Butt and Thigh Toning and Exercising

You will be happy to know that you are not the only one out there who wants the ins and outs of how tone your buttocks and thighs. How often, though, is it that you start a butt and thigh toning program only to find this troublesome area actually grows instead of shrinks when your aim is to lose buttocks and thigh fat! Or shrinks instead of increasing – if you have a flat butt. This situation has a tendency to put people off training because they don’t get the results they expect.

Why You have Problems Reducing Your Butt and Thighs?

The reason that you have so many difficulties attempting to lose buttocks and thigh fat is because these areas are main storage areas for body fat. For women reducing these areas can drive you nuts! The reason for having these fat storage areas is to assist us in times of survival. What?! You say? Let me put it this way. Say you were stuck out in the middle of nowhere without food, and just water. Your body would, after a while, start “kicking into your body fat stores” to help you survive, because you are not consuming any food. In the case of women during pregnancy if this occurred you would be “surviving for two” – thus the larger fat storage area.

How Eating the Wrong Food Affects Your Butt and Thigh Size

The size increase in your butt and thigh areas can depend on the type of program you are performing and what you are eating. To start with if your body fat storage areas tend to be your butt and thighs you need to be very careful of the extra bits and pieces you snack on. You can bet that most of the time when you consume extra calories and fat it will go, as they say, “straight to your thighs and butt”.

How Performing the Wrong Butt And Thigh Toning Program Affects Your Training Efforts

Then there is exercise. What you need to know is that there are workouts to increase the size of your butt and thighs, workouts to re-shape and reduce and then workouts to generally tone your buttocks and thighs. It’ll boil down to the way you perform your exercises, the resistance you’re using, and the combinations of specific exercises that your workouts consists of.

WHICH EXERCISES ARE YOU PERFORMING?

Sure it’s fine to say you’re going to tone your buttocks and thighs but if you are using a program that may not be correct for your body type you can easily, and unintentionally, increase the size of both of them!

How to Reduce or Increase Your Butt and Thighs!

Cardio
Cardio exercise plays an important part in how you can change or alter the size of your thighs and butt.

To decrease the size of your butt use a continual higher intensity style cardio program. So this would be around 45-55 mins at a challenging pace. You’ll need to perform around 4-6 sessions per week.

To increase your butt and thighs try using intervals for which you perform sprint drills. Around 25 minutes going from a lower intensity,  then flat out then back to low intensity and so on. You can run up bleaches then walk down, do sprint drills at the track sprinting 100 meters then walking back. You get my drift. Do this around 3 times per week. 4 times if you’re trying to nip some more body fat in the bud.

Butt and Thigh Toning With Resistance Exercise

It is important that you perform a full body workout, rather than just concentrating on your butt and thighs. This will help increase your metabolism and help bring your body into proportion.

If you’re pear shaped and your butt / thigh areas are much larger than your upper body you’ll need to help break down the muscle and fat. Your goal being to tone your buttocks and thighs and of course to also lose buttocks and thigh fat. To do this you can perform body resistance exercises…

eg… lunges – as many as you safely can per set. Your reps per set can can range from 12-15 reps per leg through to 50+ depending on how advanced you are with your leg training. Remember only do what you can!

Walking lunges are great, but if you don’t have room then stationery lunges are fine. Don’t use any weights (no dumbbells etc, nothing) just perform the lunges until your muscles start to really burn. Do this two times per week for beginners and three times (medium to advanced) per week for three to four weeks.

Once you’ve completed this you can use other leg / butt exercise combinations – including mat and floor exercises – but make sure you keep the weights light (or use no added weight) and the reps high around 20-25. Exercises like step-ups off benches etc are also great – remember – don’t use any weights, just lots of reps.

To increase your thighs and butt perform squats with heavier weights and keep your reps to around 6-12 per set. Squats, lunges, wide stance squats, deadlifts are all great. And mat and floor exercises can also be incorporated. Depending on your fitness level, including medicine ball exercises in your leg training once every couple of weeks will help develop your butt and thigh muscles to new heights that you didn’t think were possible. Your current fitness level will determine what you can or can’t / shouldn’t do. There are “beginners” medicine ball exercises you can do as well.

Once you’ve got your butt and thighs to a size and shape that you’re happy with then you can reduce the weights to moderate with reps of around 10-12 to maintain the muscle you’ve built up. You can then add some exercises such as leg extensions and leg curls etc to add more definition to your legs, focusing on butt and thigh toning.

And remember with both of the above lower body goals you don’t need to have a fully equipped gym. You can transform your lower body using your own body resistance, furniture around your home, fitball, medicine ball…

Obviously if you have knee or joint problems you’ll need to seek advice from a trainer to create a program that suits your specific needs. AND ALWAYS before starting an exercise program in general check with your doctor to ensure he / she gives you permission first!

Butt And Thigh Toning Eating Program

I know you think healthy eating is boring but it’s not. Although if you choose to make it boring and choose not to experiment with healthy foods then I guess it would be. There are so many great options out there for common-sense eating, so there is no excuses – really, healthy eating can be really yummy! And let’s face it it, if it’s going to help you tone your buttocks and thighs – that’s double the benefit.

In regards to increasing or decreasing your butt and thighs…

To Lose Buttocks And Thigh Fat…

Here’s some basic examples…
Taper off your carbs like potato, rice, pasta, grains etc after lunch. Choose brown carbs and / or fruit for breaky, morning snack and lunch along with protein of course. Include greens for lunch. After lunch stick with greens and protein as much as possible. Add some flaxseed oil to one of these meals (around 1 tablespoon).

To increase your butt and thighs… two options… the same as above if you’re trying to cut back on body fat. If not, once again, choose brown carbs and / or fruit for breaky, morning snack and lunch along with protein. Once again some greens for lunch. For your afternoon snack and dinner include greens, brown carbs and protein. Choose one meal to add 1 tablespoon of flaxseed oil.

A “simple to follow eating program” is vital when re-shaping your body and will determine whether or not you achieve your butt and thigh toning goals. Your workout/s and eating program work hand in hand to help stimulate your metabolism to burn body fat and to help re-shape and tone muscle.

General Eating Tips

Use brown carbs such as whole grain bread and sweet potatoes over white potato, white rice, white bread and pasta. Keep refined and simple carbs to a minimum. Once you get used to including brown rice in your eating plan, most folk find it has more flavour than white rice. I certainly find that myself.
Cut out as many bad fats from your diet as possible.
Don’t use high oil sauces, dressings or too much margarine or butter in your meals.
Cut fat and skin off your meat and “grill” – do not fry your meat!
Eat decent servings of fresh fruit and veggies.
Eat 4-6 smaller regular meals per day.
Increase your lean protein intake such as meat, chicken, seafood, protein shakes, egg whites, cottage cheese. Your protein shake must low in fat, fairly low in carbohydrates and high in protein.
Include EFA’s in your eating plan

And remember before starting any exercise or eating program you should consult your doctor first. The above may not suit everyone – especially if you have certain requirements within a prescribed diet for a medical condition.

Happy training folks,

Yours in fun, health and fitness

© Mandy Gibbons
Virtual Fitness Trainer

Persons who are of good health, suspect of their health or are aware of any conditions, physical deficiencies or diseases should always consult a physician before undertaking any eating or exercise program. Mandy Gibbons, Virtual Fitness Trainer, www.virtualfitnesstrainer.com.au and www.virtualfitnesstrainer.com disclaims any liability or loss in connection with the above program or advice given in this article.