Please forgive me if this has been asked many times before, as I am sure it has. I've lost around 70-75 lbs so far and am stuck between 143-145 lbs now. I still have bit of a belly and big thighs I want to rid of. I do not want abs or anything, I just want a tight belly and thinner thighs. What are the best exercises to target these areas?


Thank you.

Well the thing is that you can't target fat loss. The only thing you can do is keep losing weight and let your body reshape itself in it's own time.

However, there are things you can do to help with the reshaping in general. If you're not already, you should add weightlifting to your routine - and not the "girlie" version where you lift light weights for a gazillion reps. Read the stickies on the exercise board about weight lifting and especially the one about weights for women. There's tons of good information there.

Lifting weights and doing body resistance exercises will help you maintain lean muscle mass and give a bit of shape and definition to your body, which will help with overall proportion in those areas where you're still holding on to a bit of fat.

Well I have been exercising for a while now and feel like I am stuck. Right now I really just want to target my stomach and thighs along with my normal daily 'everything' exercises. I'd just like some pointers as to what exercises to do. Thanks.

Well again, you can't target parts of your body for fat loss. So unfortunately I can't give you the answer you're looking for.

Can you tell me what you're doing for your regular exercises? Maybe if I know what you are doing, I can help you restructure a little?

Maybe the word I am looking for is tighten? Right now along with watching my calories, I do 10-20 minutes of low impact aerobics in the morning to get me going. I work 9-13 hours a day, most of the time on my feet, then exercise an additional 10 minutes 3-5 times a week which insists of things such as squats, sit ups, jogging, etc.

Hm. Ok, what I'm thinking is that you're really not getting any EFFECTIVE body resistance work or weight training.

Is there any way you can carve out more than 10 mins in the evenings? Even 20 mins about 3x per week would be enough, if you pushed yourself hard during those 20 mins!

IN order to get the "tightening" you want, you really have to WORK the muscles. A 20 minute intense routine that included squats with weights, lunges (also with weights), planks, pushups, and dips would be a good start.

If you have access to a gym or to weight equipment, you could ramp that up even more and get faster results.

Bottom line is that to get the the tight/toned/fit (use whatever word applies) look that you're talking about, you have to work the muscles hard - which is more than just cardio/running/jogging. You have to stress the muscles in order to get them to build/tighten.

I hope that makes sense. I would read the sticky posts about weight lifting and especially the one about weight lifting for women ... it'll give you a lot of good information to get started.

Kara is really giving you a goldmine of advice. What I would add is that you should try to shy away from just working certain muscles, or body parts at the expense of others. The last thing you want to do is train one body part too much without working its associated antagonist. All that'll do is lead to muscular imbalances, and ultimately, injury.

So for example, let's say that you want to firm up your quads so you work the squats. You must also work the antagonist muscles of the hamstrings in order for your body to remain balanced.

A balanced approach to weight training is the key to the body you're after. So, make sure to work the 5 main muscle groups of the body equally as hard. Those are the shoulder girdle (chest and shoulders), the upper back, the quads, and the rear chain (calves, hamstrings, glutes, lower back), and the core. Use compound exercises that Kara has prescribed.

It's makes body relax.