Losing Weight in Your Forties

For my adoring fans, I AM BACK..

As a woman in my forties, I understand and appreciate the challenges that others in my age group face. Our waist lines want to expand even when we exercise and are careful with our nutrition.

So what can we do? Sadly there isn’t a ‘magic formula’, but there is hope.

While we can't ‘spot reduce’,( you know losing fat from specific target areas by non surgical means), you can do exercises that will help tighten those TROUBLE SPOTS (i.e. love handles, changes purses).  

I find that most of my clients in their forties complain about having a thicker waist.  Here are a few ‘SECRETS’  that I tell my clients, which you too can use to tap into the fountain of youth.  I promise, you can feel better than you did in your thirties, look your best, and have energy to spare.

YOU READY-HERE WE GO

1.GET RID OF YOUR TREADMILL!

What the hell is she talking about you are probably thinking.  If all you do on your treadmill (or any cardio machine) is long, slow, monotonous sessions, stop it! Sell your treadmill and make room in your house and life for some really effective fat burning exercise.  And you don’t need to spend a lot of money!  Your body is all you need.

2. SHORT HIGH INTESITY INTERVAL TRAINING 

The key is to keep your body on its toes LOL. You want to  replace your long easy cardio sessions with short high intensity interval training sessions. This can be accomplished with a few simple body weight exercises such as the squat jump, jumping jack or stationary sprint.

Here is an example of what I mean.

 Above I copied a picture of someone doing a squat jump.  This is the SQUAT JUMP which can be modified by  reducing the height of the jump and the depth of the squat, making it easier or harder depending on your fitness level. This is how you start your program.  It’s simple!

• Start with 20 seconds of squat jumps, follow with a 10 second recovery time.
• Try to repeat this cycle for 5 minutes (or 10 total sets).
• Now you can rest for up to one minute.

As your body adapts and your fitness level increases, add cycles until you can do another 5 minutes. You will burn a ton of calories in 10 minutes at this pace. Remember, this isn’t a slow, easy pace.  You are trying to train at a high intensity level, so you should be breathing hard, and your heart rate should be up there.

• From a squat position, powerfully jump to fully extended position, raise arms overhead
• Decelerate as your feet touch the ground, returning to the squat position
• You can also adjust the depth of your squat.  Going deeper hits your rear and thighs more effectively.

3.  PUSH YOUR WEIGHT AROUND!

To lose body fat, every woman MUST add some resistance training to their workout regime.Your GOAL is to add muscle to your body. Muscle is active, it's a calorie burning tissue that helps keep your metabolism going strong. The reason why many women in this age group are gaining weight while eating the same quantity of food is that they are losing some lean muscle mass from leading a more sedentary lifestyle.

By adding muscle building exercises 3-4 times a week, you will hold onto the muscle that you had in your twenties and thirties.  In fact, if you work hard, you can even build a little extra.This doesn’t mean that you need to join a gym or buy expensive equipment. It also doesn’t mean you are going to gain muscle bulk, or look masculine, which is another fallacy.  The female body simply was not meant to be very muscular. Using your body weight as resistance is often more than enough weight, and you will achieve a beautifully feminine physique.

Here is a list of BENEFITS that you’ll get from weight training:

• You will burn more fat than by doing cardio alone
• You will change the shape of your body
• You will boost your metabolism by retaining or building more muscle
• You will increase strength, becoming more functional
• You will build strong bones and combat osteoporosis
• You will improve joint stability and reduce the risk of injury

One of the most effective body weight exercises is the  push-up.

Push-ups aren't glamorous but they work!  You will work many of the muscles of the upper body, specifically the chest, shoulders and triceps. Many women complain that the backs of their arms are too flabby.  Doing PUSH-UPS directly TARGETS those muscles. In addition, you will target the core muscles.The key is to keep your back straight through out the push up. If body weight is too much resistance when you first begin, there are a variety of ways to modify the resistance.  Anyone can do some sort of push up to increase upper body strength, add muscle and work the core all at once.

So in a nut shell that is what I tell my patients they need to do.  I too abide by this philosophy.  Since I became a trainer at New York Sports club, I too have hung up my running shoes and started to pump some iron.