GetSlimZone.com

Fitness swimming offers the best aerobic workout with the least amount of joint stress or impact. Pool rats admit to having trouble some days getting up for a workout—but once they jump in the water and get a rush by pushing off the wall and gliding underwater they remember what it is they love about swimming. Depending on your pace, the freestyle and breast strokes will burn up about 570 calories per hour, while a strenuous workout can zap up to 790 calories per hour.

A word of warning though: appetite is partially regulated by body temperature control and since water cools the body much faster than air, studies show that fitness swimming in cold water tends to trigger appetite. So if you feel famished after swimming, consider eating a small protein snack rather than a big meal. You don’t want to wolf down the calories you just spent an hour burning off in the pool.

If you are a non-swimmer, or love the water but aren’t into doing laps, consider joining a water aerobics class where the resistance of the water provides a gentle but effective cardio workout. An aquacise class has great music that everyone enjoys—and you don’t even have to get your hair wet!

by Anthony Wakefield

If you’re just starting to work towards the goal of losing belly fat you may be feeling slightly intimidated. There is so much information out there about different approaches to weight loss that you may not even know where to start! Fortunately, if you remember a few key steps, you can be well on your way to results. Below is a five week schedule that introduces a new element to a successful plan to lose belly fat. If you can add each element at the week indicated, you’ll be on your way to success.

Week #1: Increase Your Vegetable Intake.

For week one of this belly fat loss program, the first thing you’re going to do is focus on increasing your vegetable intake. For this week, start each meal off by eating at least two cups of vegetables first. While it may seem weird to eat this first and then move on to the rest of your meal, you would be surprised at how many calories you’ll save. Once you get used to eating so many vegetables and lower amounts of other foods, then you can start mixing your meal together as usual again. Remember a starter salad will also count in this case.

(more…)

by Tabitha Stuart

Getting started on your weight loss journey can be difficult. The only thing that is more difficult is sticking to it. Some diet and fitness programs are so complicated and time consuming they are impossible to stick to. No matter what your weight loss goals are these 6 simple tips will help you reach your weight loss goals and stick to your program.

1. Water Water Water! People just don’t seem to understand how essential it is to stay hydrated. Approximately 80% of Americans live in a constant state of dehydration. Not only can this cause medical problems, but your body will hold every ounce of fluid it can get. So I recommend 64 ounces or more of plain ice water everyday. Adding a lemon wedge is fine and lemon is a natural diuretic, BUT NOTHING ELSE!

2. Portion Control is key. Even if you are eating valuable foods you can still consume excess calories. My rule of thumb is use a 9 inch dinner plate and imagine it is divided into 4 equal sections. One section would be your lean protein like fish or chicken, one would be your whole grain such as brown rice, and the other two would be produce such as steamed veggies. This works well for most dishes and makes it simple to visualize proper portions.

3. Don’t try to completely give up your favorite foods. Many people have trouble sticking to a program because they convince themselves that they can never have pizza or cake again. You should think of losing weight not as a diet but as a life style change. Therefor, it must be livable and realistic. If you go to a party, have a piece of cake. If you are really craving pizza, have a slice or two and a salad with lite dressing. If you go into knowing that you can enjoy your favorite foods from time to time you will have much more success and prevent binge eating.

(more…)

These tips have been repeated endlessly, but it always help to go over them again. Here are 5 quick tips to help you lose weight:

1) Eat Breakfast

Eating a healthy breakfast is important for jumpstarting your metabolism. Studies show that people who eat a healthy breakfast are energized throughout the day, burn more calories, and controls late night eating binges. In fact, they believe people that don’t eat breakfast only burn 2/3 the calories they would normally burn if they ate breakfast.

2)Strength Training

Muscles burn more calories than flab, so the leaner muscle you have the more calories you burn in a day. By taxing your body to a certain point your resting metabolic rate (RMR) will increase while you are sitting or even sleeping. That is around 18,250 calories a year, and almost 5 1/2 pounds of fat for doing nothing. And, that’s only one pound! Increasing lean body mass is important as people in their mid 20′s lose 1/2 to 3/4 pounds of lean body mass a year.

3) A Good Night’s Sleep

Sleep loss is shown to affect the secretion of cortisol, a hormone that regulates appetite leading you to feeling hungry and storing fat around your abdomen area. Not only that, but loss of sleep enables your body to metabolize carbohydrates resulting in excess sugar that develops insulin resistance and long story short; your carbohydrates turn into fat. To avoid these side affects it is recommended that you get at least 7-8 hours of sleep a night.

4) Drink Water

Our bodies consist of 80% water. Drinking 8 glasses or more of water every day helps flush out your system of toxins and helps lubricates your joints. When you drink enough water your body is able to do all its function and aids in burning that unwanted fat.

author: James English

We all know that some people always find it hard to stick to their diets and over time consistently fail to lose any significant amount of weight. These people have tried every conceivable new dieting idea which is thrust into the limelight, hoping that this new one is the one which will really work. But of course the miracle never occurs.

These people often blame the diet and tend to overlook the mistakes which they made and fail to truly understand what has prevented them from losing their weight. It is human nature to often forget and ignore things that you don’t want to face. People often forget about or ignore things they have eaten or failed to do while being on their diet.

If you are one of these people you need not worried, there are ways of working around these problems and hopefully the rest of this short article can help you achieve your goals. (more…)