Shockingly, not all exercises are good for you. In fact, if you’ve been doing cardio workouts to try and slim down, I have some alarming news…
Steady-state cardio (like jogging, spinning or doing the elliptical) increases the production of a stress hormone called cortisol. Cortisol causes your body to gain weight… especially around your stomach and makes it even more difficult to burn-off stubborn fat.
Have you ever noticed that no matter how much cardio you do, you just can’t seem to lose anymore weight…? It’s because doing steady-state cardio is the fastest way for your body to hit a plateau and slow your metabolism down to a crawl.
Even worse, too much cardio speeds aging! When you put your body under prolonged stress, you start producing free-radicals, which damages your cells and causes inflammation…and inflammation is what makes you OLD. Yikes!
Next I’ll show you how to sky-rocket your metabolism to melt fat away so you can get insane results in less than half the time of your regular cardio workout! (Once you learn this effective method, you’ll kick yourself for not doing it all along!
But first, here are the 5 WORST exercise mistakes you MUST stop making (if you want to burn off stubborn body fat - and KEEP it off - so you can get lean & ripped fast…
Mistake #1: Repeating The Same Workouts Over & Over
Repeating the same workout routine over and over is a surefire way to STOP getting results. We’re creatures of habit and we tend to stick to things we’re familiar with and good at. But when it comes to working out, if you want to make progress and keep seeing changes in your body, you’ve got to start switching things up.
You see, your body has an amazingly ability to adapt quickly and when it does, that’s when you hit the dreaded plateau and you STOP making progress.
In a few minutes, I’m going to tell you exactly how often you need to change up your workout routine so you can keep your body guessing, which will keep your metabolism running on high so you can kiss that spare tire goodbye…
Mistake #2: Doing Isolated Exercises
Doing isolated exercises (like bicep curls and tricep extensions) will NOT help you build lean muscle and get toned & fit. When you do these “isolated” exercises, you’re only working one muscle at a time. The problem is that these exercises do very little to increase your metabolism.
Here’s why: In order to boost your metabolism, your heart rate has to be raised to a certain level. But when you’re only working ONE muscle at a time, it’s virtually impossible to recruit enough muscle fibers to increase your heart rate significantly, so you’ll never be able to spike your metabolism or maximize your calorie burn.
If you want to slim down and tone up fast, you need to do exercises that stimulate as many muscles as possible at the same time. On the next page, I’ll show you the most effective exercises that target every inch of your body—so you can replace flab with lean, defined muscle.
Mistake #3: Doing Crunches & Sit-Ups To Get Flat Abs
When you do ab-targeted exercises (like sit-ups, crunches or side bends), your muscles get sore, which makes you think you’re strengthening your abs. There you are, crunching away thinking it’s only a matter of time before you’ll be looking beach ready with your rock-solid core.
…Yet weeks after you’ve religiously been doing your ab routine, your belly looks just as bloated and soft as it did before. All that time and pain for nothing!
Here’s the TRUTH…
Your abs were not designed to crunch, twist, and bend. In fact, it’s the complete opposite! The real role of your abdominal muscles is toprevent your mid-section from crunching, twisting, and bending. That’s right, your abs are a stabilizing force designed to resist movement in order to protect your spine.
So even though you “feel the burn” when you do crunches and sit-ups, you’re actually putting unnecessary pressure on your back, causing much more harm than good. These ab-targeted exercises can cause lower back injuries by forcing your spine to flex too much, and they do very little to actually strengthen your abs.
The key to getting sculpted abs is to burn off that stubborn layer of belly fat that’s hiding them. In the next few minutes, I’ll show you how to burn away the “ab flab” while stimulating all 6 of your abdominal muscles simultaneously — so you can finally carve out those lean, ripped abs.
Mistake #4: Using Gym Machines
Those big, shiny machines sure make the gym look high-end, but truthfully, the only thing they’re good for is for sitting down while you tie your shoes or catch your breath!
The problem is this: Machines alter the way your body naturally moves, restricting your range of motion. This severely limits your ability to fully activate all of your muscles fibers, which means less fat burning and less muscle toning.
Worse yet, machines can cause muscular imbalance and excessive strain on your joints, leading to nagging injuries down the road.
If you want fast results, you MUST incorporate exercises that allow your body to move naturally with full range of motion so you can skyrocket your metabolism and put fat-burning on autopilot.
In a minute, I’ll explain the 6 primary movements that are the foundation of these exercises…and I’ll also fill you in on the best types of weights to use for your workouts (no big, clunky gym machines required!).
Mistake #5: Doing Loooong Workouts
Longer workouts do NOT equal better or faster results. If you’ve been slaving away at the gym and your body isn’t visibly changing, you can’t do more of the same thing and expect a different result.
When it comes to getting lean and fit, your body responds to quality over quantity. I’m going to tell you the #1 way to super-charge your workouts—this simple, yet overlooked method is the single fastest way to getting lean and ripped while cutting your workout time almost in half. This technique will open up a can of whoop-ass on your workout!
by Shin Ohtake, Fitness & Fat Loss Expert, Author of MAX Workouts