Lose your Love Handles: A 3 Step Program to Streamline your Waist in 30 Days

"I purchased about 10 books from Amazon on abs in order to compare them. This one has kind of an odd program based around walking rather than resistance exercise. As a chart in one of the other books shows, a hard walk is only about 1/2 as effective as an easy run, and only about 1/4 as effective as a hard run. I think this is why the author came out with "The Fat Burning Bible," which recommends a Bill-Phillips-esque diet and exercise plan. If you're looking for a good book to help you with your abs, here's my conclusion from comparing books...

If You Want to Trim Your Waistline: You can't trim your waistline without losing fat, and you can't lose fat around your waist without losing it everywhere (focusing on a muscle group like the abdominal muscles doesn't burn fat in that location, just a little bit of fat from everywhere on the body). So, if you want to trim your waistline, skip the ab workout books and go with a good, proven overall weight loss and fitness book like Bill Phillips' Body for Life. The Abs Diet is a similar program, but like all the Men's Health publications, it advertises a 6-week transformation, which is just a little unrealistic. Plan on more like 12-24 weeks to see really noticeable changes if you are fat.

If You Want Sculpted Six-Pack Abs: If you are overweight at all, see above--you can't get a six pack while you're overweight, and you can't lose abdominal fat by doing an ab workout, so go for overall fitness. However, if you are already lean, see below.

If You Want to Strengthen or Build Your Ab Muscles: If you're trying to improve for work, play, or rehab, you might consider the following books: The Body Sculpting Bible for Abs Deluxe DVD Edition contains decently up-to-date information and tells you exactly what to do and when to do it, based on a six-week fitness course. If you're looking for a similar book with more information, you can choose from The Complete Book of Abs or The Complete Book of Core Training. The Complete Book of Abs (1998) is a little out of date in terms of its dietary/nutritional recommendations, but it focuses more on exercises that develop the external abdominal muscles (the ones you see in a six-pack), including lots of variations on leg lifts, bicycle motion, and sit-ups. It will also give you more resources for creating your own program, and, if that's what you want to do, go with this one instead of The Body Sculpting Bible. The Complete Book of Core Training (2006) focuses more on the functional body core, including internal abdominal muscles, legs, etc., and includes more trendy exercises using medicine balls, exercise balls, yoga, etc. A different sort of book is Stronger Abs and Back (1997), which was written before the current fad of selling "core training," but contains the elements of core training because it gives good functional sports-focused advice. Its dietary recommendations are out of date, but it recommends a 24-week workout plan, which is much more realistic than the 6-week plans advocated by many of the other books.

If You Have Back Pain: See your doctor, and if he prescribes abdominal/core strengthening, see above.

My one-book recommendation: Body for Life.
My two-book recommendation: Body for Life + Stronger Abs and Back.
My three-book recommendation: Body for Life + Stronger Abs and Back + The Complete Book of Abs.
My four-book recommendation: Body for Life + Stronger Abs and Back + The Complete Book of Abs + The Abs Diet.

Hope this helps!!"
~ Written on 2008-01-31

"Mr. Shilstone became famous for training atheletes and in particular helping them GAIN weight. While the diet and exercise portions of the book are very sensible and there is a lot of good information on heart disease, this book will not help you lose body fat in any reasonable amount of time. One of his "sucess" stories has a man losing 5lbs and 3% body fat in four months! He should hit the healthy range in about 5 years. The lack of resistance training is the main weakness. I suggest "The Nautalis Diet" or "Fit or Fat" if you are serious about your health and weight."
~ Written on 2006-06-28

"This is an excellent book if you have are overweight, have not exercised in a long time, and are looking to lose body fat. I can definitely believe the before and after pictures of those participants who followed this program. Unlike those pictures shown in Bill Phillips Body For Life Book, these pictures do not look doctored. Although he has certain core exercises for toning that you must engage in, I believe that you can substitute pilates and get the same effect. As for walking 45 minutes a day at a moderate intensity 6 days a week, walking is one of the easiest things to do, so you would have no excuses. I think that you can maximize the benefits of this program, my including some resistance training. The recommended eating plan, which focuses on eating low glycemic carbohydrates is excellent. Despite allowing myself a "cheat day" once a week, where I eat whatever I want, I have noticed a 4 pound loss in weight and 1 percent reduction in body fat in one month by adhering to the recommended nutrition plan 6 days a week. While this may not sound like a lot, I am willing to bet that I have probably retained more lean muscle mass than some who has lost significant weight in one month, following another program. If you lose weight too quickly and sacrafice muscle in the process, you will only gain more weight and fat over the long run and it will become increasingly difficult to loose fat because you will have drastically slowed down your metabolism. The really good thing about this book is that the program is not so strict that you would likely be inclined to give up after one to two weeks."
~ Written on 2002-11-10

"This book was so amazing! It totally changed the way i eat and live! Im 15, 5'11, and weigh 160, i used to weigh 260! This book really works!"
~ Written on 2002-02-13

"Mr. Shilstone's three steps can be summarized as follows: (1) shift your eating habits permanently, in a minimally restrictive way, guided by the glycemic index, (2) accomplish a full hour of aerobic exercise at a good intensity every day, (3) perform a serious but short core strengthening routine every day. That's the program.

The dietary portion of the program (certainly not a conventional "diet") is minimally restrictive both of the sort of foods you might be allowed to eat and the quantity of food you might be allowed to eat. You could eat like a lumberjack (if you wanted to do that) and still be well within the program. The key observation is "glycemic index," which Mr. Shilstone explains in more detail and more correctly than I could here. This is an important and very healthy suggestion, which was new to me. It is, in a sense, the natural and appropriate correction for most of the diets that are usually suggested, even the low-fat diets suggested by physicians for heart patients. More scientific basis of this is explained in Dr. Schwartzbein's books (The Schwarzbein Principle and her cookbooks), and related information appears in Cheryle Hart's book on Insulin-Resistance. This is a very good idea that I found in Mr. Shilstone's book first. My only criticism is that more information is really required than Mr. Shilstone has room to include in this small book.

The section on aerobic exercise for your hour a day is excellent. While power walking will certainly suffice, you are in no way limited. Very good and useful information is given for you to substitute any number of activities that might suit your changing interests. He gives detailed information here about the time of day when you can most usefully exercise (late afternoon, an hour and a half before going to supper) and what criteria must be fulfilled for your body to be able to burn fat (you only start burning fat well after a half hour of exercise). These insightful details will help a lot in monitoring your own effectiveness easily and without worry. He gives you that extra knowledge to know when you're done.

The core strength workout is given in two forms. Either form, when learned, can be accomplished in some time ranging between fifteen and thirty minutes. The simpler routine uses only a weight, something like a medicine ball (although a middle sized rock would do the same job). The more advanced routine requires a Swiss ball and some tubing. Both are efficient and well constructed routines.

The bottom line to a book like this is simply whether it works or not. My situation is not like every person's. I'm reasonably active, a little more active than the usual "weekend warrior," neither a total couch potato nor actually in good physical shape. I've carried between 10 and 14 pounds of extra weight that I couldn't lose for more than 10 years' time. I've tried a lot of ways to make it go, including bicycling and some moderately serious running (two miles after supper every night). Nothing has worked. Now, I don't do the cooking or the shopping in our house. According to the guidelines, our eating habits are neither exemplary nor totally wrong. So, as I count it, I am simply non-compliant with his step 1). From the start, I have been totally compliant and vigorous in step 2) via power walking. I am learning his step 3) slowly and integrating it into my routine (the bigger step) slowly. So, I would consider myself about half compliant with step 3) at this stage. So, according to my guesses, I am about half way doing his program. Happily, in this half-way mode, I'm systematically losing both inches and pounds. Now, if I said that I am losing about a pound every ten days or so, that would not be in the spirit of the book. Mr. Shilstone doesn't recommend the use of scales to monitor your progress. He asks you to use the tape measurement of your waist. So, I should say that I am losing something very roughly like an inch a month on the waist. (My estimate is rough since I am non-compliant and prefer to use a scale.)

My congratulations to Mr. Shilstone. I think this is a uniquely useful book and one that most people I know could usefully read. There is no question that this is a very good and completely adequate program to manage the "love handle" problem. The cost of this is the work of integrating the suggestions into daily life. Not everyone will want to do that (it costs about an hour and a half a day, and whatever trouble it takes to changing your cooking and eating habits). The results are a significant boost to good health, vigor, and a sense of well being. Not everyone will choose that. My suggestion is that you should only buy the book if you intend to do the routines systematically. While a useful outline, it is not really the best entertainment reading. I gave it only four stars because I consider it incomplete in the nutritional section. I still need to buy other cookbooks to help me become "fully compliant"."
~ Written on 2001-10-18