Australian Men\'s Fitness - 09.2019

nSOME MEN ONLY EVER PUT ON WEIGHTaround the

middle. A beer belly can creep in while everything

around it stays exactly the same.

One way to deal with stubborn belly fat is to focus

on a steady intake of slow-release fuel, eaten little,

often and regularly throughout the day to avoid

excess calories from any meal or snack being stored

around the middle. Combine this with plenty of

activity as part of your daily routine and a more

challenging workout every couple of days.

DITCH THE GUT

There’s no way to ‘spot-reduce’ fat, so each

workout should focus on working upper and

lower body with strength training, and should

include plenty of cardio, ideally as varied in

type and intensity as possible.

Regular cardio training will give your

metabolism a calorie-blitzing shake-up a few

times per week, while strength training will help

to boost your resting metabolic rate, meaning

that you will burn more calories all day, every day.

ADD MORE

MUSCLE

n IF YOU’RE NATURALLY SKINNY, IT CAN FEEL

demoralising trying to put on muscle and get

bigger. The key to success is to follow the model of

bodybuilders and focus your weight training on short

sets using heavy weights. There’s no need to go quite

as extreme as the pros, who might do one or two reps

of an exercise with a huge weight, then spend plenty

of time recovering in preparation for the next rep,

but you can gradually work your way towards 6 or 8

rep maximum sets with minimum rest in-between.

If you currently train using sets of 12, 15 or 20 reps,

start by ensuring that for each exercise in your

workout, repetition 12, 15 or 20 is definitely the

last one you can do. Then, over the course of a few

weeks, increase the resistance so that the maximum

number of reps you can perform is 20, 15, 12, 10 and

then 8-6. Just be careful to ensure that you’re always

maintaining good form as you increase the resistance.

It’s also important to vary your training as much as

possible, and to target different muscle groups from

different angles. Schedule your training so that over

the course of each week or two you have a balanced

combination of free weights and resistance machines,

as well as exercises that work single muscles and

some that work groups of muscles at the same time.

Finally, make sure you build in plenty of recovery

time so you can max the gains from each workout.

Ideally, each muscle group will need a couple of days

of recovery. You can still pack plenty of workouts into

each week by focusing on different areas each session.

For example, if you max out training your back and

biceps on a Tuesday, you can still train on Wednesday

or Thursday if you focus on your chest and triceps.

WHAT TO DO IF...

You’re naturally skinny and struggle to

bulk up – how to change your routine to

WHAT TO DO IF...

You struggle to lose belly fat – how to change things up to Eliminating – or at least reducing – the

amount of beer you

chug will also help.

Obviously.

78 MEN’S FITNESS SEPTEMBER 2019