A guy in the gym finishes a hard, focused set of barbell squats and re-racks the weight. His legs are wobbly, his heart is racing and he feels light headed as he takes a big swig from his water bottle. He looks down at his watch and presses the start button to begin counting down backwards from 2 minutes.

He saw on TV that 2 minutes is the perfect rest time between sets, and what he wants is to do it exactly in that way. So, the watch beeps and he’s be back in the squat rack ready for his next set of exercises with the weights.

Time is up. His still feel weak and his heart is still beating a lot, he doesn’t feel completely ok, but the watch beeped and that means his has to go back and perform another set, it does’nt matter how he feels.

He performs the next set. He is not really ready to exercise right now, so he puts forth a mediocre effort, finish the set, and waits for another 2 seconds. He is making a huge mistake, just as hundreds of lifters in another gyms.

By having a set rest interval between sets, he is forcing his body to train at an effort level that is far less than his maximum potential and is severely sacrificing the amount of muscle growth he can ultimately stimulate because of this.

Muscles grow because of an adaptive response to stress. You lift X amount of weight for Y number of reps, and your body adapts to this level of stress. In order to see continual gains in muscle size, you must continually force X and Y to higher and higher levels.

In other words, building muscle is all about progression in both weight and reps. It is about lifting as much weight as you possibly can for the greatest number of reps that you possibly can (within a given rep range of course) and then continually striving to improve.

So, every time you are going to start a new set you have to do it when you are at your maximum. If you don’t do it so, you sacrifice the amount of muscle you can build. In other words, give your body enough rest between sets in order to achieve the best results.

A watch will never tell you when you are ready to begin the next set. Instead of it, listen to your body and you will know when to follow your training.

The set rest period theory is also highly flawed because it does not take into account the fact that certain exercises tax the body much more heavily than others and therefore require more rest between them.

A shredded mid section always looks great on a person. The only thing sexier than a guy strolling on the shore with a ripped abdomen is a bikini-clad girl with six pack abs.

Tastes and standards have changed with the times. The image of the voluptuous, busty bombshell with the pouting scarlet lips has been replaced by the toned and tanned surfer chick with cut abs.

The image of the Monroe-esque figure painted on the fuselages of WWII warplanes has been replaced by the internet-savvy, corporate chick who rushes-off to the gym after work to work on her figure.

Girls with washboard abs weren’t born with them of course- it’s not inherited through the genes like a sexy butt or an ample bosom. Women with six pack abs get them through a combination of healthy eating habits and workouts that are optimized for burning body fat.

Cardio and muscle-building exercises designed to burn belly fat in women is generally the same as that of men- there’s basically no difference (except for the weight lifted of course, as men are generally larger than their counterparts).

There’s actually little difference in the skeletal muscle of men and women. Consequently, exercises and food intake for effective muscle-building and fat-loss for both sexes are the same. It’s common-sense, really- burn belly fat, reveal the abs.

Experts have discovered that the surefire way to getting ripped abs entails exercises designed to burn body fat and build muscle. The secret to exposing the lines and striations of abdominal muscles (as with any other muscle) lies in eliminating the layer of sub-cutaneous fat covering it. The shredded look would be impossible without burning-off excess body fat and keeping it off.

Lifting weights builds muscle and since muscle tissue burns calories (even while immobile), the more of it we have, the easier it would be for our bodies to avoid storing fat from excess calories. Our metabolism goes up, the more calories we burn and this inadvertently means the less effort we have to exert in our workouts. Weight lifting and exercises that burn belly-fat effectively are universal- it’s the same for both guys and girls.

There’s no doubt that many people need to lose a few pounds. Walk around where people gather, you’ll notice the fat. Don’t laugh. Unfortunately you’re likely to see it in the mirror too. If you’ve made fast weight loss your goal, keep a few simple things in mind to take off the pounds quickly and safely.

When people want to lose weight one of the most common things they do is to skip meals. Hey, if eating fewer calories is the goal then why not skip breakfast or lunch. Doesn’t weight loss come with eating less calories? That’s right but skipping meals isn’t the right way to reduce calories. Your body thinks it’s being starved when you skip meals. It goes into “starvation” mode. It starts to retain fat to counteract what it perceives as a food shortage. Another problem with skipping meals is that when you finally eat you’ll be a lot more hungry. This could lead to binge eating. Skipping a meal plus binge eating, then, will likely result in eating more calories and the body gaining even more weight from those calories than normally. It’s the worst of both worlds. Don’t skip meals.

Know how much to eat. Portion control is just as important as eating the right food. Too much of even a healthy food will still result in weight gain. Portion control isn’t easy when large portions are so common. Restaurants serve over large portions, as do most people at home.

The FDA and other sources list recommended daily allowances. If you must eat out, keep portion size in mind. Don’t eat the full portion served at the restaurant, or order less than a full meal, such as soup and a salad.

Replace white foods such as white bread, white rice and sugar with whole grain foods. Whole grains are lower in fat and higher in nutrients. The fiber in whole grains will make you feel fuller faster and longer. Also whole grains contain many nutrients that are often lacking in people’s diets.

Consume more water. Drink it instead of juices and sodas which add about 90,000 calories to the average person’s diet each year. Drink water between meals too. In fact, the goal is 8 glasses of water each day. It’s easily possible. Drinking water will also promote health in general by keeping you well hydrated and helping to avoid overheating.

Eat healthy snacks between meals. The body needs food every three to four hours to maintain proper blood sugar. Eating healthy snacks, such as fruits, helps control eating at meal times.

Fast weight loss is realistic with some knowledge and planning. Keep these things in mind and pretty soon you’ll see a slimmer you when you look into a mirror.

Want to know a way to build a better looking body… burn more calories… and more fat — even when you’re not spending time working out?

Whether your goal is to bulk up and get really big or to just get that “ripped” look — you need to know how to build muscle. It’s the easiest way to get the look you want. Here’s some tips to build muscle fast.

Contrary to popular belief, building muscle is not that hard. Here are a few great tips to help you build muscle fast so you can reshape your body and even burn more calories when you’re not exercising.

Tip Number 1 — Eat Tons of Food

If you’re exercising intensely, it’s VERY important to eat a lot. You are damaging your muscles when you exercise and they need good food to repair themselves and grow back bigger and stronger. (the bigger you want to get the more food you should eat!)

If you follow the correct diet you can build muscle while not gaining that much fat… even though you’re eating a lot. The important thing is to feed your muscles because they need lots of nutrients to repair themselves and grow.

Tip #2 - Do Plenty of Reps

It’s important to increase your volume if you want to build muscle. But don’t go crazy. You only need about 10 reps or so for each muscle group. If you stick to this general rule then your workouts won’t be too long either.

Tip #3 - Increase Protein Intake

Protein is very important for the regrowth and repair of your muscles. You have to make sure you give your muscles plenty of protein if you’re going to build muscle.

You don’t want TOO much protein though — some people go over board and some people just don’t get enough. Here’s a good guideline: about 1 gram of protein for each pound of your bodyweight.

Tip Number 4 - Don’t do too much cardio

Cardio is great for burning fat, but it can also keep you from building muscle if you do too much of it. So don’t do as much cardio when your goal is to build muscle.

All dieters are not created equal. There is a great difference in how much extra weight we are carrying, how fit we are and what kinds of foods we like to eat.

That is why the term “lose weight fast” can mean such different things to each of us. This means we need a clearer goal so that we have a better chance of success in our dieting endeavors.

So once you’ve read this article, write down your expectations. These should be your expectations, not the thoughts of others.

Then take a good honest look at them and make sure they are realistic for you. You are the only one who can judge this. You know your strengths and weaknesses. Play to your strengths and be careful not to set things up so that you overwhelm your weaknesses.

It is better to be a little more conservative with your diet to make your goals realistic.

Don’t skip this step or take it lightly. Unrealistic weight loss expectations are another big contributor to the high failures rate for dieters.

So, let’s get started.

1) Swap the junk food for real food

Simply staying away from this phony food will put you on the right track towards dropping the pounds you want to lose.

You will go a long way to quickly shedding those pounds if you simply change the quality of the foods you eat.

Raising your metabolism is one of the real secrets of effective weight loss. Consuming these types of quality foods will have your metabolism quickly moving in the right direction.

This one change alone can turn your life around and have you anxious to get in front of the mirror in the morning.

You’ll be amazed at the difference in the waistline you’ll create with this one change alone.

This is so commonly recommended, you are probably going “Yah, yah. Here we go again.” Well the recommendation to drink lots of water is excellent advice. However, a little more accuracy about how much is a lot might be helpful. This determination is controlled by things like weight, age and level of activity.

I know, everyone says this and usually “lots” is either unspecified or simply stated as 8 glasses of water a day. In truth, getting an accurate answer to this question is very complex. Age, weight, activity, etc. all play a part in determining an accurate answer.

This method has the advantage of compensating more accurately for the weight differences among people. If you weigh say 120 pounds, this formula predicts that 7 1/2 glasses of water a day should be a good amount for you.

3) Control your food portions.

The size of your food portions are a major player in “the lose” fat game. If you can cut your portions by 10% to 20%, you can make a big difference. If this is hard for you, try substituting some of your high calorie food with low calorie alternatives like apples, celery, tomatoes, grapefruit etc.

4) Have one “Free” Day a week.

Do not skip this in an effort to make things happen faster. Watching what you are eating all the time is stressful. This stress is the cause of many failed diets.

Give yourself a little stress relief and eat whatever you want one day out of the week. Be it a big fat steak or a pizza, go for it! And forget the guilt stuff. This is a legal day off, so whatever you eat is okay.

Yah, I know; you may put back a little weight. If you’ve been on track for the whole week, this will be negligible. And the peace of mind you will gain will more than compensate. The idea is to successfully reach your target weight . . . not punish yourself.

5) Make sure you have emergency rations on hand.

There is another situation that causes a lot of diet failure: having to eat out and not being able to find the right foods to eat.

So keep some food with you in the car or at work or whatever is appropriate for you. Thermos lunchboxes are great for this.

The idea here is to keep yourself out of situations where you are virtually forced to cheat on your diet. Unless it’s your free menu day, we want to stay on track.

One more thing; in our pursuit of fast ways to lose weight, we sometimes forget to be kind to ourselves.

Dieting can be stressful and demanding. Lightening this load is important. Remember, errors are just indications that it is time to correct course. So get the goal back in sight and keep heading in that direction . . . you’ll get there.

Any weight you lose is an achievement. Allow yourself to feel proud of this and let these feelings power you on to your next achievement.

Americans spend billions of dollars on dieting, diet programs, diet foods, diet books, and diet pills. Another billion more is spent on treating the diseases associated with obesity and being overweight. Health concerns related to being obese or overweight are epidemic in America. Too many extra pounds can have serious long-term consequences for your health. Being obese or overweight can result in health problems like diabetes, high blood pressure, stroke, heart disease, osteoporosis and certain cancers.

Don’t go for the quick weight loss. Make a good diet program and exercise a part of your life. There are many diet programs, you need to find the one that works best for you and stick with it. There are no healthy, short-term, diet programs for solving obesity, or being overweight. Changes in lifestyle, such as more exercise or dieting, must be permanent changes.

Exercise will get your weight loss started. Combined with a healthy diet, exercise helps the body return to a healthy condition. Regularly walking, swimming, cycling, jogging, skiing, aerobic dancing, will help get the weight off and it improve heart, lung, and brain function. Exercise stimulates various brain chemicals, which can leave you feeling happier and more relaxed than you were before you worked out.

For you to stay alive your heart needs to pump blood through your body. The heart does a much better job when your body is in shape. Your cells stay oxygenated and your resting pulse will be steady and healthy.

Do you start huffing and puffing after walking a flight of stairs? That is a sure sign that your body is not getting enough oxygen to your cells. Exercise brings oxygen and nutrients to your tissues. The body learns to use oxygen more competently when we exercise regularly. It could be walking around the neighborhood block, jogging or working out at the gym. As long as you do it regularly, your body will begin to use oxygen more efficiently. When that happens, you can increase the time and intensity of the workout.

Exercise will help flush out the buildup of plaque in your arteries that can cause a heart attack or stroke. The more overweight, inactive and the worse you eat the better chance you have of having health problems. Taking preventative measures such as exercising, will help to lessen your risk of facing serious health conditions at a young age.

Don’t overdo it when you start out, go slow and get a checkout from your Doctor. If you’ve been inactive for years, big changes can cause you big problems. Small changes over time can make you a new person. Start with 10 minutes of easy exercise or a walk every day and increase gradually over time. If you have a day when the body is too sore then skip it and work out the next day. Being steady is more important than being intense. You can get intense later when you are in shape, you will enjoy it more. Exercise releases “feel good” hormones when you have had a good workout or walk. Just the fact that you have completed the workout will make you feel better about yourself. If you want to keep those good vibrations, you have to continue to exercise and make it a part of your life.

Negative health outcomes associated with obesity are accepted within the medical community, the health implications of being overweight are more controversial. It is generally accepted that being overweight causes similar health problems as obesity just to a lesser degree.

It is generally accepted that for significantly obese patients, losing weight can reduce health risks and improve quality of life. There is evidence to suggest that for merely overweight people, the health effects of attempting to lose weight may actually be more detrimental than simply remaining overweight. For all individuals, repeatedly losing weight and then gaining it back, is believed to do more harm than good. Stay away from quick fad diets that can cause the loss of more muscle than fat. This can be the cause of additional health problems.

Part-4 Ketosis can lead to health problems like kidney failure. Ketosis is known by Atkins followers as the fat-burning process, and is one of the key factors making the diet different from other approaches. Normally, carbohydrate provides energy, but when the body uses up all its stored carbohydrate, it needs to find another fuel source.

Glucose is a carbohydrate which our brain operates on. When we do not have any carbohydrates or have shortage of carbohydrates, we commence to convert protein to carbohydrates. Glucose then excites cells in the pancreas to secrete insulin to exclude that glucose and take it into tissues to be used as fuel or stored. Protein and fat consumption do not have the same insulin production impact due to the whole point of insulin is to sustain the sugar stability level.

Ketosis results from the fatty acids’ incomplete metabolism .It comes on when the body is deprived of carbohydrates, its preferred fuel source and turns to its own fat for fuel .Ketosis (so named for ketones, the byproducts of burning fat) is an abnormal metabolic state seen in starvation and uncontrolled diabetes. Ketones can kill, but the healthy body eliminates them straight away –through the kidneys and the lungs (an unfavorable effect of the Atkins diet and is called acetone breath).v

Dieters following the low-fat regimen had a 22% drop in blood fats known as triglycerides and no increase in HDL, or “good” cholesterol. The Atkins dieters experienced a 49% drop in triglycerides and an 11% increase in Dieters are advised to cut out all carbohydrate for the first two weeks before moving on to the second section, where a few carbohydrates are reintroduced. After reaching their target weight, dieters are then told how to maintain the diet. Dieters are encouraged to maintain this level of carbohydrate intake until their weight loss goals are met. During the Pre-maintenance and Maintenance phases, dieters determine the level of carbohydrate consumption that allows them to maintain their weight.

Carbohydrate, in the form of glucose, is the first fuel used to supply energy to our body. Dr Atkins believes that when we decrease our consumption of carbohydrates dramatically, our body change from burning carbohydrates to burning fat as fuel.

Robert Atkins, who promises you can eat the delicious meals you like, never count calories, enjoy a good cheeseburger when you’re hungry, even top things off with dessert and still lose weight. Sounds really great! Robert Atkins, who developed it from a new nutritional approach he studied in the 1960’s. Atkins used his diet on himself with significant success before he began advocating it. Robert Atkins, an American cardiologist, the Atkins diet has been experiencing renewed popularity as the low-carbohydrate craze once again hits American men and women. The Atkins diet is designed to help people reduce and maintain their weight at optimal levels by increasing protein and fat intake while decreasing carbohydrate intake.

I’m assuming that you’ve thought about dieting at least once any time within the past couple of years, there’s a good chance that the diet you went on was one of the many low carb diets that are available these days.

This can probably be accounted for by a little magazines publicity along with a number of genuine success stories. And when you throw in a celeb or two into the assortment, you’ve the makings of a newfangled trend. Every one then jumps on the trend which in this case turned out to be low carb diets.

What you need to ask is if you’re thinking of taking a crack at one of these low carb diets as if the Atkins diet is so trendy at the present, and really gives support to help you in minimising your weight, why didn’t it increase in popularity long before this?

After all it has been around for as long as 30 years. That’s a lengthy time for a diet to be around without anybody noticing it until the later stages of those 30 years. And if these low carb diets are as good for you as all these books and practitioners of the diets will tell you, then why is there so much disapproval to these diets from health specialists and medical sources?

After all it has been around for as long as thirty years. That’s a extended time for a diet to be around without any person noticing it until the later stages of those 30 years. And if these low carb diets are as good for you as all these books and practitioners of the diets will tell you, then why is there so much disapproval to these diets from health specialists and medical areas?

And the Atkins diet isn’t the only low carb diet that you will uncover. There’s the ever fashionable Zone diet, the South Beach Diet, the Hollywood diet, the Stillman diet, and a multitude of other low carb diets. These diets are all similar in that they promote a high fat, high protein, and low carb intake. Each diet has its own variations and quirks and which one you try is dependent on what you’ve heard, or read, about these low carb diets.

For the persistent fanatical dieter these low carb diets may be just what they demand, since even with any negative aspects that it might have they do work, and they do aid you to lose weight. If you’re going on a diet, and it doesn’t matter overly much which diet it is, you should always be sensible and diet sensibly too.

Losing a few calories quickly won’t help you in the long term. If you keep to the guidance of these low carb diets though, your dieting tribulations shouldn’t be all that frequent and you might even find that you’ve left them all behind.

Part -3 Lose all the weight you want fatty, but after your dieting time is done, you know as well as I do you?re going back to your previous lifestyle and your putting the weight back on double time. So not only are you still overweight, you just took a step backward by utilizing the Atkins diet. Lose weight to be healthier and able to more enjoy exercise. Looking great and turning heads will take care of itself

Ketones suppress appetite, and they also triggers fatigue, nausea, and a possible dangerous fluid loss. Make sure to check with your physician prior to following a low-carbohydrate diet if you have diabetes, heart or kidney problems. Ketones contribute to suppress the appetite, because of the high protein nature of the diet, decreasing spontaneous food intake. People are permitted to eat as much as they like, they are in fact eating fewer calories because they do not feel hungry

Women lose an average of 4-12 pounds. In subsequent weeks, dieters lose an average of 1-2 pounds each week. Women were randomly assigned to read one of four diet books. They attended weekly classes for eight weeks where diet questions were addressed, but they will be mostly on their own for the next 10 months.

Insulin is the storage hormone, that causes unused sugar for fuel to be stored as fat. It keeps the body from burning stored fat. Insulin allows the extra sugar to be kept or stored in the liver and muscle as glycogen, these stores are quickly filled to a capacity. The insulin then change any excess sugar to fat -( the stuff we are getting rid of.) Insulin change excess carbohydrates to fat. Therefore when you have less carbohydrates you have less insulin and thereby create less new fat.

Insulin regulates the movement of sugar from food into the cells of the body where it is used either for energy or stored as fat. Extra insulin production from eating excess amounts of carbohydrates leads to a steady decrease in the sensitivity of the cells to insulin which leads to the body having to make or produce more and more insulin to accomplish the same job .

During this phase, you would be able to understand the maximum level of carbohydrates needed to take off excess weight. Followers of the Atkins diet tips will use “Ketostix” strips (available from a chemist or health store) to investigate or detect when their body is in a state of Ketosis. When the body is in this state, weight loss is very rapid.