It seems like the guys at my gym are always looking for something magic to make them look ripped and muscular. They act as if the best diet and exercise plan for men to lose belly fat and increase their lean muscle mass is hidden away in some Eastern Bloc vault where only a select few are privy to it. In reality, guys have all they need right in front of them. Certainly, they could accelerate their results by using a program such as Burn The Fat – Feed The Muscle, but searching for the best diet for men to get lean is sheer nonsense.
For some reason, the guys at my gym just cannot grasp that following a few basic eating guidelines will provide them optimal nutrition and melt off belly fat. Instead, I hear them discussing high-tech (meaning expensive and worthless) supplements, and workouts that last two hours. It is ridiculous.
So how do you beat it? Easy, do the things other guys do not want to do. Here are four of them:
First, get sugar foods completely out of your current diet. Foods like doughnuts, pastries, fruit juices, pop, desserts, and sugar cereals have no muscle building elements in them at all. When they are broken down, those calories are shipped right over to the fat storage tanks on your abs and love handles.
Secondly, get rid of processed foods. They are just as bad as sugar foods, except they taste even better. Guys refuse to give up pizza, fast food, bread, pasta with thick creamy sauce, baked goods, and fried foods. They blow it off and say, “I can’t. This is just me.” Well, that’s fine, except you are not going to build any muscle by putting that crap in your body. Like sugar foods, when processed foods are broken down, they are carried right to abs and love handles to be stored as fat.
(Hint: Your diet should be built on raw fruits, raw vegetables, nuts, and solid protein sources.)
Third, get away from machines and back to using free weights. Heavy free weights. Make sure you are doing a full-body workout each time you hit the gym and use only fundamental, compound-joint movements like squats, dead-lifts, pull-ups, dips, bench presses, rows, and dumbbell military presses. Change your workout with each session. Go hard, with little rest.
Fourth, start adding some interval training workouts into your cardio. Get rid of the iPod and magazines when you are on the treadmill or the exercise bike. Read up on the Tabata Method for interval training and add a few of these sessions in each week. Going hard for 20-40 minutes is NOT going to burn up muscle, it is going to melt off fat.
You can get the body you want, but it will take some time and definitely some focused effort. Male diets to lose belly fat are not diets at all. They are complete changes in your approach to eating and working out.