The Get Ripped Body
March 28th 2009
What is a get ripped workout? What is a get ripped body?
The quest for ripped usually involves the pursuit of six-pack abs, beach perfect muscles, and rock hard sculpted buttocks. Fortunately, the drive to look better usually requires a program that also provides real fitness. The kind of fitness that strengthens your heart, increases your endurance, and reduces the levels of unhealthy fat in the body.
Getting ripped is the process of improving body composition by losing body fat while increasing lean muscle mass. There are many ways to do this, as long as you learn the difference between effective workout techniques and “quick-fix” hype.
Get Ripped Workout Myths
Aerobic training at a lower intensity will burn more fat
Many fitness “experts” define a number equalling 65% of your maximum heart rate max as the appropriate “training zone” for cardio activities such as cycling, running, and swimming. The rationale is that this range is high enough to ensure that the body is working at sufficient levels to burn fat and strengthen the heart, but not so intensely as to risk over taxing the heart. Extended periods of exercise in this training range will tap into fat stores and burn fat. The key here is the word extended.
High intensity exercise, typically in the 85%-90% range of your maximum heart rate, cannot be maintained for extended periods. The body utilizes glucose in the blood to fuel this type of short-lived, high intensity activity. But even so, fat stores are also utilized to curtail a too rapid rate of glucose depletion.
In short, it’s the total calories burned that count. A high intensity workout session will always burn a higher percentage of body fat than a low intensity workout of the same duration.
Six-pack abs are the result of marathon crunch sessions
We all have a six-pack, it just can’t be seen unless you remove the layer of fat covering it. Including crunches in your workouts can further develop this muscle group. Crunches are also key for building core stability. But even marathon sets of crunches won’t burn enough calories to significantly impact fat burning. In addition, contrary to common gym folklore, there is no such thing as spot-reducing. You can’t target to burn the fat from your abdomen. It comes off as it went on, gradually and all over.
There are effective programs that can guide you in your quest to have a get ripped body. One of the most effective is the recently released Adam Waters RTP Transformation System.
