Did you know that every decade after the age of 30, a woman is expected to lose an average of 5 pounds of muscle and put on 10 pounds of fat? These figures can make you pause and think about the sedentary lifestyle we live and what it does to our health. But what women may not realise is that this phenomenon may also be causing one of the most common cosmetic problems females face – cellulite.
The key point is the loss of muscle. While most women focus on their fat levels when think of cellulite removal treatment, the reality is that their level of lean muscle mass has a much larger impact on its appearance than fat.
This is for a number of reasons. The main one is that muscle acts as a hard base for the fat under the skin and when there is the right balance between the fat and muscle, the fat is prevented from coming together and causing the lumpy cellulite appearance. But if there is too much fat or too little muscle, the fat cells come together and cause the skin over the top to be uneven.
A second reason is the fat-gain cycle that muscle loss creates. When you lose muscle your resting metabolism lowers, leading to fat gain. This extra fat can tip the balance between muscle and fat, and cellulite appears.
So, what can you do about all of this? The first step is to increase your level of lean muscle in the problem areas of the hips and thighs through anti cellulite exercise. You do this by doing strength bearing exercise like squats and leg extensions.
The second step is to do some moderate levels of cardiovascular exercise. The idea is to do the cardio to trim down on the fat. The exercises itself will do little to maintain or create muscle mass and so you cannot just do them instead of the weight lifting.
Lastly, the final step is to eat a healthy, balanced diet. There is no need to be fancy with this. Just make sure you drink 8 glasses of water and eat fresh foods that aren’t loaded with calories.
Implementing these three pieces of advice will take you a long way to reducing your cellulite and improving the look of your thighs and legs.
