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Summer Fitness: Week 4

Ready for Summer? More Muscle, Less Fat...Week four of four!

By Greg Rothman, MS PT

Put down the dumbbells for now, because this week is cardio only.

Do five to six interval training sessions, each lasting 30 to 45 minutes. To review interval training, see the third paragraph of Week Three. The best time of day is first thing in the morning, before eating anything, but after having eight to 16 ounces of water. It’s okay to do the workouts at another time if you’re just not a morning person, but morning will be most effective.

As the fat starts to burn away from the midsection, you’ll want those abdominal muscles underneath it to start to show through. So, after three of the cardio workouts this week, do three sets of 15 reps of the physioball crunch with progressive resistance as explained in my Six-Pack ab primer.

On the other two or three cardio days, do three sets of 50 repetitions of the “Bicycle Crunch”: Lie on a mat and start with your hands behind your head and your hips and knees at right angles; contract your left obliques (side abs) as you bring your right shoulder and your left knee slightly closer together and then repeat on the opposite side. Make sure that you keep your eyes focused on the ceiling directly above you and that the movement is controlled by contracting your obliques and not by flailing your elbows and legs. Make the movement smaller and more focused than you have seen or done in the past.

Continue with the three days in which you eliminate starch and sugar, but this week, do them consecutively, three days in a row. On the first day, sugar will be largely eliminated from the blood stream and your body will start releasing and burning fat more selectively. By days two and three, sugars stored in your muscle (glycogen) will also have been burned leaving your body little choice but to get energy from stored fat. But it is essential to eat proteins and vegetables (and some dairy and healthy fats are okay, too) frequently. If you are not eating frequently enough, and find that you are hungry all the time, your body may have trouble releasing the fat to be burned in the muscle cells. Don’t make that mistake and diminish the amount of fat you are capable of burning this week. For more on nutrition, don’t forget to request my two-page “Supportive Eating Guide” by sending an email to EmpowerFitness@aol.com with “Supportive Nutrition” in the subject line.

This four-week program is the good stuff, tips that have resulted in my clients losing up to eight pounds of fat in four weeks. That is very different from just losing eight pounds of weight. Your weight on the scale may not change dramatically, but the way your clothes fit will. You will have added a number of pounds of muscle and removed a number of pounds of fat. When you build and maintain your lean muscle mass and lose fat, the results are more permanent, creating a better ratio of lean to fat tissue; this results in a faster metabolism and more calories burned at rest, even while you are sleeping. The program is simple but requires adherence to every letter of it. If you are a beginner with exercise, check with your physician first to make sure you are healthy enough to embark on this sort of program.

You can do Week Four for a couple more weeks to continue fat loss, but if you notice that you’re starting to lose muscle instead, just go back to Week One and Week Two. If you want to add more muscle, you can do Week One and Week Two for two weeks each, making it a four-week muscle-building program, which you will then follow with Weeks Three and Four, which in turn may each be done for an additional week if more fat loss is desired. But do recognize that at some point the effectiveness of this program will diminish as your body becomes used to it. That would be a good time to try a new program or consult with a fitness professional.

Now, go do it! As the weather heats up in the next few weeks, and May turns to June, your body will be ready for that swimsuit you haven’t been able to wear for seasons.

Greg Rothman is the owner of Empower Fitness Studio in New York City’s Greenwich Village. He received his Masters Degree in Physical Therapy from Columbia University and has 15 years experience in the fields of fitness and rehabilitation. Be sure to get a check up and OK from your doctor before starting any exercise program. Greg's column originally appeared on GayHealthBlog.com.