women's infatuation with 'six pack abs'

A

ArtificialWings

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has led me to kick myself into "recieving" mine. a few weeks ago i had a body fat composition test using an actual machine with electrodes and all that. comes out as... :

body fat of 12.3% weighing 148 pounds.

this is about 18 pounds of body fat and i recognize that i would need to lose about 4 pounds of PURE body fat to get a really nice six going. right now unflexed i have no sixpack at all but my stomach is flat, when i flex my abs i can see them kinda well. not as well as id like. i want to get them ripped you know.. yeah, so i have a question... the whole running before breakfast hype... yeah. for someone like me who is into powerlifting ( i took 1st at nationals for 13-15 at 148 pounds!! yay for me.. ) has quite a bit of muscle mass and wants to keep it, is it safe to take advantage of the whole "cardio before breakfast routine"? i know if my body fat was a little higher, say 16 or 18% i wouldnt really worry but is 12% too low and will i risk muslce loss? i must say i dont really care if i lose you know 5-10 pounds off my benchpress or deadlift, i can put that back on, but the thought of purposely losing muscle mass makes me want to cry. is there any way i can minimize any muscle loss if i try running for 30 minutes before breakfast? thanks for all the help guys..

oh yeahh, for any one whos interested, heres a pic from nationals deadlifting .


its funny.. you guys practically got me into weightlifting 'seriously' indirectly by having all this information lying around for me to read and id just like to thank you all.

oh yeah i forgot.. i finally registered. haha. hello forum.
 
oh yeah i forgot.. i finally registered. haha. hello forum.
Click to expand...

LOL

Many people have different ways to break the %10bf barrier. Which to most guys they need to get the six pack. But you would want to do it fasted in the morning. Personally i prefer LISS. You might have to start to montior your calorie intake has well. Most people do but your very young with a lot of lean muscle relative to your weight so you might be lucky.
 
Fortunately,I think there is . It's all in the book Burn the fat Feed the muscle by Tom Venuto (the guy is all muscle and 3.7% Bodyfat !!!!!!!!!! , it's simply incredible) . The book is like 300 pages so I'm gonna say it in few sentences. Figure out the amount of calories that you need to take daily you can do that on some of the . You can do that on some web pages but I cannot remember the names now. Just take away 100 or 150 calories from that nubmer, do cardio and lift weights. The author of the book says by doing this and MOST IMPORTANT: having a clean diet, because abs are made in the kitchen, you can just loose fat not muscle, that the whole point of the book. You probably know this - split your daily calorie intake into 6 small meals every 2-3 hours. If you wanna get more info, go to . See the picture of the guy there, with only 3.7 % bodyfat and so much muscle, you're gonna conclude by yourself that what you're asking is possible. It's very simple - BUT NOT EASY! , don't mix these two simple and easy
 
Low Intensity Steady State cardio. Actually i do a bit of both that being LISS and HIIT - High Intensity Intveral Traning depends on my mood.
 
vojdancov thanks for the answer,i ll definitley look into that.

newf: i heard low intensity cardio that drags on for longer than 40 or so minutes burns fat, yes, but muscle aswell. i actually kind of enjoy HIIT although with the routine i do i can barely last fifteen minutes.
 
LISS worked really well for me for 1.5 years and then stopped. I actually couldn't keep the weight off and I was doing 40 minutes daily. That's why I came here. HIIT has helped jumpstart the weightloss again and give me much more definition and shape! I still do LISS weekly, because I like how it feels. I agree both can be effective used together.
 
yeah i understance the importance of cardio training like HIIT and LISS in fat loss however my main question is, is it safe to do HIIT on an empty stomach before breakfast without risking muscle loss for someone like myself. if so, what would i have to eat before i went to sleep, etc
 
i'm a huge believer in morning cardio - i run 3 miles every morning as soon as i get up - which is early. really burns fat, IMO. a good spin class would do the same thing i bet. for those of you trying to get a six pack abdomen i highly recommend this. i always do pushups, leglifts, reverse pushups and crunches as well.
also, i believe it's probably impossible not to lose a little muscle when dropping fat, that's not a problem though, as long as you dont lose too much. :)
 
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