Posted on: Wednesday, August 25, 2004

SHAPE UP
Spot work won't melt away fat

By Charles Stuart Platkin

Very few of us have the perfect body. In fact, we all have areas we wish we could change. Even celebrities, with the financial means to have a full-time personal trainer, have been known to complain about specific body parts (we've all heard about Jennifer Aniston's difficult thighs, Sandra Bullock's rear and Kate Winslow's stomach).

It certainly would be wonderful if we could simply do one exercise over and over again, and poof — our large thighs would melt away just like that. You can't pass by a magazine rack without glancing at "new and improved" methods for getting that stomach into "six-pack" shape. I must admit that even I have worn a rubber body wrap around my waist, just hoping to sweat my stomach into celebrity status.

So can you train one specific part of your body, and melt that fat away? And what happens when you put all that work into one area of your body? There's no way for your body to "localize" fat removal during exercise. The body breaks down fat globally, meaning it's impossible to determine where exactly the fat is going to come off.

"In our efforts to tone our bodies we neglected the most important factor: fat," says Cedric Bryant, chief exercise physiologist for the American Council on Exercise. Bryant's explanation of the commonly held "Spot Exercise" myth is simple: People think that if you have fat deposits on one specific part of your body, exercising the muscles underlying the fat will make it go away. Wrong.

When we focus our workout on one specific body part, we end up building muscle in that area, but that doesn't mean that we will see the results on the exterior. Someone who does 100 sit-ups a day for a flabby stomach will certainly increase muscle endurance for the abdomen over time, but that won't burn off the surface fat. In fact, you may not be burning fat at all up to a certain point in your workout. "The burning sensation that you sometimes feel during weight training is due to a temporary accumulation of lactic acid, and it doesn't mean that you're burning fat," says Jonathan Cane, chief exercise physiologist for the New York Police Department and author of "The Complete Idiot's Guide to Weight Training."

To maximize fat loss for those trouble spots, it's back to the same old story — you need to perform regular cardiovascular activity and train ALL of your muscles. This increases your overall lean body mass (or muscle), which raises your resting metabolic rate and thereby maximizes weight loss. "Any aerobic activity that elevates your heart rate can help you burn fat and take off unwanted pounds," Bryant says. You must create a calorie deficit; as long as you've eaten fewer calories than you need, you'll dip into your fat storage and thus burn fat for energy. Keep that in mind the next time it's after midnight, the infomercials are all running, and you're reaching for the phone to buy that rubber stomach wrap.

Charles Stuart Platkin is a syndicated health, nutrition and fitness columnist. Write to info@thedietdetective.com.