There is nothing magical about the so-called "fat burning zone".

By definition, the fat burning zone is the exercise intensity where your body burns the highest proportion of fat.

However, the fat burning zone is relatively low intensity exercise, and burns less calories than if you worked at a harder pace for the same amount of time.

The fat burning zone has never been shown in a study to be more effective for fat loss than any other type of exercise.

The purpose of exercise is to burn calories during and after exercise when the body is recovering from the workout. The fat burning zone is generally low-intensity exercise, but low-intensity exercise burns fewer calories.

Therefore, forget about this term and this fat burning myth. Instead, use the interval training guidelines from any of my weight loss workout programs to improve your fitness, calorie burning, and fat loss.

And what about spot reduction exercises? Will you lose fat from a specific area by doing certain exercises? What exercises will help you lose my love handles?

The answer of course, is "No, you can't lose fat from a specific area just by doing certain exercises."

This is also known as spot reducing, and just can't be done. If we told you that there was one secret exercise that could magically reduce the fat from one of your trouble spots, then we'd be rich. But we'd also be lying.

Fat burning isn't like building muscle. When you strength train to build muscle, you only make gains in the specific muscles that were trained ("spot gaining"). But no exercise has the ability to burn fat from one specific area only ("spot reducing").

When you exercise, you burn fat from all over your body. Doing one thousand ab crunches won't help you lose your belly fat any faster than a good total- body routine.

The best approach to fat loss is one that includes three major components.

Nutrition is numero uno when it comes to fat burning. It is so important for people to follow good nutrition principles when they are trying to improve their body. If you haven't already heard these basic recommendations for fat loss nutrition, here are the 5 best fat loss nutrition tips:

1. Eat several small meals per day, rather than 2-3 large meals.

2. Count your calories for a week.

3. Determine how many calories you should eat per day to maintain your bodyweight.

4. If you want to lose fat, start by reducing your food intake by 200-300 calories per day below your maintenance level and add 3 workouts per week using my workout programs.

5. Stop eating processed foods and replace all sweetened beverages with water or Green Tea. This can quickly reduce your food intake by hundreds of calories immediately.