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belly fat is really easy to gain and
notoriously hard to lose it can seem as
though no matter what exercises you try
and no matter how well you eat the belly
fat just won't budge and unfortunately
with exception to surgery there is
currently no proven method of being able
to spot reduce fat from the belly there
is an exercise however that is
incredibly underutilized yet powerfully
effective when it comes to losing belly
fat today i'll share what that is and
how you can start using it right away
first off let's talk about why belly fat
is so hard to lose in the first place
this was first brought to attention in
literature back in 1997 by dr bouchard
where he discovered that certain areas
of your body are easier to lose fat than
others and is largely determined by
genetics they found that although some
individuals seem to be less inclined to
store fat around their abdomen most
people's genetics prioritize abdominal
fat loss last now having your genetics
stacked against you may seem problematic
if you're looking to develop a slim or
lean looking abdomen but there is a
solution as long as you create a calorie
deficit and continue to burn more
calories than you consume every day you
will continue to lose fat eventually if
maintained long enough you will lose
excess fat from all areas of your body
even if your genetics put your belly fat
at the back of the lime and although
your diet should be your main way of
creating a calorie deficit adding
additional exercise can help speed it up
and ensure that you're continuing to
lose fat even as your metabolism slows
down now you guys are smart and you're
probably already aware of this and may
have attempted to burn more calories and
shred belly fat faster by incorporating
things like running rowing cycling or
even hit workouts these forms of cardio
tend to burn calories very quickly
making them seem like a great way to
burn off belly fat over time for example
based on what's known as a compendium of
physical activities a regularly updated
database that outlines the calorie burn
for various exercises a 170 pound
individual compared to if they were
digested around can expect to burn
roughly an additional 12 calories per
minute when running at a moderate pace
of 6 miles per hour so 30 minute running
session would lead to a net total of
about 360 calories burned do that three
times a week for a year and that would
lead to an additional 56
and 160 calories burned and given that
back in 1958 researcher wishnovsky
discovered that losing one pound of fat
requires burning 3 500 calories more
than you consume then this routine would
amount to about 16 pounds of additional
fat loss per year now while this does
sound great on paper the truth is the
overwhelming majority of people can't
actually stick with traditional cardio
long enough for fat loss to reach
stubborn areas in fact even in studies
where subjects are assigned to cardio
sessions to do
dropout rates tend to be on average
almost 20 percent it's not that these
methods don't work because they do i've
personally used running and hit
regularly in the past to get me down to
very lean levels in fact i used to
believe that these intense cardio
sessions were the key to burn off
stubborn fat but they were brutal they
required a lot of willpower i got sore
from them and really impacted my energy
and i just dreaded doing them most of
the time and although i stuck it through
and eventually did get the six pack it
was after simply because i was burning a
lot of calories i just couldn't get
myself to continue these brewing
sessions especially outside of summer
time and eventually i had lost a lot of
the progress i've made now don't get me
wrong these forms of cardio they do
definitely have their place and some
people have no problem sticking to them
in fact i still do these intense
sessions once or twice a week for
conditioning but i no longer rely on
them as my main form of cardio to lose
fat and nor should most people because
if you want to lose your belly fat and
more importantly keep it off once it's
gone then you need something that you
can stick to for life what's the
solution
it's the easiest to maintain the lowest
stress lowest fatigue most versatile
form of cardio walk in
now i know what you're thinking walking
doesn't burn many calories and there is
no way i can walk my way to a six-pack
years back i would have said the exact
same thing but a 2021 meta-analysis
titled slow and steady or hard and fast
helps shed some light on the matter the
researchers analyzed a total of 54
studies to determine the effect that
different types of cardio had on fat
loss what they found is that intense
forms of cardio like hit or running
while time efficient didn't provide any
superior fat loss effect when compared
to longer yet less intense forms of
cardio such as walking which makes sense
it's simply a numbers game your body
doesn't care whether the calories you
burned were from some crazy intense
fasted cardio session or from plain old
walk-in what matters most is what you
can do consistently over time and if you
quench the numbers you'll actually find
that the calories burned from simply
walking can very quickly add up to a
meaningful amount for example using the
same exercise database we used earlier a
170 pound individual walking at a casual
three miles per hour can expect to burn
an additional 3.4 calories per minute
and roughly 200 calories per hour if for
three days per week you add in an extra
hour of walking that would amount to 600
additional calories burned per week over
the course of the year that's an
additional 31 200 calories burned which
would amount to about nine pounds of fat
loss and the math checks out in the
literature as well with one of the few
studies out there analyzing watkins
effect on fat loss finding that subjects
who simply added in two and a half hours
of brisk walking per week experienced an
additional 3.5 pounds of fat loss over
the course of 12 weeks now although
hours of walking may sound like a lot it
doesn't have to be all at once later in
this video i'm going to show you how to
incorporate this into your life
effortlessly but first just compare the
walk-in routine to the running routine
that i gave earlier yes the running
routine will burn more calories in less
time but be honest with yourself how
likely would you be to keep that up for
a whole year if you're like most people
and you go all out for two months but
then become inconsistent and give up
after that that's 16 pounds of
additional fat loss we calculated
becomes just a couple pounds nowhere
near enough fat for most people to even
come close to burning through their
excess belly fat this is why walking is
the number one exercise to lose belly
fat and is why it's now my main form of
cardio to get lean and stalin it's easy
to stick to
so now that i've hopefully convinced you
of the power of walking let's dive into
how you can easily start applying it to
lose fat
the first step is to determine an
average of how many steps you're
currently taking you can use a health
app on your iphone or use google fit if
you're on android after week see what
your daily average comes up to if you
already know this great i'd like to know
as well so do me a favor and comment
below how many steps you're currently
taking and if you have any tips that
helped you increase it or what obstacles
may be holding you back some of you
however might be surprised with how few
steps you're taking but this is a good
thing as it means that you have a big
opportunity to bump that up for example
here's one of our built with science
program members devin who recently hit a
plateau and simply bumped up his step
count up from 3 000 steps to around 8
000 to 10 000 per day and is back to
losing fat every single week especially
in his stubborn areas it's simple but it
works for most people though i wouldn't
recommend trying to jump all the way up
to something like 10 000 steps right
away instead set a realistic goal and
for example first aim to do an extra 2
000 steps a day given that the average
individual takes about 1200 steps during
10 minutes of walking all you have to do
is throw in two 10 minute walks into
your day to accomplish that once you're
consistent with that try bumping it up
by another 2000 steps and continue doing
this with the goal of consistently
getting at least 8 000 steps or even up
to 15 000 steps per day which seems to
be the range that provides the greatest
fat loss and health benefits the key
though is to make this fit your
lifestyle some tips i personally use are
to always choose a bar parking spot
take the longest way to the washroom do
10 minutes of incline wall kit after
each workout take 10 minute walks after
each meal
take the stairs instead of the elevator
whenever possible listen to podcasts
while walking and more and for those who
are busy in the office all day a study
that had subjects add just five minutes
of walking per hour into their office
day found that over the course of the
year it would amount to over nine pounds
of additional fat loss in this case you
can also try to aim for a higher step
count on the weekends to boost your
weekly average but trust me these little
things add up apply these tips and
you'll be surprised with just how much
they can increase your step count and
even more surprise once you notice the
fat slowly coming off
that said guys i want to emphasize that
walking or any form of cardio is only
effective for fat loss if it's used in
combination with the diet think about it
the calories you burn from a whole hour
of walking or 30 minute run is
equivalent to the calories in three
pieces of toast which you can consume in
literally a matter of seconds so use
your diet as a primary way to create a
calorie deficit and supplement it with
walk-in to help speed up the process and
if you need help with putting this all
together into an easy to follow
science-based workout and nutrition plan
that you can trust will work to help you
burn off stubborn fat and build lean
muscle then head on over to build with
science.com and take our analysis quiz
to find the best program for you i'd
also highly recommend that you give this
video a watch next which is going to
cover some tips on how to structure your
nutrition plan to help further speed up
the fat loss process thank you so much
for watching don't forget to subscribe
and see you next time
