How to Lose Thigh Fat

Part 1 of 3: Thigh-Targeted Exercises

1

Do squats. There are tons of different squat exercises you can do, but the basic idea is this: With your legs shoulder-width apart, lower your bum down to the ground until your thighs are parallel with the ground. Balance here for at least three seconds before pushing up.^[1]

• Try doing squats with an exercise ball. Place the ball against the wall with your lower back firmly pressed against the ball. Not only will the ball increase the intensity of the squat--it will also give you a nice back rub!

2

Do lunges. With a 5- or 8-pound dumbbell in each hand, lunge forward with one leg and bring the opposite knee about an inch above the ground. Step back and continue with the opposite leg.and draw it in so that it lightly taps the back of your right knee. Extend the left leg out again. Repeat with the other leg.

Part 2 of 3: Eating Well and Dieting

1

Hydrate while cutting out excessive sweets from your liquid diet. Stick with water. Water is healthy, plentiful, cheap, and actually tastes good. Water flushes out harmful toxins, carries nutrients to cells, and provides a moist environment for bodily tissues that need it. Doctors recommend drinking 64 ounces of fluid per day, or about 1.9 liters (0.5 US gal).^[3]

• Avoid sodas, energy drinks, concentrated juices, etc.They're a weakness for us all, but they make shaving off those pounds really difficult. All of these drinks have tons of sugar in them, sometimes as much as 300 calories^[4], which can negate a whole workout.
• Drink green tea for a great source of antioxidants and negligible calories.^[5]Green tea contains about ten times the polyphenols as most other veggies, and assists the body in protecting its cells from free radicals. Best of all, tea contains 1-2 calories per liter, which means that a simple cup of tea (unsweetened) is about as guilt-free as it gets!
• Drink a cup of tea or a glass of water right before you eat a meal. This will trick your body into believing it's more full than it actually is, meaning that your cravings will be lower and you'll be inclined to eat less during a meal.

2

Eat healthy. You do not need to go on a diet in order to eat healthy. Simply watching what you eat will help you to slim down and get fit. When eating healthy you should consider what sort of items from each food group you should be eating. Try to eat balanced meals every time you sit down to eat.^[6]

• Carbohydrates: Complex carbs are absorbed more slowly by your body so they don’t overload your system. These include oats, whole-wheat products, and unprocessed grains such as brown rice.
• Protein: Choose lean meat when getting your protein intake. Lean meats include fish and poultry. Other forms of good protein include beans, soy products, and nuts.
• Fruits and vegetables: While it may be hard to believe, there are actually better fruits and veggies than others (though they are all pretty darn good for you.) Look for super foods like kale, blueberries, and swiss chard.
• Good fats vs. bad fats: Omega 3 fatty acid and monounsaturated fats are good for your system and will actually help you lower your cholesterol. Nuts, olive oil, seed oil, and fish all contain these ‘good fats.’ Trans and saturated fats are the things that will make your thighs larger. These include most processed food, candy, cakes, etc.
• Dairy: Try to stick to low-fat dairy products. Yogurt is especially great, as it contains bacteria that help you digest and process food efficiently. Dairy products are also a good source of protein and calcium.^[7]

3

Consider a low-carbohydrate (Atkins) diet. The theory is that overweight people eat too many carbohydrates. A diet rich in carbs causes the body to release insulin.^[8] The body controls the insulin by producing glucose (sugar), which eventually gets converted into fat. The low-carb diet structures your meals around proteins, soy-products, vegetables, fruits and nuts to avoid this. While you want to limit the amount of carbs you eat, you don't want to completely cut them out of your diet. Try to have carbs at least 20% of the time. Your body does need glucose in order to function, and carbs are a good source for that. Foods that are allowed^[9] as part of the low-carb diet:

• Unprocessed, high-protein meats, such as beef, lamb, pork, chicken, and turkey.
• Unprocessed, high-protein fish, such as salmon, tuna, mackerel, and trout.
• Low-carbohydrate vegetables and leafy greens.
• Full-fat, unprocessed cow, goat, or sheep's milk cheeses.

4

Know what foods are not allowed in a low-carb diet. Foods that are not allowed as part of the low-carb diet include:

• Grains. No pasta, bread, cakes, or pastries.
• Fruits and fruit juices.
• Processed foods. These usually have added sugar in them.
• Starchy vegetables. No potatoes, beets, or corn.
• Sugar or margarine.

5

Consider a low-calorie diet. If you burn more calories than you take in, you'll lose weight. The low-cal diet^[10] means reducing your intake to between 1,200 and 1,500 calories per day for women. It is recommended if you want to lose no more than 2 pounds per week. It is not safe to attempt to lose more than 2 pounds per week unless under strict doctor supervision.

• Limit the amount of fat that you eat to between 35 and 60 grams per day. This means that fats should make up about 20% to 35% of your entire calories for the day.
• Aim to eat about 170 to 240 grams of complex carbohydrates like whole grains, vegetables, and fruits per day. This should make up about 45% to 65% of your entire calories for the day.
• Aim to eat about 55 to 95 grams of low-fat protein, which includes meat, poultry, and fish per day. This should account for about 15% to 25% of your total calorie intake for the day.

6

Consider a ketogenic (keto) diet. Keto diets are like low-carb diets in that you're trying to avoid eating carbohydrates by substituting fats and proteins into your diet. The difference is that Keto diets are higher in fat and lower in protein that the Atkins diet.

• Why fats instead of protein? If you eat too much protein, your body turns the excess protein into glucose, which is what you were trying to avoid in carbs in the first place. On the other hand, fats have no effect on blood sugar and insulin levels.
• Shoot to get about 70-75% of calories from fat, 20-25% from protein, and 5-10% from carbohydrates.^[11] Limit the amount of carbs you eat to between 20 and 50 grams per day.
• Since being strict about how many carbs you eat is an essential part of the keto diet, it's important to understand how to count carbs correctly. Invest in a carb counter guide and study it.

Part 3 of 3: Maintaining Physical Health

1

Exercise your whole body. Without getting too technical, the body loses fat by converting it into usable energy. This process is called ketosis.^[12] But when your body converts fat into energy, it loses fat from all over, not just in a specific place like your thighs. So in order to work away that thigh fat, you have to work out your entire body.

2

Get a solid full body workout at the gym. If you want a full-body workout that burns a lot of calories but is relatively safe on your joints, try biking or swimming.^[13] These are recommended specifically for people suffering from arthritis or nursing a serious injury. Spin those legs or work those laps for an hour at least three times a week.

3

Play a sport. Joining a recreational or competitive league, or merely playing with friends, can make a huge difference in burning calories. We're more motivated to participate in sports for social and competitive reasons. This means we're much more likely to play for the entire game and burn more calories than we are to give up when the workout becomes hard.

• If you don’t like playing sports but still want to work out in a group, form a workout group with your friends. Set a gym schedule every week and help each other stick to it. You can also get exercise videos like Insanity or P90X and do them at your house with your friends. Just make sure to keep each other on track.

4

Know what sort of exercise burns less or more calories. Sadly, yoga and Pilates are not great for burning lots of calories, so don't rely on them exclusively. Yoga and Pilates burn about 200 calories per hour^[14], compared to about 800 calories burned by playing competitive basketball. If you're serious about losing thigh fat, but seriously devoted to yoga, work another program into your calorie-busting routine.

5

Walk when you can. If you do nothing else, walk. Walking is an overlooked and underrated exercise. Depending on your weight and your pace, you can burn anywhere from 100-400 calories per hour walking.^[15] And as we all know, walking doesn't take it out of you like running, biking, or swimming does. Find a walking partner and work on burning calories together!

6

Make sure you're getting your beauty rest. With all this working out, you should feel exhausted and worn out. (That's a good sign!) The great part is that getting enough sleep can also help you lose weight. That's right: Sleeping enough can help you lose weight.

• When your body doesn't get enough sleep, it produces a hormone called ghrelin and lowers levels of another hormone called leptin.^[16] Leptin tells your brain when you are full, and ghrelin stimulates your appetite. In other words, when you don't get enough sleep, your body has a bigger appetite and your brain doesn't send as many signals to your body that it's full.
• People with sleep apnea, which causes breathing cessation for periods of time during the night, are also more likely to be overweight.^[17] If you think you have sleep apnea, it's a good idea to get it checked out by a doctor so that your sleep starts paying off.

Comment below what you think! Let me know! Are you going to apply these tips to your daily life? Comment your thoughts xx

Source
http://www.wikihow.com/Lose-Thigh-Fat

Sources

1. ↑ http://www.fitnessmagazine.com/workout/thighs/exercises/top-thigh-exercises/
2. ↑ http://www.acefitness.org/exercise-library-details/1/270/
3. ↑ http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/water/NU00283
4. ↑ http://www.fitnessforweightloss.com/how-many-calories-are-in-regular-soda/
5. ↑ http://www.webmd.com/food-recipes/features/antioxidants-in-green-and-black-tea
6. ↑ http://www.webmd.com/food-recipes/tc/healthy-eating-overview
7. ↑ http://www.webmd.com/diet/features/6-reasons-to-get-your-diary
8. ↑ http://diabetes.webmd.com/carbohydrate-counting-for-people-who-use-insulin
9. ↑ http://diet.lovetoknow.com/wiki/Atkins_Diet_Food_List
10. ↑ http://www.webmd.com/diet/low-calorie-diet
11. ↑ http://www.ketogenic-diet-resource.com/ketogenic-diet-plan.html
12. ↑ http://health.howstuffworks.com/wellness/diet-fitness/weight-loss/lost-weight1.htm
13. ↑ http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/arthritis/AR00009
14. ↑ http://abclocal.go.com/kabc/story?section=news/food_coach&id=8437902
15. ↑ http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/exercise/SM00109
16. ↑ http://www.webmd.com/diet/features/lose-weight-while-sleeping
17. ↑ http://www.webmd.com/diet/features/lose-weight-while-sleeping?page=2

4 Moves To Slim Your Hips And Thighs

Many women tell me that every stray calorie seems to migrate to their hips and thighs. This is not a figment of their imaginations. And many women are looking for ways to get slim hips and thighs.

Before menopause, many women's bodies store excess fat predominantly in this area, creating what's come to be known as the "pear-shaped" body. For thousands of years, fat storage in these areas greatly helped cave-dwelling women survive during times of drought and famine. And women who could easily store fat in their hips and thighs tended to be able to give birth and feed a baby during a drought—during pregnancy and breastfeeding, the body needs as many as 1,000 extra calories a day—thus passing on their thigh-fat-storing genetics to future generations.

This is one reason why thigh fat is so difficult to get rid of. Genes left over from your cave-dwelling ancestors cause hormones and enzymes in your body to direct every extra calorie into waiting fat cells in your hips and thighs. For example, your levels of the female sex hormone estrogen may be a tad higher than other women whose bodies don't store excess fat in these areas (or as much of it).

But there are ways to coax these fat cells in your thighs to release their contents, and to coax your muscle cells into burning it up! So don't despair. Read on for the right moves that blast fat from your hips and thighs.

What Causes Cellulite?
Besides excess fat in their thighs, many women complain to me about a certain type of fat known as cellulite. They tell me that no matter how much weight they lose, they can't seem to smooth out the tiny lumps of fat on their thighs. Indeed, some of the most slender women havecellulite. Cellulite is created when fat manages to push its way through tiny holes in your connective tissue, the thick web of interwoven fibers just underneath your skin. Strong and healthy connective tissue forms a tighter web of interwoven fibers, preventing fat from pressing its way through. Weak, unhealthy connective tissue, on the other hand, more easily stretches apart, allowing tiny fat pockets to poke through. Many factors can weaken your connective tissue, setting the stage for cellulite. They include:

High Hormone Levels: Women with higher-than-normal levels of the female hormone estrogen tend to suffer more often from cellulite. Other than directing extra calories to fat cells in your thighs, estrogen also weakens connective tissue. When estrogen softens connective tissue around the womb, it makes childbirth possible. Unfortunately, estrogen softens all of the connective tissue in your body, not just that around your womb.

Poor Blood Circulation: Usually, high estrogen levels alone won't trigger cellulite to form. Many experts believe that you must also have poor blood circulation to your connective tissue, which tends to cause swelling. The swelling stretches the connective tissue apart, allowing the fat to bulge through.

Fluid Retention: Many people think that fluid retention takes place only in the abdomen. That's not true. It actually occurs all over your body, including your thighs. If you've ever pulled on a favorite pair of pants and found them tight in the thighs one day and loose the next, you've experienced the ebb and flow of fluid retention. Any type of swelling in your thighs—particularly on a chronic basis—will stretch out and weaken connective tissue.

A Frenzied Lifestyle: Emotional stress has also been shown to weaken connective tissue.

What You Can Do
First, daily exercise will help to normalize your hormonal levels. This not only helps prevent cellulite, it will also help to prevent mood swings. Second, exercising will increase blood circulation to your thighs, helping to keep the connective tissue healthy. Better blood circulation will, in turn, help to remove excess fluid. Finally, as you shed fat in your hips and thighs, you'll have less of it to press against your connective tissue.

Good News/Bad News
Genetically speaking, there are two predominant body types. Some people gain fat in their lower bodies, creating the pear shape mentioned earlier. Others tend to gain fat in their abdomens, creating what's known as an apple shape.

Though you may have come to despise the fat on your hips and thighs, you should know that you have a major advantage over people who tend to gain it elsewhere. Research has shown over and over again that abdominal fat—and not hip and thigh fat—is particularly dangerous to your health. Abdominal fat more easily makes its way into your bloodstream, clogging your arteries. Thigh fat is much less likely to do so.

Now for the bad news. Thigh fat is a little harder to burn off than belly fat. You probably know this already. If you and a guy friend have ever resolved to lose weight at the same time, you probably noticed that he had a much easier time dropping the weight in his belly than you did in your thighs.

Regardless, that doesn't mean you can't burn it off. I know that women who have excess thigh fat are generally the most motivated to get rid of it. So I probably don't have to give you much of a pep talk to help motivate you toward your goal. Abdominal fat is easy to hide with a big sweater. Thigh fat, on the other hand, is almost impossible to hide. And summer can be a very difficult time for women. My female friends and online clients tell me that they hate wearing shorts and swimsuits because they hate revealing their legs. And they tell me that their pants tend to hug too tightly in the thighs.

But you can change all of that! Not only can you slim down your thighs and hips and smooth away that cellulite, but you can also build the muscles in your legs, which are some of the largest and strongest muscles in your body. Stronger leg muscles make your overall life feel so much more effortless. You'll walk with more confidence and with a spring in your step. You'll be able to climb stairs without getting tired. And you'll be able to go on strenuous hikes—all because of your strong legs! You will feel better about yourself from the inside out.

Move 1: Seated Pillow Squeeze (works on inner thighs)

Sit on a sturdy chair (one without wheels). Rest your feet on the floor with your knees bent at 90-degree angles. Place a pillow between your thighs. Exhale as you squeeze the pillow between your thighs, as if you were trying to squeeze the stuffing out of the pillow. Hold for 1 minute as you breathe normally. Release and proceed to Move 2.

Move 2: Seated Hand Push (works outer thighs and hips)

Sit on a sturdy chair. Rest your feet on the floor with your knees bent at 90-degree angles. Place your palms on the outsides of your knees. While keeping your palms and arms stationary, push your knees outward against your palms, as if you were trying to push your palms away. At the same time, press inward with your hands, preventing your thighs from pushing them outward. Hold this isometric contraction for 1 minute, breathing normally. Release and proceed to Move 3.

Move 3: Seated Leg Raise (works fronts of the thighs)

Sit on a sturdy chair. Rest your feet on the floor with your knees bent at 90-degree angles. Rest your hands on the chair at your sides. Exhale as you lift and extend your right leg. Hold for 30 seconds as you breathe normally. Then inhale as you lower your right leg and exhale as you repeat with your left leg. Hold for 30 seconds while breathing normally. Release and proceed to Move 4.

Move 4: Seated Bridge (works the backs of the thigh and rear end)

Sit on the edge of a sturdy chair. Rest your feet on the floor with your knees bent at 90-degree angles. Rest your palms on the chair at your sides. Exhale as you lift your hips, allowing your palms and feet to support your body weight. Continue to lift your hips until your body resembles the shape of a bridge. Hold for 20 to 60 seconds while breathing normally. Release and return to Move 1. Repeat Moves 1-4 once more, and you're done.


Will you try these exercises out? Comment below what you think! Let me know xx

Source
http://www.prevention.com/fitness/strength-training/exercise-tips-slim-hips-and-thighs

9 Quick Ways to Lose Your Thigh Fat

Full disclosure: There's no one exercise or food that specifically helps you lose weight in your legs—spot reducing fat doesn't work—but keep reading to find out what can help you trim down.

KICK UP THE CARDIO

Burning calories is key to reducing your overall body fat, and heart-pumping cardio is going to make that happen. Choose the types that burn the most calories, such as biking, running, and jumping rope. As a bonus, these also tonethe legs while you're doing them. Do 60-minute sessions five times a week to really notice a difference.

GET HIGH

With your incline, that is. Pump up the treadmill's incline, find some hills to bike or run up, or take the stairs outside or in your home. You'll instantly feel your heart rate increase, which means you're working harder and burning more calories than if you were to stick to a flat surface. Incline also targets the thighs, hamstrings, and tush, toning your lower body. 

SPOT TONE

With all the cardio you're doing that's stripping away that extra layer of fat surrounding your lower body, you want to reveal strong, toned muscles underneath. Doing moves that sculpt your inner and outer thighs, hamstrings, and butt will make your legs look leaner and slimmer. 

FUEL YOUR DAY

Definitely don't skip the first meal of the day since it'll jumpstart your metabolism, which helps to reduce your overall body fat to reveal your leaner legs. Pass on sugary meals with refined carbs, and opt for a combo of protein and fiber-filled complex carbs. The protein will give you energy so you'll feel pumped for that early-morning cardio workout. As an added bonus, it also helps build muscle. The carbs will sustain that energy and keep you feeling full. 

SNACK OFTEN

Eating a little something every few hours will prevent hunger from causing you to overeat, so be sure to eat a snack in between meals. Keep it under 150 calories, and choose foods high in protein and fiber to fill you up and offer energy. Here are 150-calorie homemade snack ideas.

RECORD YOUR MEALS

You can't slim down by exercise alone. It's important to cut calories as well and to know your daily calorie intake. Though it may seem tedious, keeping a food journal works—in fact, one study found that those who logged what they ate six days a week lost twice as much weight as those who only kept track of a day or less. In order to lose a pound a week, you need to cut 500 calories a day—250 through exercise and 250 through diet is a good breakdown. Just be sure not to dip below 1,200 calories. Writing it down will keep you accountable for every bite.

DRINK MORE WATER

Choose water every time you reach for a drink, and you'll save hundreds of calories by avoiding sodas, fruit juices, and other sweetened beverages. Aside from being zero calories, H2O will keep you hydrated, which also helps with weight loss. Keep water close by, and sip it often, especially before meals—filling up on water before eating helps encourage portion control.

SLEEP RIGHT

Getting enough rest is also proven to aid in weight loss. Sleepiness makes people snack more, while also making them too tired to work out.

CONSIDER YOUR GENETICS

If you're blessed with a pear-shaped body (and so is your sister, mother, aunts, and grandmother), there's not a whole lot that exercise, eating right, and taking care of yourself can change. Do what you can, but don't obsess or stress about it. Enjoy life in the body you were given—thighs and all!

Comment below what you think! id you find this helpful? let me know xx


Source
http://www.womenshealthmag.com/weight-loss/lose-thigh-fat