This guest blog post was written by fitness and nutrition author Craig Ballantyne I have his permission to share it with you.

Men’s Fitness magazine recently asked me for 3 of my best fat loss tips. Since most times the magazines just don’t have enough space to run my full tips, I thought I’d give you a more detailed explanation of my secrets here (plus a few extra bonus tips that I didn’t send to the magazine).

Secret #1 – Focus on burning carbohydrate, not fat, during your fat-loss workouts.

Sounds backwards, right? But not when you look at how I structure my workouts. Remember that Turbulence Training focuses on resistance training and interval training. Both of these use carbohydrate as the main source of energy. So it’s obvious the workout is designed to burn carbohydrates during the training session.

I have no interest in you trying to train in your “target heart rate zone” for fat burning (aka – the fat burning zone). The whole idea of a fat-burning zone is an over-simplified idea of how the body works during exercise.

Leave the inefficient fat burning zone to the mis-educated trainers in the commercial gyms (that not surprisingly, also want to sell you a heart rate monitor so you can stay in your “fat burning heart rate zone”).

If you want to get the most results in the least amount of time, focus on burning carbohydrates, not fat.

Why do my fat loss workouts focus on burning carbohydrate rather than fat? In order to burn more calories after the workout, that’s why. When you exercise with intervals and heavy resistance training, your body uses more calories in the hours after exercise than it would if you did traditional cardio and lifted lighter weights.

Alwyn Cosgrove calls this ‘afterburn’, and I call it ‘Turbulence’.
By any name it gives you the same results – maximum improvements in your body composition (helping you lose fat while gaining muscle).

Secret #2 – Use a range of repetitions in your strength training workouts.

In order to train more muscle fibers and burn more carbohydrates, I have clients use a range of repetitions within the same workout. My workouts now use 6, 8, and 12 reps per set in order to work the muscle the most effectively.

This will burn more carbohydrates and promote as much muscle growth as possible when you are keeping the calories low.

Look out for Part 2 for rest of the secrets

About the Author

Craig Ballantyne is a Certified Strength & Conditioning Specialist and writes for Men’s Health, Men’s Fitness, Maximum Fitness, Muscle and Fitness Hers, and Oxygen magazines. His trademarked Turbulence Training fat loss workouts have been featured multiple times in Men’s Fitness and Maximum Fitness magazines, and have helped thousands of men and women around the world lose fat, gain muscle, and get lean in less than 45 minutes three times per week. For more information on the Turbulence Training workouts that will help you burn fat without long, slow cardio sessions or fancy equipment, visit www.TurbulenceTraining.com

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This guest blog post was written by fitness and nutrition author Rob Poulos I have his permission to share it with you.

By now, most people realize that adding lean muscle mass to your body does wonders for your metabolism and fat loss, as well as a host of other benefits that allow you to live out your life as healthy as possible.

Unfortunately, most people I see performing weight training or resistance training at the gym are spending too much time with the exercise and not working hard enough. They’re not going to burn very much fat this way.

The secret I’ve found is that training for lean muscle and strength requires the proper application of three vital elements that are often ignored by those who attempt it. Those three elements are:

-Intensity
-Volume & Frequency
-Progression

The intensity is how hard it is to perform for you, given your current condition. The volume and frequency are how much and how often you perform the exercise. The progression is related to how much the demands increase from workout to workout.

Most times, weight training, is carried on for too long and performed too many times per week. It is unfortunately treated much the same way as so-called fat burning aerobic exercise. But they are vastly different forms of exercise. In fact, they’re complete opposites.

Aerobic exercise typically is characterized by low to moderate intensity, high volume and frequency, and little progression. Anaerobic exercise, or weight training, must be performed at a high intensity, lower volume and frequency, and with progression to be as effective as possible.

No amount of weight training performed at a low or moderate intensity will provide significant muscle or strength building benefit beyond the first few weeks. On a high level view, it is simply the combination of sufficient intensity, coupled with attempting to increase either the number of repetitions of a weight training exercise or the amount of weight used each and every workout that will keep your body evolving into the ultimate fat burning machine!

You also have to pay attention to other details when creating an effective and efficient routine to maximize your workout and minimize your time spent in the gym. Why? Because perhaps even more important that the workout itself is the rest period that follows. You’re not going to get stronger or more muscular if you don’t rest.

You see, when you strength train properly, you are creating tiny injuries to your muscles. You then have to let the body repair itself, and then overcompensate and build upon the already existing amount of muscle mass you have. If you workout again before that process in completed, you’ll experience lackluster, if any, muscle building or fat burning results.

So make sure to get proper rest between workouts, which typically means a minimum of 1 to 3 full days of rest between properly executed resistance workouts.

Now upon hearing the idea that you’ve got add muscle to your body to ensure the maximum fat burning environment, a lot of people, women especially, start thinking, “But I don’t want to get bigger, I want to lose weight!” But this is such a shame, because it’s very unlikely to happen, and countless women are losing out on these fat burning benefits because of it.

You see, most men and almost all women simply lack the necessary genetic traits required to produce such muscle gains that would cause them to look bulky or overly-developed to most people. These traits include testosterone levels, muscle fiber makeup, muscle belly length, and others.

Those competitive bodybuilders you’ve seen on TV and in the magazines are the genetic cream of the crop for muscle development and they are typically on heavy doses of anabolic steroids, growth hormone, and other bodybuilding drugs. Don’t be fooled by these images, or those that scare you into thinking this way. Also, lean muscle is more compact that fat, as it takes up less space in your body, so you will actually be getting smaller when replacing the fat on your body with lean muscle.

Please understand that you’re putting yourself in the best position to succeed with your fat loss and fitness goals when you perform properly conducted intense resistance training, no matter who you are.

But make sure you understand and apply the three critical principles I discussed above. If you don’t, you’ll ultimately be unhappy with your results, both in your ability to burn fat and realize the lean, strong, and healthy body you deserve.

Claim your free copy of Rob Poulos’s “7 Secrets Of Permanent Fat Loss & Fitness” at his website: http://www.fatburningfurnace.com

Rob Poulos is a celebrated fitness author, fat loss expert, and the founder and CEO of Zero to Hero Fitness. Rob created the world’s most efficient method for fast and permanent fat loss with his “Fat Burning Furnace” system to help those looking to put an end to restrictive fad diets, long boring cardio workouts, and the need for super-human willpower for good.

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This guest blog post was written by fitness and nutrition author Rob Poulos I have his permission to share it with you.

Ask ten people what type of exercise they should be doing to burn fat and fire up their metabolism and they’ll all probably tell you the same thing. They’ll tell you that you need to do 30-40 minutes of moderately-paced aerobic exercise on a treadmill, elliptical machine, stair climber, etc. for 3-5 times per week.

They’ll probably also tell you that more is better…4 times per week would be better than 3, and 5 times per week would be even better.

People will tell you this because that’s been and continues to be the mainstream recommendation for fat burning by many fitness professionals. Get in a certain target heart rate and stay at that heart rate for 30 minutes or so, several times per week. I am here to tell you there is a better way.

Sure, you’ll burn some calories while you’re running to nowhere on a treadmill, but you won’t make a complete physique transformation with this type of exercise alone.

In fact, this type of exercise can actually be counterproductive to burning fat. Here are just a couple of reasons:
Long duration, lower intensity aerobics calls upon your stored body fat for energy during the sessions. While this may sound good, this can actually cause your body to create more body fat in reserve after the workout is over to have ready for your next workout. Yikes!

What’s worse, this type of exercise when done frequently as typically suggested, trains your cardiovascular system to be efficient. Again, while this sounds good, your heart and lungs can actually reduce their capacity for work as they are getting more efficient at doing easy work (your long duration, low intensity aerobic workouts), which reduces their ability to handle stress.

This can lead to a host of other problems including higher change of heart attack. You are only working within your current aerobic capacity because you’re never challenging it to go beyond what it’s capable of. And anything that is easy will not yield results even close to what’s challenging for the body to accomplish.

Instead, you should be challenging the body to increase its capacity, so that it is stronger and able to deal with stress more easily. How is this done?

The fastest and most efficient way to rev up your metabolism, burn fat faster, and develop lifelong health and fitness is to add lean muscle to your body through resistance training – period. You want life changing results in the quickest possible time? Get stronger and build some muscle. When you add lean muscle to your body you’ll be literally turning your body into a fat burning machine!

Let’s say that you were eating the amount of calories that allow you to maintain your current bodyweight, but began to add lean muscle to your body through proper resistance training…you’ll need to use some of those calories you’re eating to feed the new muscle, creating a calorie deficit in your body.

In addition, when you stimulate your body with proper resistance training like I teach my students, the repair and growth process will call upon your stored body fat for energy. This calorie deficit combined with the repair and growth process will allow you to burn fat all day long, every day. You’ll even get these fat burning effects when you’re sitting around doing nothing at all.

Also, properly conducted resistance training actually increases your heart and lung’s capacity for work. By placing intense demands on your body, it is forced into being ready for anything you throw at it. This makes you more resistant to cardiovascular health problems that plague most people…even those that exercise with aerobics frequently.

And the beauty is I’ve discovered that you don’t have to spend much time working out to get the fat loss effects, and strength and muscle gains that will create this environment…you can actually get it done with 2 or 3 weekly workouts that last between 20 and 30 minutes, and even less time at an advanced level.

And it’s easy to make this type of exercise part of your life because of its efficiency…and it will help keep you lean and healthy for the rest of it…muscle is the stuff that fat burning furnaces are made of! That I can promise you.

For more info on Rob’s program **click here**

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If you only have a small amount of time to dedicate to exercise I can tell you that it is possible to lose a considerable amount of fat if you follow the right type of program and nutritional advice.

So we don’t all have hours of time to spend working out in the gym.  In fact most people are so busy they just neglect to even go, thinking that they couldn’t possibly get enough work done in just 30 minutes.

I’m here to tell you that that thought process is flawed.

When you combine the right type of exercise in the right order then it is definitely possible.

Not many people are privy to the knowledge I have gained on how to implement these strategies for fat loss in just 30 minutes, but after successfully taking a group of individuals through the whole process over the month of January (they are just about to enter the second phase of the system)I am now opening it up to everyone.

Please visit my specialist site Fat Burn In 30 for the full scoop.

I’m only taking in 30 new students to this course and it will close again on Sunday evening, so go check it out now **click here**

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This guest blog post was written by fitness and nutrition author Rob Poulos I have his permission to share it with you.

People are confused more than ever about how to burn fat. They are confused about the best way to go about achieving the body they want. They are confused about what works and what doesn’t, and the reasons why. There are countless individuals slaving away in gyms and fitness centers around the country right now.

They are working tirelessly, almost every day, on the treadmill, stair-climber, elliptical, etc. to burn those calories and fat. They also might be lifting weights several times a week for hours at a time to build some strength and muscle. They might even join a few aerobics or spinning classes too.

They are probably also trying one of the latest diet strategies that promises miracle fat burning and weight loss. They could also be spending a lot of money on the latest and greatest dietary supplements that could be that miracle pill that will aid in weight loss. They are also carefully watching the scale as their main judge of fat loss progress.

If it goes up a pound or two, they may behave rashly and maybe even change up their entire workout or diet program! And of course there are others are doing variations on that same theme.

After all, this is the kind of stuff that many of the popular fitness and diet gurus typically recommend to burn fat. But with so many different strategies and plans being pushed as the be all and end all, what happens is we tend to overboard.

And when that happens, we lose sight of what really matters in achieving lifelong fat burning, fitness and health…the principles than many people don’t know about, most people have forgotten, and only a select few put to use to achieve lifelong health and fitness. These are the same principles I used to drop over 40 pounds of unwanted body fat, keep it off, and revitalize my life!

With any exercise or nutrition program, you’ll probably lose some fat initially, but far too often the progress doesn’t continue or doesn’t come as fast as the person would like because they’re using a temporary mindset. They’re only focused on the short term and one specific goal. So they end up switching to something else, and the cycle continues until they’ve become consumed by this cycle of confusion.

I believe that this is one of the biggest, if not the #1 reason for the lack of fat loss and fitness progress that is being experienced by the masses of exercisers and dieters in the world. They are jumping from one fad diet or exercise routine to another, while losing sight of what’s really important, and what really works.

Simply put, they are exercising far too much, not nearly intensely enough, and trying to adhere to unrealistic diet recommendations.

If instead they focused on a long term plan, a lifestyle as it’s often called, and didn’t worry about “losing 10 pounds by summer”, they would find it far easier to do the right things most of the time.

And those right things include brief, progressive, and intense resistance training, eating a diet full of nutrient rich foods, drinking tons of water, and getting plenty of quality sleep and rest. The students of my Fat Burning Furnace method understand this and are reaping the life long health and fitness rewards because of it. Are you?

For more info on Rob’s program **click here**

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This guest blog post was written by fitness and nutrition author Tom Venuto I have his permission to share it with you.

The way to break the weight loss plateau then is to:
(1) re-stimulate metabolism and re-set fat-burning and starvation hormones, and
(2) re-establish the deficit.
(3) KEEP AFTER IT!

The question was, “How do I do that? More cardio, more weight training, manipulate my diet?”
You could do all of the above. Eating less or exercising more can both increase a deficit. But one thing you might want to do first, is give yourself a little break. Take your calories up to maintenance level, maybe for a week.

The idea there is not to try to accelerate fat loss, because what you’re actually doing is removing your calorie deficit for a short period of time. What you’re trying to do is facilitate the fat loss when you jump back into it.

It gives your body a physiological break from the stress of dieting; it resets some of those starvation hormones and stimulates your metabolism so when you go back to the calorie deficit, your body responds again.

You also get mental break from the diet as well, which makes it easier to stick with the program when you go back to it.
You could also use a calorie cycling approach, to help prevent yourself from hitting another plateau, and we already covered calorie and carb cycling in the last call.

I also recommend, because so many people underestimate how much they eat, don’t take any chances. Count your calories, or at least become really aware of the portion sizes and maybe even consider keeping a journal.

You’ve probably been told many times by a lot of different “experts” that you don’t have to count calories. But when you’re in a plateau, I’d recommend that you stop guessing and really get serious about what you’re taking in.

Then what you need to do is reestablish that calorie deficit using every tool at your disposal.

Use nutrition by pulling back your portion sizes. Or use cardio. And by increased cardio, I mean increasing energy expenditure. You could increase your frequency. You could increase your duration.

But increasing energy expenditure is not necessarily doing longer workouts, just burning more calories. You could also take the same amount of time that you’re spending right now and increase your intensity.

The whole idea is just burn more calories and stimulate metabolism, which gives you your deficit back again or you can pull back your food intake and give yourself a deficit again from the food side.

There’s more than one way to do it and I don’t think that you should lock yourself in. Use all of the variables and remember that there are TWO sides to the energy balance equation, not one.

For more info on Tom’s program **click here**

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The amount of people who use high intensity interval training (HIIT) in recent years has grown rapidly as people move away from the old traditional execises like steady running and cycling in favour of this relatively new type of training that really is not up to scratch.

Here are the 9 reasons why HIIT sucks!

1.  It’s not liked it’s based on any real scientific data!  The studies conducted by Tabbata et al  showed that doing steady long durnation training like running and cycling lead to massive fitness and fat loss benefits compared with the HIIT group who hardly improved at all!!

2.  Another really annoying thing about high intensity training is that you have to have specialist pieces of equipment.  You have to be a member of a gym or health lub to actually do HIIT, unlike other training that can be carried out anywhere in the world with minimal amounts of equipment!!

3.  If fat burning is an issue for you then avoid HIIT like the plague, you’ll never get any real benefits from doing this type of intense exercise.  Doing long slow boring cardio will give you the best fat burning potential!!

4.  If you have hours to work out in the gym then HIIT may not be the best for you, it takes ages to do a full workout.  When you consider that other sessions can be done in a as little as 20  minutes you need to make sure that the high intensity sessions are never used unless you camp out at the gym!!

5.  Another physiological reason for avoiding this type of intense workout is that it really doesn’t do much for your aerobic capacity.  When this increases your heart and lungs work more efficiently, HIIT really does not do this!

6.  It’s not adaptable.  Interval training is a one size fits all type of workout.  there is absoloutley know ability to adapt exercises or workout times to match the individual person doing it.  Wouldn’t it be great if it was applicable to a whole variety of the population!

7.  It’s rubbish a delivering results in a only a handful of sessions, it takes ages to feel the benefit.

8.  Some other programs have some really simple and cheap apps that make it easier to get variety in the workouts.   There is one on the iPhone that costs less than the cost of a chocolate bar – I wish they’d bring out something for HIIT.

9.  Unlike other types of exercise intensity training, you need to do HIIT at least a couple of times a day to get any results, can you imagine using other techniques where you could workout everyother day and still get long term results.

Ok, so I was lying really, HIIT doesn’t suck and is actually one of the best forms of exercise you can do (if you’re up to it).  Every point I made obviously is one of the benefits of HIIT and therefore makes HIIT one of the best fat loss training tools.

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Alwyn Cosgrove is one of the worlds leading fat loss coaches. His thing is fat loss training and the best ways to get long term results fast.

He is a master of finding the research on fat burning and exercise and then disseminating it for the general public in a way that not only makes sense but is easy to understand…..have you ever tried to read a research paper?

One of the key concepts is called EPOC.

EPOC, or ‘Afterbrun’ as Alwyn refers to it, stands for Excess Post-Exercise Oxygen Consumption. In other words the amount of calories you burn after exercise.

We’ll go over the concept and actualities of EPOC tomorrow, for now click on the video below and see Alwyn present a hierarchical list of fat loss modalities.

If you want more information on Alwyn Fat Loss Program then visit his site Coach Cosgrove.

Until next time,
Train hard, train smart, make every rep count.

Alex

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So as promised here’s a sneak peek at some of my own training.

My goal is to shift about 18lbs of fat in as short a space of time as possible.

To enable me to do this I have started some high intensity training that will definitely burn up fat. My fat burning workout looked like this:

Warm up 5 min cycle.

A) Kettlebell Swing – 2 hands, x10 – 2 sets, 30secs rest

B) Kettlebell Swing – single arm, x10 left & right (LR) – 2 sets, 30 secs rest

C1)* Lat Pulldown – wide overhand, x 10 – 2 sets, 15 secs rest
C2) Barbell Bent Over Row – wide under hand, x 10 – 2 sets, 30 secs rest

D1) Barbell Stiff Leg Deadlift – snatch grip, x10 – 2 sets, 15 secs rest
D2) Single Arm Horizontal Biceps Curl, x 10 – 2 sets, 15 secs rest
D3) Single Arm Triceps Press down – reverse grip, x 10 – 2 sets, 30 secs rest

Bike sprints, 30 seconds at RPE (get a full RPE explanation by downloading my fitness foundations manual by entering you name and email above) – 9 followed by 30 secs RPE 5 – five minutes total.

Cool down 5 mins.

Total workout time less than 30 mins!

You can see me doing the exercises in the video below, but unfortunately exercises D1-D3 didn’t come out very well, so I didn’t add them and will record them again.

See my ‘Fat Burning Results Workout’ here on my YouTube channel

*NB. Exercises that have a letter followed by a number means that you do the A1 followed by A2 before returning back to A1 for the described number of sets.

Let me know what you think?

Alex

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