How To Get Flat Abs: Get Rid Of Those Fast Carbs

Here's how you don't get flat abs: consuming sugars and other fast carbs.

You'll notice that one of the primary rules of weight loss I laid out in my How To Get Abs: Burn Off The Fat So You Can See 'Em post was to 'limit fast carbs'. By a cruel trick of nature, fast carbs are very tasty. But they digest really quickly, and as such, release a lot of insulin quickly. This has the effect of increasing appetite, encouraging you to eat more.

The spike of insulin also instructs your body to use food as fuel, and not to use stored energy i.e. fat. This makes weight loss more difficult.

So, this post is going to show you how to (somewhat) painlessly remove these pesky fast carbs from your diet.

Replacing sugar

Those of you with a sweet tooth may lament the banning of your sugary foods. There are very satisfactory replacements, however. The ridiculous thing about most commercially available sweeteners, though, is that they're unnecessarily bad:

Artificial ones, namely aspartame (the sweetener used in most 'diet' drinks and foods) and saccharine are just plain dangerous - there's a pile of (as yet inconclusive) studies linking them to all kinds of serious diseases including cancer and brain damage. I personally try to stay away from these despite their weight-loss friendly properties.

Many natural ones, though, like fructose, honey and malitol, still have calories, so they aren't the solution either.

I recommend:

1. Xylitol

A sugar alcohol, xylitol looks and tastes like white sugar. Yes, it still has some calories, but it's low GI, so you don't get the fat inducing spike in insulin that you get from sugar. I recommend buying some and using it where ever you used sugar before for the occasional treat.

2. Stevia

Now this stuff is awesome. It's 300 times as sweet as sugar, but it's natural and comes from a herb growin in Brazil. Despite decades of use with no harm, it's still not approved in the US or EU, though, for political reasons. Ridiculous! Apparently it will be soon, however, and there is even interest from Coca-Cola to release a drink using stevia! Time will tell. But if you can source it, I recommend using it in as much quantities as you like.

Replacing white flour and white rice

White flour and white rice are fast carbs and as such are no friend of the flat ab'ed person. So instead of white flour, use whole grain flour, and instead of white rice, use brown rice. Pretty simple. Most flour based products these days (pasta, bread etc) are readily available in their 'whole grain' alternatives.

Personally, I try to heavily limit my consumption of pasta and bread anyway. They don't help the cause much even in whole grain form, since they're acidic and they don't have many nutritional benefits. But whole grain is certainly the lesser of two evils if you must have them.

Brown rice is harder to cook and as such less available in resteraunts, cafes etc, but always ask.

Replacing potatoes

Potatoes really aren't much good for you. If you must have them, have them with slow carbs (fibrous green veges) so the net speed of the carbs digesting in your belly is about medium.

For alternatives, there's always sweet potato which is very healthy. Sweet potato chips (baked, not fried) and sweet potato mash are very nice!

Replacing alcohol

The last of the major fast carbs is alochol. Unfortunately, the replacement is water!

Seriously, alcohol is public enemy number one for weight loss. Probably on par with sugar. It's high calorie and completely free of nutrition. And we all know the negative impact it has on the rest of your body. Also worthy of mention, it binds up testosterone in the body. This impedes muscle growth and will give males man boobs!

If you're inclined to take other 'intoxicants' instead of alcohol so you can still have fun at parties, I think you're on the wrong track. These are toxic and highly acidic and so will impede weight loss in any case. More practically, they encourage you to eat a super-human amount (known as 'the munchies') and make it difficult for you to stick to your diet (it's hard to remember why you need to diet at 3am out front of the kebabs shop). Alcohol does that too, of course.

Laughing, having fun and dancing are good for you, so feel free to enjoy the night life. It's better on your body (and your wallet) if you stay sober, though. So if you must drink, practice moderation.

The 90% rule

No one can have a perfect diet, so allow yourself to indulge 10% of the time (about one meal of bad foods every two days, or one full day of bad foods once a fortnight). This keeps you motivated and can satisfy cravings.

The quicker you can practice this, though, the quicker you'll see those washboard abs poking out from under your belly!