Hi Hayley,
I am a 29 year old female who needs to tone her bottom half.... I am 5'3" and weigh about 117 lbs.
my backstory.... Growing up, I was always very petite. When I say petite, I mean so skinny I looked slightly ill. I just could not gain weight. My legs looked like pins sticking out of a skirt or dress and I had no boobs (and still don't)... Needless to say, I struggled in the boy department throughout teenage hood... I was a very active child and teenager and I always had a very large appetite... So flash forward to university and I finally was able to gain a few lbs. About 15lbs in fact and I had never looked better. The weight went to my bum and thighs and I finally got a glance or two from the opposite sex. I still never gained any size to my chest, but overall I was for the first time in my life happy with my body and the needed weight I put on in university.
After graduation, I continued to live a university like lifestyle for the most part. I was still eating chicken wings, drinking way too much beer and not exercising. I hadn't exercised consistently since my days of sports playing between the ages of 6-15. So that weight I had gained to my bum and thighs has turned to pure fat and a lot of cellulite. I feel like my body does not match the number on the scale. Mind you I am quite paranoid, but I can tell people who have never seen me in a bathing suit are shocked when I take off my shorts and they see all this cellulite from a petite person. I look "skinny" in jeans and feel comfortable in most clothes, it's just the dreaded bathing suit or God forbid being naked that my true body of pure "untonedness" shows it's true colours. My stomach has always remained pretty flat, it's just my bottom half that has suffered the years of neglect from no exercise and abuse from all that sweet sweet beer drinking.
So my question for you is, what types of exercises are the best for toning legs and glutes? I don't actually want to lose any weight, in fact I would like to gain a few lbs in muscle. I don't have a problem with self-control when it comes to eating and my diet has improved significantly with regular, healthy meals and snacks.
Thank you.
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Cellulite – this is the problem of nearly 90% of women. We all have it and we all dread those summer days where we are forced to prance around in tiny swimsuits, using sarongs, skirts and towels to hide the dimples that we hate which coat our tummy, hips and thighs.
So what is cellulite? For much of my life I was told it was a different type of fat cell, when in actuality it is just fat that is sitting right under our skin, in between our connective tissues. And because of the way connective tissues run in women, the fat has no choice but to bulge in between the tissues, which causes those dimples.
There are many factors which can contribute to cellulite, including genetics and a poor diet, and unfortunately there are no magic tricks to getting rid of it, as much as the multibillion dollar cellulite industry would like us to think.
The first step you need to take to help minimize the dimples on your thighs and hips is clean up your diet. The only way you can burn fat off of your body is to eliminate sugars. You need to start by regulating your insulin and blood sugar, which means taking out refined carbohydrates (think white bread and pasta), cutting out alcohol, limiting your fruit intake and avoiding all excess sugars. If you are not willing to start there then there is no point in moving forward because exercise alone will not be enough.
As for your exercise routine you need to move your legs. Get yourself into a spin class ASAP! Not only will the hour long workout burn mega calories, you will also reap the benefits of how cycling builds strong and sexy muscles in your legs. If spinning is not your thing, then get on a treadmill at an incline of 6 or higher and walk for 45 minutes at a pace where you do not need to hold on. Holding on while walking on a treadmill is useless and you are wasting your time so if you feel the need to grab a side rail, slow down.
And make friends with lunges, squats, step ups, hamstring curls, and leg presses. You need to start putting some serious muscle mass onto your legs so keep the reps low and the weight high. Think 3-5 sets of 12-15 reps. Muscle is more dense than fat so it will occupy less space on your body, yet you may see an increase in the number on the scale.
We are women and women have fat on our bodies. We need fat on our bodies. We will always have fat on our bodies. Our tummies will always roll when we bend forward and most likely our thighs will touch together at some point in our day. If you are part of the 10% of the population that was lucky enough to not be plagued with cellulite then count your lucky stars. But for the rest of us, myself included, you need to accept that it will always be there, no matter what you do. You can limit it, yes, but because we need body fat, those fat cells that are under our skin will always dimple, even just a little.
