Can You Lose Weight From the AB Lounge?

The Ab Lounge is one of many consumer abdominal workout machines. Working the abdominal muscles with the Ab Lounge will invoke some calorie burning, but will likely not lead to significant weight loss on its own.

Function

• The Ab Lounge looks something like a lawn chair with places to put the feet and handles to grab above the head. By moving the knees in and the elbows down, the machine engages the abdominal muscles while keeping the user in a comfortable seated position.

Calorie Burning

• The only way to lose weight effectively over time is to burn more calories than you eat; while the Ab Lounge will burn some calories, the abdominal muscles themselves are relatively weak and will not burn as many calories when engaged as exercises that involve the legs, such as running or swimming.

Commercials

• TV commercials for equipment like the Ab Lounge often claim you can lose weight using their devices with minimal time and effort; these claims are false.

Considerations

• The best way to lose weight is to reduce calorie intake while increasing aerobic activity; aerobic activities can be sustained for long periods of time to burn many calories while the Ab Lounge can be used for short periods of time since the abs will fatigue quickly.

Misconceptions

• It is often believed that working the abdominal muscles will burn fat on the belly; this type of "spot reduction" does not work--the body burns fat as a means of providing energy to the muscles, but it does not burn fat disproportionally from the stores above the muscles that are being engaged.