You may be wast­ing your time in the gym or at home if you are try­ing to shape your body or get rid of the body­fat. Dont’ believe what I said? Well, most peo­ple are, that is when it comes to exer­cise for get­ting rid of bel­ly­fat and get­ting into bet­ter shape.

I was in the gym the other day (noth­ing new .. ; ) and I saw all 4 of these exer­cises being per­formed by var­i­ous gym mem­bers (again, noth­ing new). And they are use­less for 99% of the peo­ple on the planet.

Here they are:

USELESS EXERCISE 1: Walk­ing Dumb­bell Lunges

Okay ladies, this one is for you, although I see guys do this exer­cise as well, many of them do that.

This is where you take a pair of dumb­bells and kneel with one leg, then the other, and so-on, walk­ing around the gym as you go.

The idea behind this exer­cise is to work the butt, and to some extent the thighs, but it’s a joke. It’s some­thing invented by train­ers who should know better.

If you want to build and tone your butt, exer­cise one leg at a time. Lunges are a great exer­cise for this, but save your energy. Do them on a Smith Machine or with a bar­bell. Work one leg at a time, too. Do not alter­nate legs. This just wears you out aer­o­bi­cally before it has a chance to get to your glutes.

Here’s how I per­form lunges: On a Smith Machine, with pretty heavy weights, one leg at a time. I will do 2–3 sets, or do them in Jon’s 7 Minute Body-Style Work­out Fash­ion. I will fin­ish one leg (and one butt cheek) before mov­ing to the other leg.

Why? Again, because to focus on the mus­cle more intensely and to avoid turn­ing a leg/butt work­out into a car­dio session.

USELESS EXERCISE 2: The Sit-Up

I’m shocked when I saw peo­ple still think sit-ups done the old-fashioned way actu­ally work the abs. Even worse, most peo­ple have been fooled into believ­ing this actu­ally helps get rid of bel­ly­fat. It is really nonsense.

Bel­ly­fat is burned off when you have a good nutri­tion plan and through gen­eral exer­cise, not using exer­cises for the abs. Ab exer­cises are fine, but guess what? — never train your abs more than 3–5 min­utes. Your ab work­out actu­ally only need to took 3 min­utes and 12 sec­onds to com­plete. And then you will feel your abs are sore!

But with­out the nutri­tion plan, for­get it … I’d never SEE my abs at all. I’d just have a nice wall of mus­cle with a bunch of flab cov­er­ing it up. The best nutri­tion plan for abs is The Every Other Day Diet Plan.

The best exer­cises to do for the actual ab mus­cles are hang­ing leg raises, done slowly, crunches (if you do them right) and that’s really all you need.

USELESS EXERCISE 3: The Bench Press

I’m going to get a lot of flack from the guys out there who love to bench, but I’m here to tell you that this exer­cise for bodyshap­ing is all but worthless.

Why? Because most peo­ple are not built right body-wise to bench press on a flat bench with a bar­bell. I am not, that’s for sure.

Bench presses work if you have short arms, a rel­a­tively short torso, and your shoul­ders are genet­i­cally strong.

Pro­tect your shoul­ders and really work your chest by doing incline dumb­bell presses with your palms fac­ing OUT, not in toward your head. This pro­tects the rota­tors cuff, a part of the shoul­der that is often injured using bar­bell bench presses.

Com­bine this with a good cable fly or press move­ment and you’re set. Again, you only need about 7–14 min­utes of chest work tops to get the job done.

USELESS EXERCISE 4: Most Car­dio Exercises

Yep, saved the best for last.

Here’s a fact: Most car­dio (bike, tread­mill, glider, what­ever) is a waste to time, UNLESS you do it at the right time with the right nutri­tion plan.

The calo­ries you burn from car­dio will be eas­ily negated sim­ply by eat­ing a bagel! Hardly effec­tive for get­ting rid of body­fat. Weight train­ing and/or resis­tance train­ing at home or with your body weight, as cov­ered in 7 Minute Mus­cle, is your best bet for exer­cise that burns-off mega-calories and keeps on burn­ing long after the exer­cise ses­sion is over.

Here’s how to use tra­di­tional car­dio wisely:

1. Do it first thing in the morn­ing on an empty stom­ach;
2. Keep your heart rate down to 75% of your max (220 minus your age x .75 will give you this num­ber, at least approx­i­mately);
3. “Burst” for 2–3 min­utes in your ses­sion up to 85–90% of your max heart rate.
4. OR, do car­dio right after weight or resis­tance train­ing when your heart rate is already ele­vated and your blood sugar is lower. Your body burns blood sugar first dur­ing exercise.

Car­dio for most peo­ple only needs to be per­formed 3–4 times a week for 20 min­utes. If in case you want to get your body­fat below 10%, then you can do more, but only using the rules above.

Hope this saves you a ton of time with your workouts.

Enjoy your hol­i­days!

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