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How to get rid of love handles?
No one loves love handles, those uncharming flaps of flesh that stick out like belly ears. Unfortunately, it's almost impossible to target specific parts of your body to lose fat from. How can you get rid of love handles when they stubbornly linger?
Love handles form over the group of muscles normally referred to as the obliques. Often, when you work out to strengthen and tone your abs, your obliques are also part of the training. But sometimes these areas are not focused on closely enough. One way to get rid of love handles is working your abs and your back muscles at the same time. This ensures that the obliques are also put to work, and you end up with a well-balanced workout that tones you all over.
Another way of losing love handles is by disguising them. Instead of focusing on the waist, look at your upper body. Could your shoulders stand to get a little broader? If you can bulk up your upper torso and biceps, you create a V shape that naturally minimizes that love handle part of your body, giving you that carrot shape that draws women.
If you prefer to focus on the obliques, it is possible to exercise to lose love handles. The three best exercises to get rid of love handles are the ubiquitous crunches, dumbbell side bends - or any other kind of resisted side bend, provided you're using the side muscles to pull yourself up - and good overall cardio. This love handle workout does two things. First, it strengthens the muscle that underlies the fat, giving it a firmer foundation and minimizing its appearance. Second, the cardio helps melt the fat away, leaving only the muscle behind. Good solid exercise can help you lose love handles fast.
Besides exercise, there is no substitute for a good diet. If you want to try a love handles diet, remember first that every extra calorie in men tends to be deposited around the middle, right in the love handle zone. Do you spend your days eating fast food and your nights out on the town, drinking? This is where those love handles came from to begin with! Get rid of love handles by eliminating those extra empty calories from your diet. Stop drinking, or at least cut down on it, and start eating salads once in a while. Read about the meat in your diet, and eliminate one or two of the fattiest; replace them with lean meats like roast beef. Drink more water, and cut your sodium intake.
If you need to burn love handles in a hurry, there are a couple of temporary quick fixes. One is the rub-and-wrap: before going to bed, coat your waist with a layer of Preparation H and wrap plastic wrap over top of it, several layers, pulling them tight. The astringents and anti-inflammatories in the cream will eliminate up to three inches overnight, but the effects are only temporary.
As a last resort to get rid of love handles, you can always try liposuction. This is the only targeted permanent fat reduction method available, and should be tried only when everything else fails and with full awareness of the risks.
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