest for serious results. Try the Tabata format – eight periods of 20 secs full-out work followed by 10 secs recovery.

Muscle up to slim down

Building lean muscle mass will speed up your metabolic rate and promote fat burn – so get strength training. Compound exercises that use bigger muscle groups will be most effective – like squats, deadlifts and kettlebell swings.

Running on empty

Exercising in the morning before your first meal is a great way to shed fat. Research shows that fasting (which is essentially what happens overnight as we sleep) leads to increased adrenaline and reduced insulin levels, creating an environment that is more conductive to the breakdown of fat for energy. If you’re not used to this, though, ease yourself in and remember to stay hydrated.

Team tactics

When it comes to fitness, it’s easy to fall into a rut by doing the same workouts over and over – especially if you’re partial to studio classes. So give your fat-loss hopes a sporting chance by joining a football, hockey or tennis club. Not only will variation keep you motivated, these sports incorporate the need for repeated bursts of effort (interval training) that we know burns fat.

Up and down

Alternating your exercises between upper and lower body in a circuit format results in an extra calorie burn because your cardiovascular system has to work harder. Peripheral Heart Action training, as this is known, challenges the heart to keep pushing blood from one part of the body to another, in order to deliver oxygen to fuel the muscles. A routine like this also allows you to move straight from one exercise to the next, as muscle groups get a chance to rest, so you can get your workout done quicker.

Explode the fat

Also known as jump training, plyometric exercises involve stretching the muscles prior to explosively contracting them. Think burpees, box jumps and jumping lunges; all of which result in high calorie expenditure, making them a valuable weapon in your fat-loss armoury.

From time saving to fat burn, high-intensity exercise is one of the best ways to get more bang for your buck at the gym. And the fastest method? It’s got to be Tabata. Warm-up and cool-down aside, the workout lasts only four minutes including rest periods. There really are no cons to this no-frills, super-speedy method. Don’t forget to do some mobility exercises to warm up and stretches to cool down.

Perform 20 seconds of a resistance exercise such as squats, kettlebell swings or medicine ball slams, followed by 10 seconds complete rest. Repeat eight times.

2 Circuits

If you have a little more time, make use of the fancy equipment on offer at the gym. Good health clubs will have TRX, kettlebells and sandbags on offer, and you’d be a fool not to use them. Check out our Workout Routines for ways to work out using all kinds of gym equipment. Remember to keep rest periods short and intensity high if your goal is to burn fat.

3 Cardio

If you prefer using cardio machines but don’t fancy a spin class, why not combine various machines in one session to avoid getting bored? Try 15 minutes on the treadmill, 15 minutes on the bike and 15 minutes on the rowing machine – you could even throw in some resistance exercises between each transition to spice things up. Interval training is a good option, but beginners can always start off with a steady pace.