If you’ve been eating clean, dieting hard and busting a gut at the gym you should be enjoying the fruits of your labour.
Consistency brings results. If you work hard enough for long enough it should shine through in your physique.
But sometimes, no matter how hard you try, you just can’t shift that last little layer of fat which is stopping you from having a six pack sharp enough to grate a carrot on.
If you really want to burn off that last bit of stubborn blubber then always revert back to Rule 1:
Abs are made in the kitchen.
It might be worth having another look at your diet – are you eating as clean as you can? Are you sneaking to the freezer at night to gorge on ice cream?
There are two things that you can remove from your diet that will make a big difference to your body composition.
Grains
This could be the one major thing stopping your getting rid of that belly. Foods containing grains like pasta, bread, cereal and junk food like biscuits and baked goods are not great if you’re looking to sharpen up your physique.
Things like white bread and white pasta are loaded with sugar which break down fast. So when you eat them it spikes your blood sugar, causing your body then store it all as fat (normally on your belly). Two slices of white bread contain 36g of carbs.
Refined grains are the worst culprits – they essentially have all the nutrients stripped out, leaving you with the high carb, high calories junk devoid of nutritional value.
Wheat and other grains also contain gluten. While we might not all suffer from celiac disease, there are many people that are sensitive to this protein and it can cause an inflammatory response in the body, bloating and digestion problems.
Try cutting out grains for a few weeks and see what a difference it can make. Switch up to carb sources like sweet potato, brown rice and quinoa which take the body longer to break down.
Milk
Everyone loves milk. We stick it in our cups of tea, lavish it on our porridge and drink it by the bucket load.
But it might just be holding back your aspirations of getting your stomach looking like the Coronation Street cobbles.
And it’s not just milk – pretty much all dairy products. Yes, even cheese. We know milk is full of protein, Vitamin D and calcium, but if you’re trying to peel the last layer of fat off your stomach in time for summer, then milk won’t really help.
It’s full of fats and also contains a fair amount of lactose – which is a sugar that can spike your blood sugar levels. Before then getting shunted into your fat cells (adipose tissue) to hide that chiselled stomach you’re looking for.
Try going dairy free for a month and you should definitely see a difference in your stomach.
