Topical fat loss (spot reduction): is it possible? Part I

Is it possible to lose fat on the thighs by exercising the thigh muscles?

Losing fat by exercising the muscles next to it, is technically called "spot reduction with exercise" or "local/topical fat loss with exercise". This process is physiologically impossible because fat cells are enclosed in connective tissue compartments that make it impossible for the fatty acids released from your fat cells to diffuse their way into the adjacent muscles and be consequently oxidised there. In addition, muscles are also enclosed by connective tissue too that makes it even more impossible to receive fatty acids from the nearby adipose tissues.

To make this clearer to you, let's assume that you decide to exercise your thigh muscles (quadriceps) to get rid of fat on the front of your thighs. Let's assume you choose to cycle at low intensity for one hour to achieve that. Now your quadriceps muscle will receive all the fuel it needs (including fatty acids) by arteries that serve this muscle, and as we know arteries contain blood and nutrients that come from the heart. In turn, the heart receives blood and nutrients (including fatty acids) from veins and lymph vessels, that originate from all the tissues and organs of the body, including your internal organs and peripheral tissues, such as the fat tissues in your thighs, arms, back, face etc. This practically means that the fat your quadriceps muscles use could come from anywhere in the body, including your arms, your stomach, chest etc.

In the same manner, when the adipose cells (fat cells) found on the surface of your thighs release fat, this fat is taken up by the circulation and ends up in your heart, from where it can reach and be "burned" by any muscle of your body, including your stomach muscles, your arm muscles etc. - not specifically your quads.

In a few words, fat is circulated in the body by a central pump (the heart) and does not diffuse to nearby tissues.

As you can see there is no guarantee that the fat burned by your front thigh muscles may originate from your front thigh fat cells, so exercising a specific muscle in order to burn the fat on top of that muscle is pointless. Although most trainers now know that spot reduction with exercise is impossible, most everyday people are not aware of this fact and keep wasting their time doing leg abductions to reduce saddle bags, which is completely pointless, as pointless as doing squats to lose buttock fat or doing leg adductions to burn inner thigh fat. Therefore, do not waste your time doing abs to reduce abdominal fat, it won't happen soon. Your abs, however, will become firmer... True, in all these cases you will build firmer muscles which will improve your appearance in that area, but if you want to have a "six pack" or super firm and smooth thighs you have to do more than local exercises....

"So what is the solution if I want to reduce fat from a specific area?"

You may not be able to reduce fat on a specific area with exercise but you can always do loads of aerobic exercise and follow a strict diet to burn fat from all over your body. This approach if sustained long enough will in the end eliminate the stomach or thigh fat that you want to get rid of, but in most women this will only happen after there is be no face fat or breast fat left on their body. This is clearly not the way to go - nobody wants to have slimmer thighs if the price she has to pay is a gaunt face and a flat chest!

However, all is not lost. There are two ways to reduce local body fat from a specific area of your body. One is by applying a good topical fat loss cream and the other is by having a good anti-cellulite treatment just before or after you exercise. I know it sounds a bit implausible but please let me explain the rationale behind these two approaches.

What determines where your fat comes from when you exercise any part of the body...

...is not the proximity of the fat to the "working" muscle but your genes, your hormones, the type of food you eat, the type of exercise you perform, the nutrients you apply locally (in the form of a cream) on the skin above the fatty tissue you want to reduce, and the mechanical stimulation this fatty tissue receives.

In the second part of this article will analyse all these factors in detail, but in summary what you should know is that local fat loss or spot reduction is not possible by exercising the local muscles. However, this doesn't mean you should stop exercising, quite the opposite, try to exercise a lot in order to lose overall fat and at the same time use a local treatment or cream to focus the exercise-induced fat loss on a specific spot. Local treatments that offer vigorous mechanical stimulation or damage fat cells in other ways are good options, as are good quality creams that contain several fat-fighting ingredients in high concentrations.