The Ultimate How to Get Lean Guide

At the moment, I’m in the last phase of my Bellyfat Challenge — I’ve lost a good amount of fat but I have about 10 pounds to go (or so).
I’m enjoying getting lean, but those last few pounds are always the toughest.
And so, I’ve called in some experts.
Last week, I shared my favorite fitness bloggers and, in turn, the fitness blogs they read. This week I’ve called on them for tips on getting lean.
Now, let’s look at the question I’ve posed to them:

• I asked for their top tips for getting lean. Not every tip, just the best.
• Assume the person isn’t obese but has a bit of a spare tire
• Assume the person already exercises regularly and tries to eat “healthy” most of the time.

If you’re looking to get rid of that last bit of stubborn fat, here are some great tips.


1. Mark’s Daily Apple. Mark Sisson is one of the leading advocates of a return to the diet and activity style of our primal ancestors, and the author of The Primal Blueprint. Here are his tips:

• Make your short, fast, intense workouts even shorter, faster, and more intense, and your long, slow workouts even longer and slower. A common impediment to real leanness is overtraining. We’re inundated with the idea that “more is better” when it comes to working out, but the reality couldn’t be more different. Excessive exercise gives your body the “danger” message; throughout the course of our evolutionary history, high levels of activity – running, lifting, throwing, climbing – generally meant something was chasing us or we were chasing something else. When you spend an hour jogging on the treadmill or cranking that elliptical machine, your body goes into that flight or fight mode automatically. When you weight train seven days a week, your body thinks you are in mortal danger. Why else would you be subjecting your body to that kind of stress on a regular basis, if not for survival’s sake? Cortisol is the stress hormone, and too much cortisol leads to insulin resistance, weight gain, and muscle waste. Overtraining is the classic way to secrete excess cortisol. That said, intensity is important, but only in small doses. Instead of spending two hours in the weight room, keep it to a maximum of forty-five minutes, but make it a good hard all-out effort. Even twenty-five minutes will work. Push yourself harder and faster and shorter, and you’ll get better results in less time. By the same token, instead of running at 85% of your maximum heart rate for an hour and burning primarily glucose and glycogen, go for a three-hour hike, or even just a walk around the neighborhood. By keeping your heart rate at no more than 75% of your maximum, your body becomes a fat burner. If leanness is your ultimate goal, there’s nothing more effective than limiting the secretion of cortisol and maximizing the use of fat for fuel. Then pick one day a week where you do a series of short, all-out sprints, with the heart rate at max for 15-40 seconds. Short, intense workouts improve insulin sensitivity and minimize cortisol, while long, slow workouts optimize the use body fat for energy.
• Intermittent fasting. My last tip is my personal favorite, and it might just go against everything you’ve ever heard about proper fitness and nutrition: fast once or twice a week, preferably before your workouts. Intermittent fasting – going 18-30 hours between meals every once in awhile – can actually stimulate fat burning while maintaining muscle mass and conserving strength. It’s an old holdover from the early hunter-gatherer days, when the hunt wasn’t always successful, but we still had to develop a way to extract enough energy till the next meal. Our bodies always turn to body fat for energy first; in fact, that’s why we store body fat in the first place – to save for energy for later, leaner times. For the person who’s almost lean, but not quite there yet, throwing in a fast once or twice a week can really be the difference maker. I’d even try ending each fast with an intense weight training session and waiting an hour after to eat to really get the full benefit.

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2. Fitness Black Book. Rusty Moore is an authority on creating a lean, slim, athletic look. Rusty, btw, has a new ebook out that I’m reading now called Visual Impact: Mastering the Skill of Gaining Muscle Without Bodyfat. Here are Rusty’s tips for getting lean:

Healthy Snacks: 10 Ideas for More Wholesome Eating

What are the basic healthy eating habits always passed along to us?

Eat move veggies, drink more water, move more and get rid of the junk. All great ideas.

It also got me thinking. For me at least, the most difficult part of healthy eating is when it comes to snacks. It would be nice to think we’re all going to start reaching for a raw carrot or celery stick when hunger strikes between meals. But it can be difficult to go from junk to super healthy in one step.

So here are a few ideas to help you snack more healthfully. As with all things, remember that even healthy snacks aren’t going to be good for you in large quantities, so moderation is key.

10 Healthy Snack Ideas

1. nori sheets
Head to your local Japanese or Asian grocery store and grab some nori. Yes, the seaweed stuff used in sushi rolls is delicious fresh from the pack. Although it is quite drying so you will need some water with it.

2. nuts
My go-to snack, especially when I’m traveling. Almonds, brazil nuts, macadamias, pistachios: there’s so much variety to explore. Nuts are portable, delicious and packed with minerals. Look for dry roasted, preferably unsalted. And remember nuts like almonds with their skins on have more fiber than those without.

3. kale chips
There are a heap of different commercial kale chips on the market these days. While delicious, they tend to be expensive, so you could have a go at making your own. Just toss some kale (or other leafy greens) in a little oil, layer on a baking sheet and bake for 5-10 minutes until crisp.

The 8 Habits of Healthy Living

1. Stop smoking. This is by far the most important habit, as it affects almost every single one of the leading causes of death. It’s also the hardest of these habits to change. It’s not at all impossible — I quit six years ago next month.

2. Lose weight (if you’re overweight). This is not exactly a habit — the best habit to form to lose weight is to eat less. Or eat more of things that don’t have a lot of calories, like fruits and veggies. Being overweight is just below smoking the worst risk factor for many diseases.

3. Exercise. You don’t need me to tell you to exercise, but listen to this: lack of exercise is a major risk factor for heart disease, stroke, colon & rectal cancers, diabetes, breast cancer, high blood pressure and high cholesterol. If you don’t exercise, you’re just asking to get a major disease. It’s almost a magic pill: do a bit of exercise every day, and you get healthy. You don’t need much — start with 5 minutes a day in the morning.

4. Drink only in moderation. Heavy drinking is one of the worst risk factors for many diseases. That’s more than 2 drinks of alcohol a day for men, and more than 1 drink for women. A glass of red wine is a good thing, but too many and you’re greatly increasing your risk of disease.