Muscle for Life with Mike Matthews - Why Belly Fat Is So Stubborn (and How to Lose It)

Episode Date: December 13, 2017

Did you know that certain fat cells in your body are extremely “resistant” to being mobilized and burned? Did you know that these fat cells tend to accumulate in the dreaded belly, hip, and thigh regions of your body? And did you know that you can use a handful of science-based diet, exercise, and supplementation strategies to beat (and burn!) stubborn fat for good? Imagine having that tight waist and those washboard abs you’ve always wanted…all year round. Imagine never again having to suffer through strange diets or grueling workout routines…only to be disappointed in the results. Imagine knowing which supplements are scientifically proven to help you get lean and which are a waste of money. Well, you don’t have to imagine these things because I’m going to lay it all out for you in this episode. By the end, you’re going to know what makes belly fat so tough to lose and exactly what to do to get rid of it once and for all. Let’s get to it. 3:22 - Why is belly fat so stubborn? 4:51 - What is the physiology behind burning fat? 8:24 - What are the biggest myths regarding belly fat? 10:28 - How do you get rid of belly fat? 13:01- What is a good strategy to tackle belly fat? 21:34 - What supplements do you recommend for belly fat? 34:48 - What is your personal belly fat loss routine? Want to get my best advice on how to gain muscle and strength and lose fat faster? Sign up for my free newsletter! Click here: https://www.muscleforlife.com/signup/

When you exercise, when your insulin levels are at that low baseline level, your body is able to both mobilize and burn more fat during your workouts than when insulin levels are elevated. Forget flat belly diets, weird tricks, and all the other nonsense out there on how to lose belly fat. In this podcast, you are going to get the real story and the real science of losing it for good. So let's start with confirming your suspicions. Stubborn fat is a real thing. Certain fat cells in your body are indeed very resistant to being mobilized and burned. And these stubborn fat cells do tend to accumulate in the dreaded belly, hip, and thigh regions of our bodies.

And lastly, we actually can use a handful of science-based diet exercise and supplementation strategies to beat and burn stubborn fat for good. And we're going to break it all down in this podcast. In the next 20 minutes or so, you are going to learn exactly why belly fat is so hard to lose, hip and thigh fat for women is so hard to lose, and exactly what you can do to get rid of it once and for all. Now, before we dive into this episode, I have to shill for something to pay the bills, right? No, I'm just kidding. I'm not big on promoting stuff that I don't personally use and really believe in. So instead, I am going to just quickly tell you about something of mine, specifically my fitness book for men, Bigger,

Leaner, Stronger. Now, this book has sold over 350,000 copies in the last several years and helped thousands and thousands of guys build their best bodies ever, which is why it currently has over 3,100 reviews on Amazon with a four and a half star average. So if you want to know the biggest lies and myths that are keeping you from achieving the lean, muscular, strong, and healthy body that you truly desire, and if you want to learn the simple science of building the ultimate male body, then you want to read Bigger, Leaner, Stronger, which you can find on all major online retailers like Amazon, Audible, iTunes, Kobo, and Google play. Now, speaking of audible, I should also mention that you can get the audio book, 100% free when you sign up for an audible account, which

I highly recommend that you do. If you're not currently listening to audio books, I love them myself because they let me make the time that I spend doing stuff like commuting, prepping food, walking my dog and so forth, so much more valuable and productive. So if you want to take Audible up on this offer and get my book for free, then simply go to www.bitly.com slash free BLS. And that will take you to Audible. And then you just click the sign up today and save button, create your account and voila, you get to listen to Bigger, Leaner, Stronger for free. Alrighty, that is enough shameless plugging for now at least. Let's get to the show.

So let's start at the top. Why is belly fat so stubborn? Now, if you are having trouble losing belly fat, I have good news for you. You don't have to worry that you are genetically cursed and that you're doing the wrong exercises and you just don't know which special exercises you should be doing. You don't have to worry about your hormones. Your hormones are probably fine. You don't have to worry about the foods you're eating you're not struggling because you're eating the wrong foods sugar is not the problem carbs are not the problem grains are not the problem gluten is not the problem i think you get the point and the reality is you could follow every thin belly rule that mainstream gurus prescribe you could do every belly flattening exercise on the internet.

You could get rid of every possible hormone clogging food. You could eliminate every form of sugar in your diet, and you could even subject yourself to the trials and tribulations of low carb living and still have handfuls of ugly belly fat for the rest of your life. It doesn't have to be like this though. No matter what your genetics are, no matter where your hormones are at, you absolutely can have a lean ripped stomach. And it can be easier than you ever thought possible if you know what you're doing and why. And all that begins with a physiological understanding of how fat burning actually works. So when we talk about burning fat, what we're actually talking about is a two-part process consisting of lipolysis and

oxidation. So lipolysis is the process whereby fat cells release the molecules of stored energy, which are called fatty acids, into your blood. And then oxidation is the process whereby cells utilize or burn those fatty acids for energy. Now the body's primary method of stimulating lipolysis is the production of adrenaline and noradrenaline, which are known as catecholamines. So what happens is these chemicals enter your blood and they travel to fat cells and they attach themselves to those fat cells at points on the known as receptors. And once they attach to the fat cells, these catecholamines trigger the release of the fatty acids stored within the fat cells. And then other cells are able to use those fatty acids as

fuel. So the fatty acids travel around now in your blood and other cells grab them and burn them as fuel. Now, all of that isn't exactly news to many people, but what most people don't know is that fat cells are not all made alike. Some respond very well to catecholamines and some don't. Now, if you have dieted for any period of time, you have absolutely experienced this. You have experienced the frustrating reality that certain areas of your body, like your chest, your arms, your face, tighten up pretty quickly, but then other areas of your body and the areas that you probably care the most about, like your stomach, your hips, your thighs, seem to not change at all, seem to have no response to the diet and exercise. And the primary reason for

that boils down to one simple fact. It's this fat cells contain two types of receptors for catecholamines. And those receptors are diametrically opposed in function. So these receptors have names. So one type is known as the alpha receptor and another type is the beta receptor. And while the physiology in play, the mechanisms are pretty complex, what it comes down to is alpha receptors hinder lipolysis and beta receptors trigger it. Therefore, fat cells with a high amount of beta receptors are relatively easy to mobilize, whereas those with a high amount of alpha receptors aren't. And this is why when you start a fat loss regimen, you see immediate results in certain areas of your body that contain large amounts of fat with large amounts of beta

receptors. The areas like our chest, our arms, our face, but then you'll see like no results in other areas like your stomach, hips, and thighs because the fat cells in those areas of our body tend to have a lot of alpha receptors, which means they are just very hard to mobilize. So that's why belly fat tends to hang on for dear life when you're cutting. And before we look at strategies for breaking down these fat cells defenses, let's look at some of the biggest myths that are out there. Because if you Google around for belly fat loss tips, you're going to wind up reading a lot of bullshit. And I want to give you a quick antidote. So the first thing you need to know is that unfortunately you can't preferentially target belly fat for

elimination, at least in any way that makes a significant difference. So no amount of crunches or planks or anything else are going to directly burn your belly fat away. You should also know that there are no individual foods that are going to help or harm the process. The belly bulge that you want to get rid of isn't caused by high glycemic carbs or processed foods or dairy or whatever else that the health gurus say. And no amount of healthy fats or fancy stuff like MCT oil or exogenous ketones or anything else is going to just get rid of it for you. Meal frequency also isn't the problem. Many people say that you need to eat many small meals per day to stoke the metabolic fire, to really ramp up your metabolism and burn away that stubborn fat. And that if you

eat fewer, larger meals, you're going to send your body into some form of starvation mode, which is going to tell it to hold on to belly fat and stubborn fat. Not true. Eating at night also isn't a problem. That's another big myth. Another common culprit that is thrown around is that if you eat the majority or if you eat a large amount of calories late at night, you are going to either have trouble losing fat or even gain fat faster. And that is not true. Studies show that you can eat the majority of your daily calories early, late, whenever it has no effect on weight loss parameters or body composition. Stress also isn't the culprit. While it certainly can promote behaviors that lead to weight gain, like overeating, for example, it can't directly cause weight gain through hormonal imbalances

or any other mechanisms. So if all of those things are not the way out, what do you need to do? And again, the good news is it's actually pretty simple. You really only need to do two things to get rid of ugly belly fat and ugly stubborn fat once and for all, you need to one, reduce your body fat percentage. And this really is what it all comes down to. So if you're a guy and you bring your body fat percentage down to 10%, or if you are a girl and you bring it down to 20%, at that point, really the bulk of your belly fat will be gone. Yeah, you're still going to have some, you're not going to be absolutely shredded, but you are not going to have much fat to grab onto anywhere on your body. And every bit that you get leaner from there will mean even less

to pinch on your waist. And the second thing that you need to know is that you can use certain diet exercise and supplementation strategies to help you burn fat faster and better mobilize belly fat. So given the first point of just getting your body fat percentage down, of course, anything that you do that just accelerates fat loss in general is going to also accelerate the loss of stubborn fat. That said, there are a couple specific things you can do to help your body better get at and get rid of the stubborn fat, including belly fat. And when you combine both of these strategies, when you combine faster fat loss and better fat cell mobilization, or maybe you could say targeting a bit of a misnomer, but the concept I guess is more accurate than inaccurate, you can have a very effective stubborn fat loss routine.

And so let's talk about that routine. There are five aspects to it. And the goal of course, is to just speed up fat loss in general and to help your body better mobilize the fat cells that have high amounts of alpha receptors. So the first part of this strategy, of course, relates to energy balance, and that is utilize a moderately aggressive calorie deficit. Now, when you are dieting for fat loss, your goal should be to lose fat as quickly as possible, while also preserving your muscle and your health and psychological wellbeing. And how well you do this will be mostly determined by the size of your calorie deficit. So if you have a small deficit of let's say five to 10%, that is going to yield smaller and slower results than a larger deficit of let's say 20 to 25%.

The question here though, of course, is how large of a calorie deficit can you get away with? How large of a deficit can you place your body in before problems arise, you know, hunger cravings and even muscle loss. And there is a bit of research that actually can help lend insight here. So one study that was conducted by scientists at the university of Uveskola, study that was conducted by scientists at the University of Uveskola, probably mispronouncing that, but it is a Finnish word that is hard to pronounce. Anyways, in this study, they had elite lean, so around 10% body fat or lower track and field jumpers and sprinters restrict their calories for fat loss for four weeks. Now, all participants in the study exercised on their regular schedule and they followed a high protein diet, which is good. And one group maintained about a 12%

calorie deficit. So they ate about 300 calories fewer than they were burning every day. While the other group maintained about a 24% deficit. So they ate about 750 fewer calories than they burned every day. And after four weeks, the 12% deficit group lost very little fat and muscle. And the 24% deficit group lost an average of about four pounds of fat and very little muscle. Now I've seen very similar results with my own body and with the many, many people that I've worked with. I mean, thousands at this point, what I've found is that if you eat enough protein and you use weightlifting to drive your fat loss, which means you also keep cardio to a minimum, you can safely maintain a 20 to 25% calorie deficit and maximize fat loss while also minimizing muscle loss. All right. So the second part of this

five part strategy is to train in a fasted state and combine that with a couple of supplements that we're going to talk about. Now, if you've ever looked for advice online on how to lose fat faster and especially stubborn fat faster, you've probably come across exercising on an empty stomach. According to many experts, if you exercise on an empty stomach, you are going to increase the amount of fat that your body burns while you work out and possibly even increase the amount of stubborn fat that you burn while you work out. Well, there is some truth to this, but it's not quite that simple because what is an empty stomach exactly? How empty are we talking about?

What types of exercise work best in this regard? And are there any drawbacks are just some of the questions that need to be answered. And the first thing that you need to understand is that it's not enough to just have a stomach that feels empty. That guarantees nothing in the way of accelerated fat loss. That said, what can help you lose fat faster is training in a fasted state. And especially when you combine it with a couple supplements and what that has to do with is not how empty your stomach feels, but the levels of certain

hormones that affect fat loss. You see, when you eat food, your body's insulin levels rise and it begins breaking down, absorbing and using and storing the nutrients that you've just eaten. Scientifically speaking, this is known as the postprandprandial or fed state and prandial means having to do with a meal so post after prandial meal and this state can last anywhere from two to six or more hours depending on how much you ate and what types of food you ate now eventually your body finishes processing all the food and then insulin levels drop down to their low stable baseline level, which is where they remain until you eat food again. And when you're in that state,

you're in the post absorptive state or the fasted state. So what happens is every day, your body is flipping back and forth between these fed and fasted states. And when you exercise, when your insulin levels are high and when your body is still processing your last meal, you are doing what is called fed training or fed exercise. And when you exercise, when your body has finished processing your last meal and insulin levels are low, that's called fasted exercise or fasted training. Now there's nothing wrong with training in a fed state, of course. I mean, any exercise burns energy and any energy burning supports your weight loss efforts. But what many people don't know is that when you exercise in a fasted state,

you can reap a few unique fat loss benefits. For example, research shows that exercising in a fasted state increases both lipolysis, so breakdown, and fat oxidation rates, and oxidation is the burning. So what this means is when you exercise, when your insulin levels are at that low baseline level, your body is able to both mobilize and burn more fat during your workouts than when insulin levels are elevated. and burn more fat during your workouts than when insulin levels are elevated. Another benefit is studies show that blood flow in the abdominal region in particular is increased when you are in a fasted state, which of course helps you burn stubborn fat better in that region. And the reason for that is, of course, for catecholamines to reach fat cells and then mobilize them for burning. They need to travel through the blood. So if you have reduced blood flow to any area in your body, it's going to be harder to lose fat there. And one of the other problems with stubborn fat, in addition to the alpha receptor problem, is that blood flow tends to be lower in those regions.

And therefore, fasted training can help overcome this. There is, however, a major downside to fasted training, and that is it increases muscle breakdown rates, and particularly after you are done working out. And this is undesirable because if you damage and you break down too many muscle cells in your workouts or just over the course of a day, then your body won't be able to keep up with repair with muscle protein synthesis. And that means that you can lose muscle over time. If it's extreme or minimally, you will gain less muscle over time than you would otherwise. Now, another downside to fasted training is that your workouts tend to be rather lackluster. So most people find that they have less energy and less focus when they're

exercising in a fasted state. And that makes it hard to maintain the level of physical and mental intensity that they're used to. And so fasted training then is a double-edged sword. It can be good for losing fat faster. And again, I will say that, especially when combined with a couple of supplements, which we're going to talk about by itself, it doesn't make that big of a difference, but it is slightly better. However, it's not so good for maintaining your muscle and enjoying your workouts. Hey, before we continue, if you like what I'm doing here on the podcast and elsewhere, and if you want to help me help more people get into the best shape of their lives, please do consider picking up one of my best selling health

and fitness books. My most popular ones are Bigger, Leaner, Stronger for men, Thinner, Leaner, Stronger for women, my flexible dieting cookbook, The Shredded Chef, and my 100% practical hands-on blueprint for personal transformation, The Little Black Book of Workout Motivation. Now, these books have sold well over 1 million copies and have helped thousands of people build their best body ever. And you can find them anywhere online where you can buy books like Amazon, Audible, iTunes, Kobo, and Google Play,

as well as in select Barnes & Noble stores. So again, that is Bigger, Leaner, Stronger for Men, Thinner, Leaner, Stronger for Women, The Shredded Chef, and The Little Black Book of Workout Motivation. Oh, and one other thing is you can get any one of those audio books 100% free when you sign up for an Audible account. And that's a great way to make those pockets of downtime, like commuting, meal prepping, and cleaning more interesting, entertaining, and productive.

Now, if you want to take Audible up on that offer and get one of my audio books for free, just go to legionathletics.com slash Audible and sign up for your account. And that brings us to supplementation because the easiest way to cancel out these downsides and to actually punch up the positive is with effective supplementation. So as far as muscle loss goes, the supplement I like most for this is called HMB. And it's a substance that is formed when your body metabolizes the essential amino acid leucine, which is the amino acid that directly stimulates protein synthesis. And this supplement HMB, it is usually sold as a muscle building aid because there was one study that was basically fake science.

One study in particular that demonstrated, and I put that in scare quotes, demonstrated that HMB is more effective than steroids basically for gaining muscle, which of course is not the case and further research proved otherwise. It proved that HMB is not good for increasing muscle growth. However, it is an effective anti-catabolic agent and that has been established in good research. So what that means is that HMB is very good at preventing muscle breakdown, which means that it may also help you recover faster from your workouts and experience less muscle soreness. And of course, that doesn't mean you're going to directly gain muscle faster, but it is worth noting that if you can recover faster from your training, then you can work more volume into every week. And the more volume you can put into any muscle

group, the better chances you have for gaining more muscle over time. Another interesting point with HMB is that it has no effect whatsoever on insulin levels, which again, makes it particularly well-suited to fasted training because it won't break your fasted state like food will. Because remember when you eat food, protein and carbs in particular, insulin levels rise, and it doesn't take very much to do that, to take you out of that fasted state and to put you into more of a fed state. General rules, for example, from the intermittent fasting community are that you really want to have no more than 30 calories before your training if you're going to be training in a fasted state. Because once you start getting above that, insulin levels start rising to the point where you're more like it's

mildly fed training than fasted training. So all those reasons are why HMB, I think, is perfect for use with fasted training. It has those reasons are why HMB I think is perfect for use with fasted training. It has powerful anti-catabolic effects. It has non-existent insulin effects, and that means it can help you reap the fat loss benefits of fasted training without having to worry about the issues related to muscle loss or to insulin secretion. I also like HMB more than BCAAs, which are commonly recommended if you're going to be training in a fasted state, because really, you know, BCAAs are, it's three amino acids. It is leucine, isoleucine, and valine. And out of those three, it's leucine is really what you want. The other two have very little effect, if any at all, on protein synthesis rates. It's

leucine. So you need to have two to three grams of leucine. That's what you want before you're doing your fasted workout. HMB, however, is much better for suppressing muscle breakdown rates than leucine. If I remember correctly, one study found it's about 20 times as effective in that regard. So all that is why I'm a fan of HMB and why you'll find a clinically effective dosage of it in my pre-workout fat burner, which is called Forge. Now Forge also contains yohimbine, which can improve your workout performance and help you lose fat faster and actually can help you lose stubborn fat in particular faster, which is something that we will talk more about soon. All right. So that is strategy number two. Let's move on to number three,

which is do high intensity interval cardio. Now, high intensity interval training or HIIT or HIT for short is a method of exercising where you alternate between periods of almost all out intensity and periods of low intensity recovery. And the idea here is pretty simple. So during your high intensity bouts, what you're doing is you're pushing yourself almost as hard as you can. And then during your low intensity periods, you're trying to catch your breath in preparation for the next sprint. to catch your breath in preparation for the next sprint. And the bottom line is multiple studies have shown that HIIT is just significantly more time effective for losing fat than traditional low intensity steady state cardio or LISS, L-I-S-S for short. For example, one study that was conducted by researchers at the University of Western Ontario found that people lost more fat doing

four to six 30-second sprints with four-minute rest periods in between each than 60 minutes of incline treadmill walking. And if you do the math there, that's pretty impressive. You're talking about 17 to maybe 27 minutes of hit resulted in more fat loss than 60 minutes of, you know, the more traditional bodybuilder type of cardio. And that's not a one-off occurrence either. Those results have been replicated in quite a few other studies as well. So the science here is clear. If your goal is to burn as much fat in as little time as possible, then HIIT is absolutely the way to go. Now, the exact mechanisms behind this advantage aren't fully

understood yet, but scientists have isolated a few factors and they include the fact that HIIT increases your metabolic rate for up to 24 hours. Those effects are minor, of course, but every little bit counts and helps. It also improves insulin sensitivity in your muscles, which helps your body better absorb and use the food that you eat rather than store it as fat. It increases your muscles ability to burn fat for energy. It elevates growth hormone levels, to burn fat for energy. It elevates growth hormone levels, which aids in fat loss. It spikes catecholamine levels, which again are the chemicals that mobilize fat in your body for burning. And it also decreases post-exercise appetite in many people, at least, which of course helps you stick to your diet and prevent overeating. Another thing that I really

like about HIIT is that the workouts don't have to be long. You don't have to do more than 20 or 25 minutes in a session for it to be highly effective. And as far as cardio goes, the shorter your cardio sessions are, the better you're going to preserve your muscle and strength while you're cutting. Okay, so let's move on to strategy number four, and that is to lift heavy weights. Now, if you're familiar with me and if you're familiar with my work, you know that I'm a big proponent of heavy compound weightlifting. As far as fat loss goes, this type of training has two big benefits. First, it helps you preserve your strength while you are in a calorie deficit, which of course then helps

you preserve muscle. And that is the most effective way to preserve your muscle while you're cutting is to use it and to use it intensively. And another advantage is it dramatically increases your basal metabolic rate for several days after each workout. And research actually shows that this type of training can result in hundreds of more calories burned over the course of several days than workouts performed at a lower intensity, with lighter weights. One more noteworthy benefit of heavy compound training is simply the fact that most people find it more enjoyable than the higher rep, higher volume, feel the burn workouts, which also tend to be longer and more enjoyable workouts means better long-term compliance and

progression. And of course, then better results. And this is particularly true when you're cutting because you're probably already dealing with a bit of a depressed mood and lower energy levels and so forth. So, you know, grueling workouts are especially hard when you're cutting and are also kind of unnecessary, I would add, because unless you're new to weightlifting, you're not going to be gaining any muscle to speak of. So really what we're trying to do with our weightlifting is burn a bunch of calories or, you know, burn a good amount of calories and stimulate our muscles enough to maximally

preserve them. And that's it. And that's why some people even argue that you really should just do like a push, pull legs kind of three day a week, heavy compound weightlifting program when you're cutting and then use lower intensity cardio as needed, um, to bolster energy expenditure. And I, I understand that, that argument. I would say, I mean, again, one, I prefer HIIT when I'm cutting because I just like the shorter workouts and getting more bang for the buck. And I also would rather go in the gym and for example, so on a push-pull legs, you're kind of just hitting your major muscle groups with the big exercises. I would rather go in and let's say, do like an accessory day where

I'm going to do some arms and some shoulders and some abs and some calves. Lord knows I need more calves. I'd rather do that, you know, to burn a couple hundred calories, then go walk an hour. And that's just me. And then that brings us to the fifth and final strategy, which we've already talked a little bit about, and that is supplements. So it's take supplements that have been proven to impact fat loss. And of course, supplements are not the key to fat loss. You can do just fine without any supplements, but if you combine the right ones with a proper diet and exercise routine, you can dramatically speed up the process. So here's my personal fat loss stack, so to speak, and this is what I use and this is what I recommend. So the first supplement is caffeine.

And I guess you can get caffeine without supplementing, but I do get my caffeine from a supplement, from a pre-workout supplement. And the reason why it helps is caffeine increases the amount of energy that your body burns throughout the day. It increases your basal metabolic rate. And it's also nice because if you take enough of it, it improves strength, it promotes muscle endurance, it enhances anaerobic performance, so it makes for better workouts. And it's also worth noting that studies have shown that caffeine is best delivered in a pill or powder format, but you do need to watch out for building up a tolerance, especially when we're talking about weight loss, because over time, the more you have caffeine, the less effective it becomes in its fat burning effects.

So therefore the best plan when you're cutting is probably to have caffeine three, maybe four days a week, I would say max five, and then have no caffeine on the other days so you can preserve its effectiveness as much as possible. a natural chemical that's extracted from a species of African plant, the yohimbe plant. And studies show that yohimbe can accelerate fat loss by blocking the activity of alpha receptors in fat cells. It's also a mild stimulant, but what really makes it special is that it blocks the activity of alpha receptors. Remember alpha receptors are the ones that hinder fat burning. So when catecholamines bind to alpha receptors, nothing happens. If they bind to beta receptors, the fatty acids are released and then ready for burning. So what yohimbine does is it enables your body to reduce its fat stores faster. And it also is particularly useful as you get leaner and you are dealing with more and more stubborn fat. It's those stubborn fat holdouts. Again, that as you get leaner,

you'll notice that, you know, you might've visibly lost quite a bit of fat in your face, basically, you know, most of your upper body, but then certain areas of your body, if you're a guy, it's probably your, your stomach and your, especially your lower stomach, you know, lower abs. If you're a girl, it's your hips and thighs. They, they haven't changed as much as, as you had hoped. That's, that's definitely the case. And so as you get leaner, what you're dealing with, what's left to lose becomes basically more and more stubborn fat. So, uh, your him being is, is great in that regard, because it just helps you get through that final slow period faster. Now there is a catch with your him being though, because elevated insulin levels negate its weight

loss effects. This is what we have seen in research. So if you want to reap its fat loss benefits, then you need to be in a fasted state, which again, now that is why I've said multiple times that if you're going to train in a fasted state, when you're cutting, I highly recommend you combine it with a couple supplements because you're going to get a lot more fat burning out of it. And yohimbine also can improve exercise performance. And studies show that it seems to be particularly effective at fighting off physical fatigue and increasing time to exhaustion. So that's more relevant to endurance exercise or maybe CrossFit type workouts. But because it is a stimulant,

you probably will notice that you have a bit more energy in your workouts and can push yourself a bit harder. And as far as buying yohimbine, you can buy it by itself. But as I mentioned, it is in my pre-workout fat burner forge along with HMB and CDP choline,

which I won't go into here because it's not particularly relevant to our current discussion. But if you want to read more about it or learn about Forge, just go to legionathletics.com slash Forge, and you can check it out. So the next supplement that I recommend you consider is sinephrine, which is a mild stimulant that you will find in certain types of citrus fruits. And it's actually similar to ephedrine, which you've probably heard of. It's just not as powerful and it's a natural alternative to it. So ephedrine is a man-made drug, whereas synephrine is a natural substance found in

certain types of citrus fruit. And the reason why I recommend synephrine is not only can it increase your basal metabolic rate, it also works synergistically with caffeine. So it makes caffeine's fat burning effects stronger and vice versa. Caffeine makes Senefrin more effective. And it also has a similar effect to Yohimbine in that it can help block the activity of alpha receptors even further. So you can kind of

gang up on those alpha receptors by taking both yohimbine and sinephrine. And how that works is the molecules themselves bind to those receptors, basically shutting them down. So then when catecholamines come along, they bind to the beta receptors because the alpha receptors are all filled up with yohamine and sinephrine. I know that's kind of a silly way to explain it, but that is basically how it works. So as far as buying sinephrine goes, you can just buy it. You can buy sinephrine hydrochloride, you know, just the sinephrine molecule, or you can buy a bitter orange extract, which can be standardized for sinephrine content, or you can check out bitter orange extract, which can be standardized for synephrine content, or you can check out a different fat burner of mine. So I have Forge, which is specifically a pre-workout fat burner and specifically for use with fasted training for the reasons we have

discussed. And then I have a fat burner called Phoenix, which is more just a general fat burner that helps increase your metabolic rate and helps amplify the power of different fat burning chemicals that are produced by our body and also helps increase the feeling of fullness from food, which of course helps you stick to your diet. And it has a number of ingredients and one of them is sinephrine. And if you want to learn more about it, just go to legionathletics.com slash Phoenix, P-H-O-E-N-I-X. Okay. So let's just wrap this up with my own personal, you could say belly fat loss routine, just so you see how all these pieces fit together. So it all starts with a 25% calorie deficit and a high protein diet. So I'm eating around one gram to 1.2 grams of protein

per pound of body weight per day. And my'm eating around one gram to 1.2 grams of protein per pound of body weight per day. And my exercise schedule is about four to five hours of heavy weightlifting per week, and no more than two hours of HIIT cardio per week, usually closer to one to one and a half hours split up into 20 or 25 minute sessions. And that of course is the engine that drives all the fat loss. So remember no amount of supplementation is going to matter if you don't get that stuff, right? However, once you do the supplements can help. And here's how that routine breaks down for me. So I lift early in the morning. So about 15 minutes before 10 to 15 minutes before. So I take one serving of forge. I take one serving of Phoenix and I take one scoop of pulse, which is one half of a serving of pulse.

And so I lift weights for maybe about 60 minutes. And then afterwards I eat my first meal. And then later with lunch, I usually it's a salad with chicken. That's what I like to eat for lunch. Get in some greens, get in some protein, get in some healthy fats in the way of avocado, sometimes some nuts. And I'll generally eat this around 12. And as you can tell, it's not that larger a meal. We're looking at maybe 40 grams of protein, no more than 25 grams of carbs and no more than 15 or 20 grams of fat. And the reason why I'm eating a small meal there is I want to be back into a fasted state by about 5.30 or 6 p.m. so I can do fasted cardio. If I were to eat a larger lunch, and especially if it were to contain a fair amount of carbs, there's a good chance that my insulin levels would still be elevated come cardio time. So to play it safe, so to speak, I keep that meal small and give my body

a good five to six hours to fully process it. And I'm not taking any supplements at lunch, or at least any fat loss supplements. And then around five 30 or six, uh, you know, it's cardio time and about 10 or 15 minutes before I'll have a serving of forge, a serving of Phoenix and another scoop, another half serving of pulse. And then I'll do my 20, 25 minutes of hit cardio, usually on an upright bike or a recumbent bike. And then I'm going to eat dinner after. And that's it. That's what I do. And that allows me to lose fat rapidly and especially lose stubborn fat rapidly, which is nice, of course. And I should mention briefly that one scoop of pulse contains about 175 milligrams of caffeine. And for some people that might be kind of iffy,

you know, if you're having that five to six hours before going to bed, my body processes caffeine quickly. So, you know, I'll probably feel it for about an hour and then, and then I basically feel nothing. So that's why I can get away with that without screwing up my sleep, but that may not be the case for other people. So just keep that in mind. So that's it. That's everything. For all the millions of people that are out there struggling to lose belly fat and resorting to all kinds of weird diets and supplements and flat belly tricks, just know that it doesn't have to be that way, period, for anybody ever. If you simply take the simple actions laid out in this podcast, and especially

all the ones not having to do a supplementation, because again, those are the least important, but if you just at least do those things, if not everything, you can get that lean, rippling six pack that you've always wanted and you can keep it for the rest of your life. Hey there, it is Mike again. I hope you enjoyed this episode and found it interesting and helpful. And if you did, and don't mind doing me a favor and want to help me make this the most popular health and fitness podcast on the internet, then please leave a quick review of it on iTunes or wherever you're listening from. This not only convinces people that they should check the show

out, it also increases its search visibility and thus helps more people find their way to me and learn how to build their best bodies ever too. And of course, if you want to be notified when the next episode goes live, then just subscribe to the podcast and you won't miss out on any of the new goodies. Lastly, if you didn't like something about the show, then definitely shoot me an email at mike at muscleforlife.com and share your thoughts on how you think it could be better. I read everything myself and I'm always looking for constructive feedback, so please do reach out. All right, that's it. Thanks again for listening to this episode and I hope to hear from you soon. And lastly, this episode is brought to you by me. Seriously though, I'm not big on promoting stuff that I don't personally use

and believe in. So instead I'm going to just quickly tell you about something of mine, specifically my fitness book for men, bigger, leaner, stronger. Now this book has sold over 350,000 copies in the last several years and helped thousands and thousands of guys build their best bodies ever, which is why it currently has over 3,100 reviews on Amazon with a four and a half star average. So if you wanna know the biggest lies and myths that are keeping you from achieving the lean, muscular, strong, and healthy body that you truly desire, and if you wanna learn the simple science

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