Tips to Beat the Holiday Belly Bulge

1. Don’t just do cardio: Yes, you are burning calories when you are doing a cardio workout, but cardio workouts alone won’t do much for your waist. You need to do a combination of weights and cardiovascular training. Strength training increases muscle mass, which allows your body to burn more fat. Remember muscles are our fat burning machines!

2. Get out of your comfort zone. Work a bit harder than the previous workout with respect to your body. Listen to your body and how it feels the next day should tell you if you worked it too hard or not enough. Try core strengthening exercises to tighten the mid- section, not necessary the traditional ab crunches.

3 Reduce your intake of processed foods. These increase inflammation in our bodies and belly fat associated with inflammation. Increase your intake of vegetables, fruits, and fermented foods which help prevent belly fat because they contain antioxidants which have anti-inflammatory properties.

4. Lack of sleep can add to belly fat. Those who sleep five hours or less a night are more likely to gain weight.

80% of how we look and feel comes from what we put IN our bodies, NOT how many hours we spend working out. I would like to say it’s 50%-50%, but research and my experience with clients has shown, it is more of a 80%-20% balance. Exercise is a close second and it’s super important, but it is very hard to exercise off bad nutrition.

To sum it up… with proper nutrition, strength training, and adequate sleep you can beat belly bulge during the holidays and with perseverance you can LOOK & FEEL better throughout the year!