Fat loss... it can be your butt’s greatest friend and greatest enemy at the very same time!
Friend: when you lose fat around your waist, it will immediately make your butt LOOK bigger, even if it doesn’t actually GET bigger. This is a very good thing, however...
Enemy: when you lose fat from your butt, it will make your butt SMALLER, especially if you haven’t got very much muscle mass on your glutes!
THIS is the problem a lot of people run into with the glutes. When they’re carrying extra bodyfat, they have a butt because they’ve been storing fat in the butt area. When this fat starts coming off, the lack of muscle mass in the glutes really shows up.
Another issue is when people focus on endurance- based cardio training for fat-loss (like the treadmill or jogging, etc.). Endurance-based training not only
doesn’t build the glute muscles, it can actively cause your body to want to REDUCE the glute muscles. Here’s the thing...when you’re jogging, it’s a stress on your body, causing it to burn calories. And what’s your body’s best way to reduce the stress? Drop bodymass somehow.
MUSCLE is easier to drop than fat and your body will get rid of it so it doesn’t have to carry so much weight around when doing this long-duration exercise and your glutes are a big muscle and therefore a big target.
Couple this with losing the fat from your butt and many people’s trouble activating the glute muscles in the first place, it’s no wonder so many butts disappear with fat loss!
All is not lost, though! Not only can you KEEP your butt while you’re losing fat, you can actually BUILD your butt at the same time. As your waist gets smaller and you actively build the glutes up bigger with proper training, they’re going to look even LARGER than if you just worked on building them without the fat loss. And now you’re going to learn my tricks for doing it...
Method #1 - Integration
This is the easiest way to start. Whatever leg training is included in your current fat-loss program, directly substitute one of the glute training programs from this book. The majority of the best glute-building exercises also work the legs very effectively, so you won’t be losing out on anything there, but the focus on the glutes is going to give you that preferential butt work that you need to keep your butt there while you lose fat.
Method #2 - Prioritization
This goes hand-in-hand with Method #1. The idea here is to prioritize your glute training FIRST in whatever fat-loss training you’re currently doing. It might mean shuffling around the exercise order in your workouts, but make sure and always work your glutes FIRST.
When you’re losing fat, you’re in a caloric deficit...this means you’ll less energy available for training and that means whatever you work first is what you’re going to be able to put the most energy into. And that means GLUTES.
training for leg training and doing it first in your fat-loss workouts.
Method #3 - Daily Specialization Training
You’ll find versions of this Daily Specialization program in the book for every training level. Essentially, you’re going to be picking one glute- specific exercise and working it for one set done twice a day, EVERY day...and I do mean EVERY day...for as many reps as you can get. You’ll take no days off on this one.
By training your glutes in this fashion, you’re not demanding a lot of them in each single workout you do but you ARE demanding more of them more frequently. Your body responds to this stimulus by preferentially building the glute muscles, even when it might be decreasing muscle mass in other places of your body.
You’re basically teaching your body that in order to survive, it needs to build the glute muscles, since that’s what is being most frequently demanded of it. It works like a charm and will actually even HELP your fat-loss efforts by giving your metabolism an extra boost twice a day.
Method #4 - Incorporation
What you’re going to do here is force your glutes to do more overall work by doing extra glute training inserted in between every upper body exercise you do.
For example, if you’ve just finished working your chest with bench press and you’re about to move to pull downs for your back, do a single set of a glute exercise, THEN move onto the pull downs.
Do this every time you switch from one upper body exercise to the next. One single set for a glute exercise won’t take long and won’t dramatically extend your workout but it will, overall, increase the workload your glutes are getting.
Don’t do it between lower-body exercises, though, because glute exercises already work the lower body!
Method #5 - Starting It Off
This is another way of prioritizing the glutes. At the beginning of EVERY training session you do, choose whatever glute exercise works best for you and do one single set with moderate weight for as many reps as you can get.
Again, we want to give your body the idea that glutes are a priority and it needs to build them to cope with the specific demands being placed on them.
Method #6 - Eat ’Em When You Earn ’Em
In this case I’m talking about carbohydrates and some basic nutrient manipulation designed to boost the muscle-building effects of your glute training. This technique won’t work for all fat-loss nutrition plans as some of them require you eat in a very specific pattern, but if you’re doing just a general reduced- calorie diet, it’ll work just fine.
First, follow your fat-loss nutrition plan as you normally would.
Then, you’re going to eat more carbs AFTER you earn them with glute training. This increase in calories will help fuel muscle growth.
Fat-loss training requires a caloric deficit overall in order to be successful - you have to burn more calories than you’re taking in in order to lose fat. The problem is, your body needs MORE calories to build muscle (which is what we’re trying to do with building a bigger butt).
So by tying your increased food intake to immediately AFTER you’ve earned it with your glute training, you’re going to preferentially get more nutrients and more muscle growth to your glutes specifically while still maintaining that overall reduced calorie intake so you keep up with the fat loss.
The Bottom Line:
As you’ve probably gathered from these tricks, the BEST way to keep your butt while losing fat is to actually WORK it!
It’s going to be a case of use it or lose it and we definitely want to use and NOT lose it. So put the programs and exercises in this book to work and watch that butt GROW while you pull that extra fat off!