How To Get Rid of Love Handles

If you’ve got love handles, trust me, you’re not alone. This is one of the most common areas where the male body stores fat.

Today I’m going to give you a four step, no-BS strategy to get rid of love handles once and for all, starting from any body fat level.

However, strategies will vary for the guys that have the most noticeable love handles versus those men are already pretty lean and want to get rid of those last remaining signs of love handles.

If you have more love handles and belly fat to lose, changing your nutrition and your body composition is going to be your first step.

No matter what you’ve heard…

There’s no amount of crunches or aerobic exercise that can undo the worst nutrition mistakes.

However, once you’ve got your nutrition habits dialed in, there are certain types of exercises that can create muscle definition in the abs, lats and obliques. This will help the remaining love handles appear less obvious as you continue to work to decrease your body fat percentage.

Let’s dive into each of the steps in detail so you can incorporate them into your daily routine and start to see those love handles disappear.

STEP ONE: IMPROVE YOUR NUTRITION

If you’re carrying a lot of body fat, the very first thing you have to do is clean up your nutrition.

Don’t start looking for specific exercises, like a bunch of crunches, planks, Russian twists, or some other magic exercise to get rid of love handles. Core isolation exercises won’t work because you can’t spot-reduce belly fat.

As much as some health gurus preach it, aerobic exercise isn’t the answer either because you can’t out-exercise a bad diet.

You’ll have to consistently focus on your nutrition to eliminate overall body fat, and the love handles will fall away with it.

Now, you might say, “But, Jeff! I always watch what I eat”, or “I only drink on weekends”. Guys, it’s important to pay attention to the details.  There are things you might be doing regularly and perhaps not even realizing just how often you’re doing them that could be getting in the way of losing the excess body fat. You need a balanced diet and a calorie deficit: consuming fewer calories than you burn.

Once you start really focusing on your nutrition, you’ll find that there may be one or two things you’re doing on a daily basis that are keeping you from reaching your goal. Consuming excess sugar and liquid calories are two of the big ones.

Eat a diet rich in protein, fibrous and starchy carbs, and cut out the unnecessary calories from fats and refined sugars. Check out the article on How To Lose Body Fat Fast to see more details about why more aerobic training isn’t the answer, and some great tips on forms of protein, fat sources and the best types of carbohydrates for fat loss.

STEP TWO: INCREASE THE WIDTH OF YOUR LATS

Start working right now on increasing the size and width of your lats.

Why the lats if you’re looking to lose love handles?

Because visually, as your lats get wider your waist is going to look narrower.

To develop that visual difference between lats and waist, you need to modify your lat exercise form a bit. I’m going to use the one armed row as an example of the form modification we’re talking about.

If you watch as I do this, when I take the dumbbell just up to the level of my waist, but not beyond, I’m never fully contracting the lat.

Instead, to train the lowest point in the lats closest to the love handles, we need to pull the elbow back behind the body.

You’re going to have to decrease the weight a little bit here, so that you can get that elbow behind your body without over-rotating, almost wrapping around your back. Lifters with an ego are going to have a hard time with this, because we all love to swing those big dumbbells. But unfortunately, that does nothing for the lats.

When you incorporate this exercise form in all of your lat training, you’re going to feel the difference, and you’ll start to see a widening of the lats and the comparative visual narrowing of the waist.

STEP THREE: INCREASE YOUR AB TRAINING CONSISTENCY

The next step is to increase the frequency of training your abs – provided you’re already focused on a healthy diet.

My Six Pack Promise app can show you how to work your abdominal muscles at all different levels: beginner ab workouts to advanced ab workouts. Regardless of your level, you’ve got to work your abs more frequently to create some visual distraction in your middle.

I preach very regular ab training, even up to five to seven days per week. You don’t have to work your core muscles for hours and hours at a time. The most important thing is that you’re consistent with it.

The Six Pack Promise app deals out six-minute workouts with abdominal exercises according to your specifications for fitness level, available equipment and more.  A portal web version of this app is included with all of my ATHLEAN-X programs to help you make sure you’re getting your ab training in.

And here’s the best news…

You will begin to see your abs at a much higher level of body fat than you might think. Even at as high as 11% or 12% body fat you will begin to see muscle definition, especially in the right light.

STEP FOUR: TRAIN YOUR OBLIQUES!

If you’re in that sub-10% body fat level range but still have some residual love handles, I’ve got a solution for you.

Stubborn love handles are pretty common in very fit men, because it’s the number one place where men tend to carry their body fat. It’s also the last place they lose their body fat.

If your diet is already dialed in with a healthy nutrition plan, and you’re training your lats and abs, there is one thing left to focus on. And it’s something that others may tell you NOT to do:

Train your obliques!

Believe me, do not listen to anyone who says to not work your obliques because it will thicken your waistline.

No!

Developed obliques will make your waist look incredible as you continue to work on getting rid of body fat.

If you look at the picture below, I am artificially bloated. You can’t see very much of the obliques.

But when I get rid of that body fat like in the photo below, you see the oblique muscle underneath.

That is what you want.

Training the obliques develops those horizontal lines that contribute to the V-taper, creating even more visual narrowing.

The external oblique is a core muscle that runs downward from the ribs toward the pelvis, and is responsible for the V-taper of the abs. The left obliques pull the torso toward the right and the right external obliques pull toward the left.

When you pair that up with your developed abs and your wider lat size, you’re on the road to seeing really good things when you look in the mirror.

To work the obliques, move in the same direction of the muscle fibers. An Oblique Twist With a Band is one exercise you can do.

OBLIQUE TWIST WITH BAND

Using a band, twist and pull in the direction of the fibers. Switch to the other side and twist in the opposite direction, down and in.

When you pull in the direction of the muscle fibers, down and in, you’re working your external obliques. Anchor the band the other way, and you follow the internal obliques (which you can’t see) and rotate down and in, those muscles will be worked as well.

Now you’ve got a no-BS strategy to get rid of your love handles no matter how far you are from your goal. This plan works, I promise you. But remember this: it’s going to take some effort.

If you’re looking for a training program that picks it up from here and takes it further with step-by-step plans that don’t rely on deprivation diets and restrictive eating to help you with your fat loss goals, check out the options below:

MAX/Shred ==> Challenging workouts focusing on fat loss without losing muscle mass
AX1 ==> Build muscle with strength workouts and blast fat at the same time
Program Selector ==> See which weight training program best fits your goals