How many bodies you got

How Much Protein Do You Need?

Barbie Cervoni MS, RD, CDCES, CDN, is a registered dietitian and certified diabetes care and education specialist.

Verywell / Alexandra Shytsman

Eating enough protein daily is essential to cover your body’s needs. Protein helps your body maintain a proper fluid balance, builds and repairs tissues, transports nutrients, and provides other vital functions.

Understanding how much protein you need depends on several factors and changes over time and with certain lifestyle factors. Everyone needs a different amount but determining what’s right for you is easier when you know more about the factors involved. Read on to learn more.

Determining Protein Needs

When determining your protein needs, you can either identify a percentage of total daily calories or target a specific number of grams of protein to consume per day. You can also use your weight, activity level, and lean body mass.

Percent of Daily Calories

Current U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) dietary guidelines suggest that adults should consume between 10% and 35% of their total calories from protein. To get your number and track your intake, you’ll need to know how many calories you consume daily.

Once you know how many calories you consume, multiply that number by 10% and 35% to get your range. For example, a person who consumes 2,000 calories per day would need to consume 200 to 700 calories daily from protein.

6 Tips for Getting More Protein in Your Diet

Protein Grams Per Day

You can target a specific number of protein grams per day as an alternative to the percentage approach. A straightforward way to get a range of protein grams per day is to translate the percent range into a specific protein gram range. The math is easy.

Each gram of protein contains four calories. Divide the two calorie range numbers by four. Someone who eats 2,000 calories per day should consume 200 to 700 calories from protein, or 50 to 175 grams of protein.

Based on Weight and Activity

Other ways to get a more specific protein goal may consider lean muscle mass and/or physical activity level.

The average adult needs a minimum of 0.8 grams of protein per kilogram of body weight per day. One kilogram equals 2.2 pounds, so a person who weighs 165 pounds, or 75 kg, would need about 60 grams of protein per day.

However, your protein needs may increase if you are very active. The Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics, the American College of Sports Medicine, and the Dietitians of Canada suggest that athletes need more protein.

These organizations suggest that athletes consume between 1.2 grams and 2.0 grams of protein per kilogram of body weight per day, with endurance athletes at the lower end of this range and strength and power athletes at the higher end.

How Much Protein to Build Muscle?

If you are aiming to build muscle, you will need to consume more calories than you burn and enough protein to support new tissue growth. Research suggests about 1.4 to 2.0 grams of protein per kilogram of body weight each day to build muscle, but numbers vary. Speak to a sports nutritionist if you need more guidance.

Health Benefits of Eating Protein

Protein helps to maintain body tissues, including muscles, organs, the nervous system, blood, skin, and hair. It also serves as a transport mechanism for oxygen, fats, vitamins, and minerals.

In addition, eating protein can help you manage your weight because it takes longer to digest a protein-rich meal. After consuming a meal with protein, you’re likely to feel full and satisfied longer.

The amount of protein needed to lose weight is actually higher than it is to maintain your weight. This is because when you are in a calorie deficit, you lose muscle mass easier. To preserve muscle, increasing the amount of protein you eat can help. How much depends on your current weight, body composition, calorie needs, and more.

Some protein foods have additional health benefits. Legumes are high in protein and fiber and contain phytochemicals that may have health benefits. Fish, such as salmon, tuna, herring, and trout, are high in protein and also omega-3 fatty acids that are essential for health.

Protein Deficiency

Unlike fat and glucose, our body has little capacity to store protein. If you were to stop eating protein, your body would start to break down muscle. Protein deficiency is rare in developed countries. However, it can happen if you’re not eating enough food every day.

It’s sometimes challenging for certain people to eat enough protein, including those with very low-calorie diets, vegans, or elderly individuals. Supplementing with protein powder or shakes may help these people obtain enough protein. Speak to your doctor if you want to learn more.

Protein Overconsumption

On the flip side, it is possible to overeat protein. Some people believe that excess protein is excreted in the urine. However, only part of the protein is excreted. Another part of the protein is converted to glucose for energy or stored as fat.

So if you eat too much protein—and too many calories as a result—you risk gaining weight from excess calories. If you eat more protein than you need but still have your calories balanced, then you will not gain weight, even with the additional protein.

If your calorie goal stays on track, but you get more protein than you need, you are may not be getting enough carbohydrates or fat for your body to function correctly. In addition, excessive protein intake can be strenuous on the kidneys. People with certain types of kidney diseases need to manage how much protein they eat.

The key to proper nutrition is achieving the appropriate balance of macronutrients. Eating large amounts of protein can lead to dehydration, even in elite athletes. So if you follow a high protein diet, it’s important to drink extra water.

Protein Sources

Protein comes from plant and animal sources, and you can meet your protein needs with either type of protein. Plant sources are typically not considered complete proteins since they lack all of the essential amino acids. For this reason, eating a wide variety of plant-based proteins that cover all of the amino acids you need is important.

Meat and Seafood

Lean meats, poultry, fish, seafood, eggs, and dairy products are excellent protein sources. Each provides all of the essential amino acids along with many other nutrients such as iron, B vitamins, and zinc, which are primarily found in animal foods.

Coldwater fish such as salmon, tuna, and herring make good protein choices because they’re also rich in omega-3 fatty acids EPA and DHA, which are almost exclusively found in seafood and essential for health.

A chicken drumstick with leg, thigh, and back, (258g) contains 62g of protein. A 6-ounce serving of salmon contains 34g of protein. Eggs contain about 6g of protein each, which varies with the size of the egg.

Plant-Based Protein

Some vegetables like spinach and kale contain a minuscule amount of protein. Whole grains, such as quinoa, are also a source of protein (1 cup has about 8 grams of protein).

Keep your plant proteins healthy by choosing recipes and cooking methods that preserve their nutritional benefits. For example, use tofu (22g of protein in a half-cup serving) instead of meat in a stir-fry, add nuts or seeds to a dinner salad or use dry beans like kidney, navy, or black beans as your primary protein source for a few meals.

The amount of protein in various beans differs slightly, but kidney beans contain about 8g of protein in a half-cup serving.

How to Get More Protein

Here are a few tips to get more protein in your healthy diet.

One serving of protein usually comprises 3 to 5 ounces of meat, poultry, or fish; one egg; 1.5 ounces of cheese; or about 12 walnuts.

You can also use other methods to consume the right portion size. A serving of meat, poultry, or fish is about the size of the palm of your hand. A serving of cheese is the same size as two dice. Keep in mind that these servings vary based on hunger, weight, age, activity level, and other factors.

Guidelines for Specific Populations

Many sources that suggest protein guidelines provide numbers for adult men and women. But specific populations may need more or less protein to manage a medical condition or facilitate growth.

Consult a health care professional or dietitian to determine your ideal daily protein goal.

What You Need to Know About Burning Fat

Heather Black, CPT is a NASM-certified personal trainer and owner of Heather Black Fitness & Nutrition where she offers remote and in-person training and nutrition coaching.

DisobeyArt / Getty Images

Your body stores calories as fat to keep you alive and safe. There are many gimmicks that claim to amplify fat burning, such as working out in the fat-burning zone, spot reduction, and foods or supplements that supposedly make you burn more fat.

If you intend to reduce the amount of fat stored in your body, learn how to burn fat through a variety of types of exercise instead of seeking a quick fix that is not likely to work. Here’s what you need to know.

Basics of Burning Fat

If you’re trying to reduce your body’s fat stores, knowing how your body uses calories for fuel can make a difference in how you approach weight management. You get your energy from fat, carbohydrates, and protein. Which one your body draws from for energy depends on the kind of activity you’re doing.

Most people want to use fat for energy. It may seem that the more fat you can use as fuel, the less fat you will have in your body. But, using more fat doesn’t automatically lead to losing more fat. Understanding the best way to burn fat starts with some basic facts about how your body gets its energy.

The body primarily uses fat and carbohydrates for fuel. The ratio of which fuels are utilized will shift depending on your activity. A small amount of protein is used during exercise, but it’s mainly used to repair the muscles after exercise.

Higher-intensity exercises, such as fast-paced running, cause the body to rely on carbs for fuel. The metabolic pathways available to break down carbs for energy are more efficient than those for fat breakdown. Fat is used more for energy than carbs for long, slower exercise.

This is a very simplified look at energy with a solid take-home message. Burning more calories matters more than using fat for energy. The harder you work, the more calories you will burn overall.

It doesn’t matter what type of fuel you use when it comes to weight loss. What matters is how many calories you burn.

Think about it this way—when you sit or sleep, you’re in your prime fat-burning mode. But you probably don’t think of sitting and sleeping more as a pathway to losing body fat. The bottom line is that just because you’re using more fat as energy doesn’t mean you’re burning more calories.

Myth of the Fat Burning Zone

Exercising at lower intensities will use more fat for energy. This basic premise is what started the theory of the fat burning zone, which is the idea that working in a certain heart rate zone (around 55% to 65% of your maximum heart rate) will allow your body to burn more fat.

Over the years, this theory has become so ingrained in our exercise experience that we see it touted in books, charts, websites, magazines, and even on cardio machines at the gym. The trouble is that it’s misleading.

Working at lower intensities can be great, but it won’t necessarily burn more fat off your body. One way to increase your calorie burn is to exercise at higher intensities.

This doesn’t necessarily mean that you should avoid low-intensity exercise if you want to burn more fat. There are some specific things you can do to burn more fat and it all starts with how often and for how long you exercise.

Burn Fat With a Mix of Cardio

You may be confused about exactly how hard to work during cardio. You may even think that high-intensity exercise is the only way to go. After all, you can burn more calories and you don’t have to spend as much time doing it.

But having some variety can help you stimulate each of your energy systems, protect you from overuse injuries, and help you enjoy your workouts more. You can set up a cardio program that includes a variety of different exercises at different intensities.

High-Intensity Cardio

For our purposes, high-intensity cardio falls between about 80% to 90% of your maximum heart rate (MHR). Or, if you’re not using heart rate zones, about a six to eight on a 10-point perceived exertion scale. What this translates to is exercise at a level that feels challenging and leaves you too breathless to talk in complete sentences.

But you’re not going all out, as in sprinting as fast as you can. There’s no doubt that some high-intensity training work can be helpful for weight loss as well as improving endurance and aerobic capacity.

You can get the same benefit from short workouts spread throughout the day as you do with continuous workouts. For example, a 150-pound person would burn about 341 calories after running at 6 mph for 30 minutes. If this person walked at 3.5 mph for that same length of time, they would burn 136 calories.

But, the number of calories you can burn isn’t the whole story. Too many high-intensity workouts every week can put you at risk in a number of ways.

Potential Risks

If you do too many high-intensity workouts, you put yourself at risk for:

If you don’t have much experience with exercise, you may not have the conditioning or the desire for breathless and challenging workouts. If you have any medical condition or injury, check with a healthcare provider before training.

If you’re doing several days of cardio each week, you would probably want only one or two workouts to fall into the high-intensity range. You can use other workouts to target different fitness areas (like endurance) and allow your body to recover. Here are some examples of how to incorporate high-intensity workouts.

One way to incorporate high-intensity workouts is to exercise at a fast pace. You can use any activity or machine for a 20-minute workout at a fast pace, but the idea is to stay in the high-intensity work zone throughout the workout. Twenty minutes is usually the recommended length, and most people wouldn’t want to go much longer than that.

Tabata training is another form of high-intensity interval training in which you work very hard for 20 seconds, rest for 10 seconds, and repeat for 4 minutes. In this workout, you should be breathless and unable to talk.

Additionally, interval training is a great way to incorporate high-intensity training without doing it continuously. Alternate a hard segment (e.g., running at a fast pace for 30 to 60 seconds) with a recovery segment (e.g., walking for 1 to 2 minutes). Repeat this series for the length of the workout, usually around 20 to 30 minutes.

Moderate-Intensity Cardio

There are a variety of definitions of what moderate-intensity exercise is, but it typically falls between 70% to 80% of your maximum heart rate. That would be a level four to six on a 10-point perceived exertion scale. You are breathing harder than usual, but can carry on a conversation without much difficulty.

Schedule your day around exercise instead of trying to squeeze it in when you can. Making your workout a priority increases the chances that you will accomplish your goal. The American College of Sports Medicine (ACSM) often recommends this level of intensity in its exercise guidelines. The lower end of this range usually incorporates the fat-burning zone.

Moderate-intensity workouts also have some great benefits. For instance, even modest movement can improve your health while lowering your risk of heart disease, diabetes, and high blood pressure. Also, it takes time to build up the endurance and strength to handle challenging exercises. Moderate workouts allow you to work at a more comfortable pace, which means you may be more consistent with your program.

You also can usually get into the moderate heart rate zones with a variety of activities. Even raking leaves or shoveling snow can fall into that category if you do it vigorously enough.

Examples of Moderate Intensity Workouts

For weight management, you would likely want the majority of your cardio workouts to fall into the moderate range. Some examples include:

Low-Intensity Activity

Low-intensity exercise is below 60% to 70% of your MHR, or about a level three to five on a 10-point perceived exertion scale. This level of intensity is no doubt one of the most comfortable areas of exercise, keeping you at a pace that isn’t too taxing and doesn’t pose much of a challenge.

This fact, along with the idea that it burns more fat, makes low-intensity exercise popular. But, as we’ve learned, working at a variety of intensities is ideal for weight loss. That doesn’t mean that low-intensity exercise has no purpose, though.

It involves the long, slow activities you feel like you could do all day. Even better, it includes activities you usually enjoy, such as taking a stroll, gardening, riding a bike, or a gentle stretching routine.

Low-intensity cardio can be something you do all day long by doing an extra lap when you’re shopping, taking the stairs, parking farther from the entrance, and doing more physical chores around the house. Exercise such as Pilates and yoga are at a lower intensity but help develop your core, flexibility, and balance. They can be a part of a well-rounded routine.

Importance of Consistent Exercise

It may seem like a no-brainer that regular exercise can help you burn fat. But it’s not just about the calories you’re burning. It’s also about the adaptations your body makes when you exercise on a regular basis. Many of those adaptations lead directly to your ability to burn more fat without even trying.

Benefits

Here are some benefits of consistent exercise.

Lift Weights to Burn Fat

Adding more muscle by lifting weights and doing other resistance exercises can also help with burning fat. While many people focus more on cardio for weight loss, there’s no doubt that strength training is a key component in any weight loss routine. Here are some benefits of weight training.

Burn Calories

If you lift weights at a higher intensity, you can increase your afterburn, or the calories you burn after your workout. That means that you burn calories during your workouts, but your body continues to burn calories even after your workout while your body gets back to its resting state.

Keep Metabolism Going

A diet-only approach to weight loss could lower a person’s resting metabolic rate by up to 20% a day. Lifting weights and maintaining muscle helps keep the metabolism up, even if you’re cutting your calories.

Preserve Muscle Mass

If you are restricting calories, you risk losing muscle. Muscle is metabolically active, so when you lose it, you also lose the extra calorie burn muscles produce.

To start, choose a basic total body workout and do that about twice a week, with at least one day in between. As you get stronger, you can do more exercises, increase intensity, or add more days of strength training. It may take a few weeks but you’ll eventually see and feel a difference in your body.

Strategies

To burn more fat when strength training, here are some strategies that you can utilize.

If you want a more structured program, try a four-week slow build program which includes a schedule of cardio and strength workouts that allows you to gradually increase your intensity.

A Word From Verywell

When it comes to burning more fat, you have to work at it. The good news is that it doesn’t take much activity to push the body into that fat burning mode.

Try incorporating some type of activity every day, even if it’s just a quick walk. Then, build on that over time. Soon you’re on the way to burning more fat. It also can be beneficial to work with a registered dietitian or certified personal trainer to develop a more individualized program.

Mul JD, Stanford KI, Hirshman MF, Goodyear LJ. Exercise and regulation of carbohydrate metabolism. Prog Mol Biol Transl Sci. 2015;135:17–37. doi:10.1016/bs.pmbts.2015.07.020

U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Activity guidelines questions and answers.

Willis LH, Slentz CA, Bateman LA, et al. Effects of aerobic and/or resistance training on body mass and fat mass in overweight or obese adults. J Appl Physiol (1985). 2012;113(12):1831–1837. doi:10.1152/japplphysiol.01370.2011

How to Get Shredded: 10 Steps to Getting a Six Pack

Are six-packs built in the kitchen or the gym? The truth is it’s both. Getting shredded requires a combination of building muscle and losing fat, so depending on where you are in your fitness journey, this can take a while.

There is no quick fix for getting defined abs; you cannot spot reduce fat or out-train a crappy diet. And there are no magic supplements or specific diets that change this. Achieving a shredded look requires some serious hard work, time, and dedication. However, getting there doesn’t have to be complicated.

How long does it take to get abs?

For many people, getting shredded requires them to build muscle mass or «bulking» before focusing on fat loss. And that’s really it in a nutshell; there are only two requirements for getting a six-pack:

This overall process can take many months, if not years. The reality is, many people cannot build a beach body in six weeks, but you can still make drastic improvements in your fitness and health. And with enough dedication and patience, you will eventually get there.

Having this understanding going into it is key. It allows you to be realistic with your expectations and will help ensure you don’t get discouraged or give up when results don’t come overnight.

How to Lose Body Fat and Gain Muscle at the Same Time

The holy grail would be to short-cut the process of bulking and cutting back to back and just do both at the same time. This is somewhat possible but requires some interesting physics.

Technically, building muscle requires weight gain, and losing fat requires weight loss, so how can you do both simultaneously?

It is possible to reconfigure your body composition over time, but your weight will change. And the process may take a little longer than if you went through the traditional cycling of massing and cutting.

One study suggests that with a high protein intake and a well-planned strength training program, you may be able to increase lean mass while simultaneously losing body fat (2). Researchers found that as long as protein intakes remain high (up to three times the RDA), and you are participating in regular strength training, you may not only be able to preserve lean mass in a calorie deficit but can help increase it slightly.

Although this approach is likely not efficient long-term, it is difficult to achieve, and the amount of muscle gained may not be as significant as what you would experience on a traditional bulking diet.

Do fat-burning supplements work?

I’m going to give you the number one secret to optimal fat loss; it is cutting calories. That’s it. If you don’t get that part right, it’s pretty damn near impossible to lose body fat.

But companies and «experts» are still going to talk to you about raising your metabolic rate and speeding up the fat-burning process, through supplements and special diets, but these are false promises.

Based on what we know about the human body and existing research, you cannot hack your metabolism; it is largely determined by your body weight (mainly lean mass) and basal metabolic rate (BMR). And even though some supplements like caffeine, might cause minor increases in BMR, the amount is typically so small it doesn’t outweigh the need for calorie control (3).

Fat-burning supplements are often dangerous, ineffective, and expensive.

Research has yet to conclude that any supplements promote more fat loss than diet alone. The bottom line, if something sounds too good to be true, it probably is.

Your complete guide to getting ripped

Now that we’ve gotten common misconceptions out of the way, we can dive into what does work in helping you get more shredded. Here are ten steps, backed by science, that will assist you in getting those abs to show and the chiseled physique you’re dreaming of.

Step 1: Strength train to build muscle

Moreover, your abs are a muscle, and just as with any other muscle in your body, increasing the size of your abs and strengthening them can promote better definition in your stomach. But don’t just focus on core exercises, increasing your lean mass overall can help give you better results and make the process easier. Plus, many compound lifting movements and heavy lifting, in general, incorporates your abs. If you haven’t been lifting weights or including any strength training in addition to your ab workouts, you may want to start.

For how often you should be training, weight training three times a week has both been associated with more muscle growth than less frequent training (7,8,9,10). And the amount you can lift may not matter according to studies, heavy weights for low reps and high-frequency light weight lifting are both associated with positive muscle growth (11).

In other words, just strength training at any weight multiple times a week is going to support lean mass.

Best Core Building Exercises:

There are endless variations of these simple exercises that include hanging, weighted, decline, etc. Including a variation of these basic functional movements at least 3 days a week and increasing the difficulty can help build your ab muscles over time (12,13,14).

If you are looking to bulk first, stick to a moderately high calorie diet and weight train for a few months before moving on to a calorie deficit in step 2. If going right to a cut, keep weight training and working your core consistently.

Step 2: Cut Calories to Lose Fat

Whether you are bulking first and then cutting, or working to change your body composition all at once, controlling your calorie intake is essential.

The way calories work is that they provide 100% of the energy your body needs each day. You get calories from foods and beverages and burn calories through daily movements and bodily functions. If you are eating more calories than you need, they get stored as reserve energy, also known as fat. And if you eat less than you need, you must tap into these reserves, and essentially burn body fat for fuel. Thus, cutting calories consistently is the most effective way to lose body fat.

It’s also important to not cut your calories too low. While this can help speed up the process temporarily, you may end up losing precious lean mass. Research suggests that this may be more important for trained individuals and those with less fat to lose, compared to those with less lean mass and more body fat to begin with (15,16,17).

Not to mention that starving yourself is likely going to make the process much more difficult, by negatively affecting your energy levels, mood, and appetite (18,19,20).

Start by figuring out how many calories you need a day to lose weight and track your daily intake to ensure you are below this amount daily:

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Stick to your calorie goals for at least three weeks and reassess your progress. If you aren’t feeling or looking leaner, consider cutting a little lower. And if you are starving and having trouble sticking to your diet, consider increasing your calories a little.

If you only master step 1 and step 2 of this guide, you are going to get results. The rest from here is really just supplemental to those two key factors.

Step 3: Eat Enough Protein

Protein is also protective of your muscle in a calorie deficit, helping you lose more body fat and less lean mass (23).

Moreover, high protein diets (at least 25% to 30% of your calories from protein) are thought to support better appetite control and reduce cravings, making it a dieter’s best friend (24,25).

Step 4: Eat a Moderate Amount of Healthy Fats

Eating fat will not make you fat unless you are eating too many calories. However, limited research implies that some people may be more susceptible to changes in body composition from fat intake than others (26,27). After all, fat is more likely to be stored as body fat in a calorie surplus compared to other macros.

Fat is also calorically dense, meaning it can be easy to go overboard and add more calories than you realize. So, unless you are following a specific, high-fat diet like keto, controlling your overall fat intake could be important in helping you maintain calorie control and promote more fat loss (28).

The type of fat you eat also matters, with research suggesting healthier, unsaturated fats are less likely to be stored as fat compared to saturated fats (29). Including some healthy fats is also thought to be appetizing and satisfying, since fat provides appealing flavor and mouthfeel to foods, making it easier to stick to your diet (30). Moreover, healthy fats offer important health benefits that should not be ignored.

Aim to keep fat at 20 to 30% of your total calories and opt for more healthy, unsaturated fats to keep you feeling satisfied and obtain potential health benefits.

Step 5: Try Carb Cycling

Contrary to popular opinion, carbs alone do not cause weight gain. And if you are hitting the gym hard, your workouts could benefit from adequate carb intake. Instead of going low carb, consider cycling your carbs.

Carb cycling may be protective of lean muscle when carbs stores are replenished strategically on higher carb days and have positive effects on appetite control at later times (31,32,33). In addition, it is thought to promote more fat utilization when carbs are limited, helping you burn more body fat in a calorie deficit (34,35).

Additional benefits include positive effects on overall calorie control without having to be ultra-restrictive. Since your body does not regulate calories in 24-hour increments, it is more of a rolling accumulation over time, cutting carbs and subsequently calories on certain days of the week, can help you decrease your weekly calorie average. And timing lower calories and carbs on days you are less active, means you are less likely to negatively impact your workouts, and more likely to control appetite and protect lean mass on higher activity days.

Consider swinging your macros from one day to the next, allocating more carbs on heavy lifting and high intensity training days, and lower carbs and calories on light days or rest days.

Another approach to nutrient timing is by utilizing more carbs in pre and post-workout meals and stacking more carbs during the time of day you are more active.

Step 6: Use Portion Control

Even if you are meal prepping and tracking all of your intake, it can still be a challenge to get accurate portion control if you are not weighing or measuring your food.

Every calorie counts. It can be easy to estimate your portions incorrectly, especially underestimating, when you aren’t weighing everything. Eyeballing or measuring cups work great for a while, but eventually, those extra calories add up.

In some studies, participants tend to underestimate their calorie intake by up to 20% on average, which can be enough to inhibit fat loss altogether (36,37).

For example, just pouring a small amount of oil in a pan to cook your food may not seem like a big deal, but you could be adding a hundred calories or so to your meal without realizing it.

Consider purchasing a food scale and learning what weights align with your portion and calorie goals to be as accurate as possible when prepping and tracking your food.

Here are some examples:

Weighing your food portions will ensure you are tracking as accuratly as possible and will ultimately help you stay on track better.

You can also set yourself up for more success by systematizing your diet. Eat at roughly the same times each day and make your diet more routine in general. This will help cut down on any added variables that may throw you off, including temptations and being stuck hungry somewhere without healthy food on hand. It also does wonders for your portion control.

Step 7: Add High-Intensity Interval Training (HIIT)

If your morning jog or the elliptical isn’t getting you results, it may be time to up your intensity. Increasing the intensity of your cardio or conditioning workouts can not only help you burn more calories in the gym but may have additional fat loss benefits.

Some research suggests that high-intensity interval training or HIIT workouts may promote fat loss and improve stamina faster than endurance training alone (38,39,40,41). This level of output is thought to create a significant shift in your metabolic output that continues a high calorie burn after you are done training (42). And HIIT training may offer unique benefits in burning more belly fat in specific (43).

Try this HIIT workout designed by Jenny Scott, Senior Content Developer at International Sports Sciences Association :

1. Lateral shift

4. Bodyweight Squats

1. Reverse lunges

5. Mountain Climbers

1. Shoulder stretch: hold for 10 to 15 seconds, then switch arms. Repeat 2-3 times on each side.

2. Quad Stretch: Hold for about 15 seconds, then switch legs. Repeat 2-3 times on each side.

3. Posterior chain stretch: hold for about 30 seconds. Repeat 2-3 times.

Add two high intensity training days to your workout routine to support fat loss and help you lean out.

Step 8: Get Some Sleep

As for fat loss, poor sleep has been linked to increased belly fat in numerous studies (44,45,46).

Sleep is also essential for recovery in general, helping us keep our energy levels high and mood stable, both of which can affect our desire to work out and stick to a healthy diet if not managed properly.

Aim to get at least seven hours of quality, uninterrupted sleep each night.

Step 9: Control Stress

Learning to combat daily stress or at least channel it in a more positive way could be key to helping you lose more body fat and get better results.

Step 10: Stay Consistent

All of the steps above are meaningless unless you practice them consistently. And being consistent simply means repeating the same behaviors on a regular basis.

The goal is not perfection, nor is trying to stick to a diet perfectly realistic for most people. Instead, focus on getting it right a majority of the time. Consistency coupled with patience and enough time will ultimately lead you to your desired results.

Six Pack Abs Diet

Balancing everything it takes to get into the best shape of your life can feel overwhelming. Especially if you struggle with stress, time, family, and other outside factors that can hinder your motivation or block your progress. There aren’t a lot of solutions out there to simplify the hard work that goes into building muscle and training to get shredded, but there are meal plan solutions that can help you get the diet part right.

If the diet is where you continue to struggle, grab this free meal prep toolkit for fat loss to dial in your nutrition and start losing more body fat. Pairs perfectly with Trifecta a la carte proteins, carbs, and veggies to help you customize your diet to your specific macros and make meal prepping as easy as possible.

Take the guesswork out of dieting.
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Muscle Tone: The Truth About How To Get A Toned Body

Do you want more muscle tone? Of course you do!

Maybe you want to tone up your legs, or your stomach, or your arms, or your back, or your butt. Hell, maybe you want to tone up your entire body.

And that’s why you’re here. You want to know all of the best tips, tricks, and secrets for how to get toned as quickly and effectively as possible.

Sound about right? Cool.

Here’s the first thing you need to know…

Everything You’ve Heard About Tone Is Bullshit

Confused? Don’t worry. This will make perfect sense once you learn what these words actually mean. In fact, let’s define them right now.

What Is Muscle Tone?

In this context, muscle tone refers to having a sufficient amount of muscle mass, plus a low enough body fat percentage for that muscle to actually be visible.

So, the less fat you have covering your muscles, the more “toned” and “defined” and “sculpted” you will look. The more fat you have covering your muscles (or if there’s simply not enough muscle present), the less visible your muscles will be and the less “toned” you will appear.

In a nutshell… Muscle – Fat = Tone

So, whenever a person says they want to “tone up,” they’re really just saying they want their muscles to be more visible than they currently are.

How do you make this happen, you ask? By either:

Most people are surprised to hear all of this, because they’re under the impression that getting a toned body is this special thing that happens some special way using special workouts, exercises, methods, and techniques.

But… it’s really not anything like that at all.

To show you what I mean, let’s go over the 4 most common myth-based approaches people use when trying to get toned.

4 Stupid Myths About How To Get Toned

Do any of these sound familiar? I bet they do. And they’re all bullshit.

Because in order to get toned, you need less fat and/or more muscle, and this sort of myth-based crap is ineffective at both.

Here’s The Truth About Muscle And Fat

The truth is, in terms of your appearance, the only thing you can do to a muscle is make it bigger or smaller.

You can’t tone it, or sculpt it, or shape it, or define it, or [whatever else] it.

Nor are there different types or textures of it (bulky, lean, toned, etc.) you can build. That’s all nonsense

Muscle is muscle. You can only increase or decrease how much of it you have, or increase or decrease how much body fat is covering it.

And, like I explained earlier, getting “toned” is all about building enough muscle and losing enough body fat so the muscle you’ve built is sufficiently visible.

And since the stuff on the list above isn’t good for building muscle or burning fat, it’s mostly just a big waste of time in your quest to get toned.

Allow me to elaborate…

How Muscle Is Actually Built

Research shows that building muscle requires a particular type of stimulus – specifically tension, fatigue, and damage (source) – and the typical “light weight, high rep, toning workout” nonsense is laughable at providing it.

Building muscle also involves gradually getting stronger over time (aka progressive overload), and using the same super light, not-at-all-challenging weights over and over again for months/years is the opposite of that.

In addition, muscle is most effectively built when using a well-designed weight training program that incorporates optimal amounts of volume, frequency, and intensity. The typical “toning workout for women” takes none of this into consideration.

How Fat Is Actually Lost

Losing fat has just one requirement: a caloric deficit, which means consuming fewer calories than you burn.

And what we have on the list from before is a collection of training methods that rely on “spot reduction” being possible. It’s not.

You see, spot reduction is the idea that you can burn fat from one specific area of the body by doing exercises that target that area. For example, arm exercises will supposedly target the fat on your arms, and leg exercises will supposedly target the fat on your legs.

And this will supposedly burn the ugly body fat that’s covering your muscles, thus revealing those pretty muscles and making them look toned.

Unfortunately, this isn’t actually possible, because exercises target muscles, not the fat on top of those muscles.

Spot reduction is just another myth that has been disproven over and over again in the real-world, as well as in studies (sources here, here, and here). This makes every training method built around it a myth just the same. (Details here: How To Lose Fat From Your Stomach, Arms, Thighs, And More)

The reality is that you’re only capable of losing fat from your entire body as a whole. Exactly where on your body you lose fat from first, second, third, etc. is predetermined by your genetics and can’t be changed by the workouts, exercises, or amount of sets and reps you do, or the amount of weight you lift.

So, How Do You Get Toned?

It’s a simple 4-step process…

Step 1: Ignore The Myths

Ignore all of the myth-based “toning” nonsense you often see. It’s useless at best, and counterproductive at worst.

“Toning workouts” and “toning exercises” and “light weight/high reps” are all bullshit concepts marketed (primarily) to women that perpetuate a variety of weight training myths that only prevent those women from getting the results they want. Ignore it.

Step 2: Understand That Muscle – Fat = Tone

There’s nothing all that magical or complicated involved here. It’s just a matter of building enough muscle and losing enough fat so the muscle you’ve built is sufficiently visible.

Step 3: Determine What Needs To Improve

Why aren’t you as toned as you want to be? Is it because you have too much body fat, not enough muscle, or a combination of both?

Once you know the answer to this question, you’ll know what you need to focus on going forward.

(By the way, if you’re not sure about which goal you need to focus on, feel free to check out The Results Crew. Myself and another experienced coach will provide you with all of the personalized guidance and support you need.)

Step 4: Take The Proper Action

If you need to lose more body fat, here’s everything you need to know:

If you need to build more muscle, here’s everything you need to know:

If you need a well-designed muscle building workout, here ya go:

If you need to lose fat and build muscle, the stuff linked above will cover the majority of what you need to know. In addition, I’d also recommend:

Summing It Up

The only (natural) ways of improving how your body looks are by building muscle and/or losing fat.

And being toned? That’s just a matter of getting that combination where it needs to be so there’s a sufficient amount of muscle built + a low enough body fat percentage to allow that muscle to actually be visible.

So if muscle tone is your goal, you need to focus on losing additional fat and/or building additional muscle. Everything else – like the typical myth-based “toning” nonsense most people do – won’t help.

Need Help With Your Diet And Workout?

Don’t waste another minute of your time searching for what to do. I’ve already done the research for you and created step-by-step plans that work. Select your goal below.

Protein Calculator: How Much Protein Do I Need?

Determining how much protein to eat per day is important for any lifter, athlete, or person, period! Here’s the number to aim for to build muscle, lose weight, and support your exercise goals.

The amount of protein you need depends on a number of factors, including your weight, age, goals, and activity level. The daily minimum recommended by the National Institutes of Health is 0.36 grams per pound of body weight for a sedentary person. However, if you do intense workouts, have a physically demanding job, or both, experts say you may need more—perhaps as much as double.

This calculator will tell you how much protein to eat each day based on your specific body and lifestyle. Dial in this nutritional priority to take control of your nutrition and nail your goals!

Protein Intake Calculator

This daily protein target can help you lose weight in the form of body fat while minimizing muscle loss. Here are the next steps on your weight loss journey:

1. Pick a weight-loss workout plan.

A well-designed program is an essential part of turning hard numbers into hard-body results! Here are the most popular ones from BodyFit:

2. Calculate your macronutrient ratio.

Protein is just one of the three macronutrients. To get targets for the other two, as well as a daily calorie target, use the Bodybuilding.com Macronutrient Calculator.В

3. Learn about the best fat-loss supplements.

Supplements can help you accelerate your results once you have your protein intake and training in place. Krissy Kendall, Ph.D., shares her recommendations in the article, «5 Ways to Up Your Fat-Loss Supplement Game.»

4. Join a fitness community.

For over 10 years, members of BodySpace have been helping each other build their best bodies. Join a fitness community that’s over 2 million people strong!

This daily protein target can help you build lean muscle mass while minimizing body-fat gains. Here are the next steps on your journey to see the scale go up:

1. Pick a muscle-building workout plan.

A well-designed program is an essential part of turning hard numbers like calories into hard-body results! Here are the most popular ones from BodyFit:

2. Calculate your macros.

Protein is just one of the three macronutrients. To get targets for the other two, as well as a daily calorie target, use the Bodybuilding.com Macronutrient Calculator.

3. Learn about the best supplements for gaining muscle.

Supplements can help you accelerate your muscle-building results once you have your protein intake and training nailed. Krissy Kendall, Ph.D., shares her recommendations in the article, «8 Proven Supplements for Muscle Growth and Strength.»

4. Join a fitness community.

For over 10 years, members of BodySpace have been helping each other build their best bodies. Join a fitness community that’s over 2 million people strong!

This daily protein target can help you focus on body recomposition, or gradually burning fat and building muscle, while focusing on your health. Here are the next steps on your journey to customize your nutrition:

1. Pick a workout plan.

A well-designed program is an essential part of staying motivated and seeing results. Here are some of our most popular programs from BodyFit:

2. Calculate your macros.

Protein is just one of the three macronutrients. To get targets for the other two, as well as a daily calorie target, use the Bodybuilding.com Macronutrient Calculator.

3. Learn about the best health-focused supplements.

Supplements can help you accelerate your results and support your training once you have your protein target and training in place. Chris Lockwood, Ph.D., shares what to take and why in the article, «Start Here: The Most Important Supplements for Every Body.»

4. Join a fitness community.

For over 10 years, members of BodySpace have been helping each other build their best bodies. Join a fitness community that’s over 2 million people strong!

Which Goal and Activity Level Should I Choose?

Maintain Current Weight

First time tracking your protein? Or not sure which goal is right for you? Then start with «maintenance.» Many nutritionists say before you start tweaking your macronutrients and protein intake, you should spend some time at maintenance level and get more comfortable with tracking your foods and portion sizes.

Choosing «maintain current weight» will give you a protein intake of around 1 gram per pound of body weight, a target many experts recommend for overall health and athletic performance.

Lose Weight

If you know that you’re ready to lose a few pounds and you have some experience counting calories or tracking macros, select «lose weight.» This will give you a slightly higher protein intake to aim for than weight maintenance. Why higher? Because when you’re looking to lose weight, extra protein can help you control your appetite and minimize muscle loss.

Gain Weight

Many people take what sounds like a simple approach to gaining weight: Eat all the protein they can handle and train as often and as hard as possible. This may work for a few days or weeks, but it’s often tough to stick with. Selecting «gain weight» will give you a strategic bump up in protein that reflects a moderate calorie surplus of 500 calories, on a 40/30/30 macro split. If this doesn’t make the scale go up after a couple of weeks, you may need to add a few hundred more calories from carbs or fats—probably not more protein.

Activity Level

This choice should reflect the amount of activity in your life based on how you exercise and how physically active your life or job is. Nutritional researchers agree that both calorie and nutrient estimates should take more into account than just the amount you exercise. Here’s how to figure out what’s right for you:

How Did We Calculate Your Protein Intake?

Bodybuilding.com’s protein calculator starts with the Mifflin St. Jeor equation, which is considered by our nutritionists and dieticians to be the «gold standard» of calorie calculators. Here’s how it works:

Then, this BMR count is multiplied, depending on your activity level:

Sedentary = 1.2
Lightly active = 1.375
Moderately active = 1.550
Very active = 1.725
Extra active = 1.9

The calorie count is then adjusted based on your goal:

Weight loss: Reduce by 10-20%
Weight gain: Add 500 calories
Weight maintenance: Unchanged

This calorie count is split into macronutrient percentages in the following ratios, based on splits commonly recommended by our nutrition experts for muscle gain, weight loss, and weight maintenance. (Yes, weight gain and maintenance are the same ratio, but the calories and macros are different.)

Weight loss: 40/40/20 (carbs/protein/fats)
Weight gain: 40/30/30
Weight maintenance: 40/30/30

Finally, your protein intake comes from applying those percentages to your daily calorie number. Each gram of protein is «worth» 4 calories.

If you’d like to see your complete macros rather than just protein, use our full macro calculator.

What Are the Best High-Protein Foods?

Once you have a daily protein target to aim for, the next puzzle is how to figure out what foods can help you get there each day.

What foods will work best for you depends on your dietary preferences, budget, and eating style, which is why we’ve collected a comprehensive list to serve every type of circumstance in the «Ultimate List of 40 High-Protein Foods.» But one thing is true: Eating all of that protein in a single meal won’t be much fun! You’ll feel a whole lot better, and stick with your approach for longer, if you have a plan.

If you’re struggling to get enough protein, consider these time-tested strategies:

The Bodybuilding.com Recipe Database also contains hundreds of recipes to help you get more protein in your diet, ranging from hearty breakfasts to decadent desserts and every meal in between.

How Do I Calculate the Protein in My Food?

You can do this using food labels, as well as by weighing out your food on a food scale and using one of the many online nutritional databases.

Weighing food may seem like a lot of counting and not much fun, but it gets easier over time. Fitness coach Vince Del Monte says in the article, «From Here to Macros: 4 Steps to Better Nutrition» that you quickly learn to «eyeball» quantities of both calories and macronutrients after just a few weeks of practice.

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