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The High Performance Journal - October 15th, 2024

Belly fat is the hardest to lose and the easiest to gain.

For this reason (and many others), it's one of the most frustrating areas of the body to trim down.

What most people don't understand is that the average person tries to lose the midsection by doing the WRONG things.

They'll do endless crunches, juice cleanses, and other extreme methods, hoping to melt away the stubborn fat, only to end up with the same spare tire staring back at them.

Thankfully, our coaching clients can skip through this BS and lose their bellies with ease and minimal stress.

And the good news? You have abs. They're just hidden under a layer of fat. Want even better news? You can do this at almost any age.

Don't believe me? Meet Brett.

Brett (name withheld) is a 57-year-old lawyer who wanted to get his body in shape so he could live a longer life for his family.

In this article, I want to share a step-by-step guide we used to help Brett lose 27 lbs and see his abs for the first time in his entire life (WHAT!).

Want to lose the belly? Keep reading.
 

Your Step-By-Step Guide To Losing Belly Fat

What you need to know is that there are 2 types of belly fat: Subcutaneous Fat and Visceral Fat.

Subcutaneous Fat is the stuff you can pinch. It's the squishy layer right under your skin, and while we may not like how it looks, it poses zero health dangers.

Example: 

This is what happens to our bodies when we get fat: pic.twitter.com/jNCth2wht2

— Dan Go (@FitFounder) October 13, 2024

Then there’s Visceral Fat—the real troublemaker. This is the fat deep inside your abdomen, wrapped around your organs. High levels of visceral fat have been linked to everything from heart disease to diabetes.

Visceral fat is easier to lose, while subcutaneous fat loves to hang around like that last friend at the party who just won’t leave.

But don’t worry; Just like Brett did, follow this guide and be patient. Eventually, both types of fat will get the message and start packing their bags.

Step #1 - Eat More To Lose More

Photo courtesy of @fitnesschef_

You must be in a caloric deficit to burn the belly fat. Full stop.

Ideally, you want to cut at least 500 calories from your diet (or more, depending on where you're starting) over a long enough period to see changes in your midsection.

While doing this, you also want to eat at least .8 to 1 gram of protein per pound of body weight because the last thing you want to do is lose weight and lose muscle at the same time.

One thing to watch out for is that cutting calories can leave you hungry and tired. This is why you want to volumize your foods by adding plenty of cruciferous veggies to every meal to increase feelings of satiety.

This is the best way to eat MORE while losing weight.

After we set up his meal plan and volumized his meals he would always come back telling us that he couldn't eat anymore WHILE he was dropping fat. Win-win!

Step #2 - Use the Secret Belly Fat Burner

Sleep is like your body fat reset button.

When you skimp on sleep, your body gets stressed out, producing more cortisol, the hormone that loves to hang on to fat, especially around your belly.

Lack of sleep also messes with hunger hormones and makes you tired, which causes you to crave more junk food and overeat without even realizing it. Worse yet, your metabolism slows down, and you burn fewer calories throughout the day.

On the flip side, getting 7-8 hours of quality sleep helps regulate your hormones, keeps your metabolism firing, and reduces your chances of storing fat in your midsection.

Plus, it helps you recover better from workouts, which means more muscle retention and fat burning in the long run.

When working together, Brett had issues going to sleep but not staying asleep. So we used some of the strategies in this free sleep protocol I created for our clients.

Don't sleep on what a great night of sleep can do for you. It's literally your secret weapon to burning belly fat.

Step #3 - Raise Your Metabolic Floor

While sleep and diet set up the foundation, we need to support our metabolism while we burn the belly off.

The first step to doing this is to lift weights at least 2-4x/week using progressive overload.

Resistance training prevents muscle loss, keeping your body lean and defined. Plus, more muscle means higher energy expenditure, making it easier to shed fat overall—including that stubborn belly fat.

The second step is to increase your NEAT (non-exercise-related physical activity). This is the daily movement (walking, biking, fidgeting) you do outside of your workouts.

NEAT raises your energy expenditure, making it easier to get into a calorie deficit and burn fat, including stubborn belly fat.

For Brett, we made lifting weights and getting 10k steps a mandatory part of his routine.

While most of his work left him deskbound, we managed to get around this by conducting most of his meetings while walking on a desk treadmill.

Because he did so many meetings every day he regularly crushed 14k steps without thinking about it.

Step #4 - Focus On The START

You would think that eating a new diet, improving your sleep habits, implementing a new workout plan, and getting double the amount of steps every day would be overwhelming.

And you'd be right.

The trick is understanding the body transformation phases. Here's what I mean...

There are many phases to body transformation, which I'll get into at the end of the article, but the most important (and hardest) part is the launching phase.

This is why 80% of the energy used in getting a rocket into space is used at the launch. They do this so the rocket can reach "escape velocity" and be carried into orbit using its own momentum.

We place massive importance on getting our clients off the ground the right way and emphasize a mentality of IMPERFECT ACTION.

With Brett, we amplified the accountability and he responded by fully participating in his life-changing transformation.

Once we got that down, we shifted to the final step.

Step 5 - Shift Identity

As we were helping Brett lose the belly, we would always do something that I see no one else doing: reflect on his experience.

The experience of getting lean and healthy is subtle. We don't realize the benefits of what we're doing until we reflect back on it.

The more we reflect on how exercise, sleep, diet, and other healthy habits improve our lives the more reasons we give ourselves to keep doing them.

After Bill was done a workout, we'd ask him how it felt. He'd usually say, "It felt awesome. More energy. Better mood etc.."

After Bill ate a healthy meal, we'd do the same and he'd usually say, "I feel light, energetic, and focused".

We would have him keep a journal of his body transformation experience to relate the behaviors to how he felt.

This was on top of things we'd get him to train his mind like visualization, affirmation, and other things in our identity-shifting program that comes along with coaching.

This was crucial to shifting his identity because we don't realize we're feeling these amazing benefits until we note them down.

We need to change the mind as we change the body, or else we'll just end up back where we started.

Other Notes:

New evidence shows that you can lose belly fat by localizing and targeting your belly using the cardio strategy mentioned in my last ​4 Minute Fridays newsletter​.

In short, you do a few sets of ab exercises followed by an intense HIIT cardio session. When you work your abs and follow it up with cardio, you increase that blood flow, which helps mobilize fat to be burned for energy.

The bottom line is we need more studies on this, and if you're not willing to do this for the long term, it should be viewed as a short-term fix for losing belly fat.

Lifestyle > Outcome

There are 3 phases to transforming the body:

1. Launch
2. Metabolic Health
3. Optimize (longevity and metabolism)

While the principles of dropping the belly are the same, the nuances will be different for everyone.

Most importantly, as we evolve, we must always relate our actions to behaviors/standards for our healthy lifestyles.

Remember, the goal is not just to lose belly fat and get a lean stomach. The goal is to create a lifestyle that makes that inevitable.

You now have an evidence-based system for losing belly fat and getting a flat stomach. All you have to do is start.

Onwards and upwards 🚀

- Dan

When you're ready, here are 3 ways I can help:

1. The Lean Body 90 System: When you’re ready to get in great shape, Lean Body 90 is the obvious choice. You can get in great shape and reach your fitness goals in just 90 minutes a week. Lose weight and build muscle even without hours in the gym or highly restrictive diets. Join 1000+ students here.

2. Are you an entrepreneur who wants to get lean, boost energy, and get in your best shape? Apply for private one-on-one coaching here.

3. Promote yourself to 340,000+ subscribers​ by sponsoring this newsletter.

References:

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2. Hairston KG, Bryer-Ash M, Norris JM, Haffner S, Bowden DW, Wagenknecht LE. Sleep duration and five-year abdominal fat accumulation in a minority cohort: the IRAS family study. Sleep. 2010 Mar;33(3):289-95. doi: 10.1093/sleep/33.3.289. PMID: 20337186; PMCID: PMC2831422.
3. Vankerckhoven L, Raemen L, Claes L, Eggermont S, Palmeroni N, Luyckx K. Identity Formation, Body Image, and Body-Related Symptoms: Developmental Trajectories and Associations Throughout Adolescence. J Youth Adolesc. 2023 Mar;52(3):651-669. doi: 10.1007/s10964-022-01717-y. Epub 2022 Dec 9. Erratum in: J Youth Adolesc. 2023 May;52(5):1114. doi: 10.1007/s10964-023-01760-3. PMID: 36484894; PMCID: PMC9735114.
4. Chung N, Park MY, Kim J, Park HY, Hwang H, Lee CH, Han JS, So J, Park J, Lim K. Non-exercise activity thermogenesis (NEAT): a component of total daily energy expenditure. J Exerc Nutrition Biochem. 2018 Jun 30;22(2):23-30. doi: 10.20463/jenb.2018.0013. PMID: 30149423; PMCID: PMC6058072.
5. Brobakken MF, Krogsaeter I, Helgerud J, Wang E, Hoff J. Abdominal aerobic endurance exercise reveals spot reduction exists: A randomized controlled trial. Physiol Rep. 2023 Nov;11(22):e15853. doi: 10.14814/phy2.15853. PMID: 38010201; PMCID: PMC10680576.