The Best Exercises To Lose Belly Fat.

"What are the best exercises to lose belly fat" much be one of the most searched fitness questions on the whole internet. Which is why I'm going to answer it for you all, because when I took a look into the top results on google for that exact question I wasn't blown away by the answers. But before I give you my top 5 exercises to help you lose belly fat or get 6 pack abs, we just need to touch base on a couple of key concepts first. 1) You cannot spot reduce fat. 2) You only lose body-fat when in a calorie deficit. So firstly, even if you reaaaaaallllyyyy want to lose belly fat, you can target where the bodyfat you lose is going to come from. It is going to come off generally. Some from your belly, some from your legs, some from your back and so on. So in essence, there is no one exercise that will specifically target the bodyfat you're currently storing on your belly. PLUS, you can do as many amazing exercises as you want, all of them super effective and crazy high intensity, but if you're eating too much and not maintaining a calorie deficit over a period of time... you won't lose bodyfat. So eating fewer calories than you consume has to be your priority when it comes to losing belly fat. But that being said, there are some exercises I would absolutely prioritise for clients who want to lose belly fat. So here are my top 5 exercises to lose belly fat. 1) A Heavy Squat Or Deadlift First up I will prioritise a heavy squat or deadlift where possible. That could be a back squat, front squat, or goblet squat. It could be a conventional deadlift, sumo deadlift or hex bar deadlift. The key thing is that it is going to be heavy for the individual, and the aim is to get stronger on that exercise. Why? These exercises recruit the vast majority of the muscles in your body, and focus on the largest and strongest muscles in your body (your quads, hamstrings and glutes). This means that they: A) Have a high calorie burn in the moment. B) Help you burn more calories in future workouts as you get stronger. C) Help you build muscle which burns more calories at rest. So from one exercises, you can get about as much calorie burn bang -for-buck now, tomorrow, and long into the future. 2) Pull-Ups Pull-ups are a incredible exercise for anyone, but particularly great for someone looking to lose belly fat for a few key reasons: Firstly, they are great for recruiting a huge amount of upper body muscle including the abdominals, which is beneficial for all of the same reasons as the squat or deadlift above. Secondly, they make a PERFECT superset exercise for heavy squats. It creates a lower body push/upper body pull superset, and the bar will be at the perfect height for barbell pull-ups for those who can't do full bodyweight reps yet. These combined make for a quick and efficient whole body high recruitment superset that you can do on one station in the gym. Thirdly, as I mentioned pull-ups recruit the abdominals a lot more than you think. They create the link between your upper body pulling muscles and the weight of your legs and help you to position your body and control your swing throughout the movement when done well. In fact, they'll recruit your abdominals more that a lot of the traditional crunch or sit-up exercises you're used to seeing in fitspo ab workouts online. Finally, pull-ups are a great motivator to lose bodyweight in the form of body fat (or specifically belly fat), as they're significantly easier to do when you're lighter. Having this as a performance goal alongside your fat loss goal can be really motivating and keep your training and eating well for longer. 3) Hill Sprints In terms of cardio, nothing will be bigger bang-for-buck in calorie burning terms than hitting some sprints. My preference is hill sprint on a gradual incline as they have a lower entry point for people who haven't sprinted in a while. The speed is lower making it easier on your hamstrings, and the ground contact forces are lower making it easier on your knees and ankles. Build yourself up over time starting with lower volume sub-maximal reps (6-8 reps at 70% speed with 2-3 minutes rest), and gradually increase. Over time these will jack your heart rate up HIGH, burn calories in the moment and after your workout, and get you feeling as athletic as you're going to look. 4) Bike Variants Next up are variations of the indoor bike, namely the Assault Bike and Concept 2 Bike Erg. The Assault Bike is a great substitute for hill sprints if you're unable or unwilling to hit the hills. It's a piece of kit that is designed to help you burn calories fast and is really well suited to high intensity work where you want to hit the ground running every interval. The Concept 2 Bike Erg would be my preference for lower intensity work. This could be zone 2 long slow duration cardio on days in-between hard lifting or intervals, or it could be 60-120s active recovery between sets of lifting. This can help people who find themselves being "all or nothing", and switch them to "always something", without burning out or over doing things. Whichever piece of kit you chose, they're both low impact compared to running, and becoming increasingly available in gyms. 5) Ab Rollouts Finally, I wanted to include one ab exercise to keep you guys happy, because whatever I say I know you're still going to want that burning sensation in your abs that helps you feel like you're hitting that area specifically. So I'm choosing probably my favourite ab exercise of all, the ab rollout. Recruitment wise, these are legit. Your abs are going to be lit up from rep one, and for most people you're probably going to need to start with a regression to complete reps with good form. That how tough they are. But they also have great carryover to your squats, deadlift and pull-ups that I mentioned earlier, and they'll help you improve at those even quicker, helping you become a belly fat burning machine even sooner. Work through the progressions, beef up your abs, then when the belly fat is gone you'll have an awesome midsection to show for your hard work. Thanks, Ian.