If you are the kind of guy that has cases of Billy Beer in your basement, don't even bother reading this section.  If, on the other hand, you look at the floor and can't see your shoes and that bothers you, read onward.  While working with overweight subjects I noted that many of them possessed very large protruding stomachs.  In the beginning, I assumed it was from an excess accumulation of fat around their midsection and if they dieted and exercised properly it would go away.  As time passed, I became increasingly frustrated.  No matter how much weight they lost, and regardless of how hard they exercised, their mid-sections never seemed to change.  Some of these clients had very skinny arms and virtually no fat on their legs; yet their mid-sections looked like a gigantic balloon that had been inflated beneath their skin.  During that period, I used a tape measure and scale to monitor their progress.  That was about 20 years ago.  Eventually, instead of using a tape measure I began to use skin calipers.  Then something strange happened.  The skin fold method that I used required that three sites be measured around the abdominal section.  I began to realize that many patients with large protruding stomachs didn't really have as much fat around their mid-sections as it appeared.  The caliper readings from their waists equaled that of much thinner people; yet their stomachs hung out so far it made them appear more obese than they actually were.

Several years later, when I began working with bodybuilders and power lifters this same problem surfaced.  A power lifter would come into my office looking very heavily muscled everywhere except his mid-section.  I was shocked to see the mid-sections of athletic people resembling the mid-sections of the obese.  It wasn't unusual to see a power lifter sporting a six-pack of abdominals with a 38-40 inch waist.  When I took caliper readings around their mid-sections, the numbers would be very low, yet their bellies stuck straight out.  Furthermore, when I pushed on their abdominal wall, their stomachs were hard as a rock.  When they dieted down, the protrusion remained, even though they had a low percentage in their body fat measurement.  It wasn't just the power lifters that had this problem.  I began to see more and more bodybuilders exhibiting this same dilemma.

  With all my clients, the first thing I do is record their current eating patterns.  This allows me to analyze the problem areas and to gain an understanding of where they are with their current knowledge of nutrition.  Then I record their body fat.  After several years of collecting data on each person's eating habits and skin folds, one correlation between the obese subjects and the power lifters began to emerge.  They both ate large quantities of food late at night, usually high in fat and typically right before bed.  The pattern seemed to be the same in almost every instance.  On the one hand, the person either skipped meals and ingested a very large amount of food at dinner or would ingest large amounts of high fat food at every meal.

What is commonly referred to as a pot belly is actually abdominal distension.  Abdominal distension is caused by over-loading your intestinal system with large volumes of food, then sitting down or lying down, thereby allowing the stomach muscles to relax.  When repeated often, this process will lead to a permanent protrusion that is almost impossible to change. (Notice that I said "almost").  Just think about the truck driver that drives for long hours and then finally pulls into the greasy spoon diner.  He crams down a large fatty meal like chicken fried steak, mashed potatoes with gravy, butter covered veggies and follows it with a piece of apple pie.  Then, off he goes into the wild blue yonder sitting for several hours while his belly relaxes on his lap.

Many power lifters or bodybuilders create their abdominal distention by simply overeating in an attempt to gain weight.  Heavy late night meals coupled with high calorie meals during the day almost always leads to abdominal distension.  And it's not just men that develop distensions.  Women can get them just as easily.  The degree to which a person experiences this distension depends on several factors.

 In the case of the weightlifters, there seems to be another element playing a role in the girth of their mid-sections.  It's called heavy squatting.  To make matters worse, squatting following a heavy meal seems to play an equal role in how big the pot belly becomes.  Imagine a weight lifter eating a high fat lunch or dinner, then a few short hours later loading up the squat bar.  The internal force and pressure created by the heavy meal in the intestinal tract, coupled with the force and pressure of the squat, shoves the abdominal cavity outward causing the distension.  Squatting is not the only exercise that contributes to this condition.  Any heavy exercise performed after a large meal can lead to distention particularly if done while holding your breath.

The third component responsible for the abdominal distension is visceral fat.  Visceral fat accumulates around the internal organs, in this case around the intestines, and causes the internal space to increase in size.  As the internal fat deposits increase, so does the internal space needed to house the extra fat.  During autopsies, researchers note an abnormally large amount of fat accumulating around all organs of obese subjects.  As the fat cells located on the external portion of the body become filled, the body will begin storing fat internally as well.  This explains why very obese people appear to possess an abnormally large amount of lean body mass when measured for body composition.  On the one hand, they do have more muscle.  After all, how else would they be able to carry all the excess weight?  Their bodies respond to the extra weight by increasing muscle mass.  Just look at an obese person's calves: they're usually huge!  While some of the increased lean body mass is muscle, most of it is internal fat which is impossible to measure with calipers.  The tendency for some people to store large amounts of fat around their internal organs appears to be genetic.

 Another aspect that contributes to abdominal distension is the use of anabolic steroids.  A frequent comment made by bodybuilders once they quit using steroids is how much smaller their waistlines become.  A steroid user will generally notice a drop in waist girth about six months after cessation of the drugs.  Why?  Steroids exert their effect in two different ways.  First, steroids are somewhat indiscriminate; they don't just make your biceps bigger.  Organs are muscles too.  Steroids exert a similar, growth promoting effect on your heart, stomach, intestines, etc.  How much, what kind, and how long a person uses the steroids determines the extent of the distension they may experience.  When a bodybuilder quits using the anabolic steroids, he notices that his muscles lose their fullness, his strength goes down and the pump he once furnished while blow drying his hair also fades.  In addition, just as the glory muscles diminish in size upon the cessation of steroids, the internal organs will also decrease in size.  There has been some suggestion that steroids may also contribute to a greater amount of visceral fat accumulating around the organs.  To my knowledge, no study has ever been done to prove this, yet it does make sense.  Just look at the protruding bellies that grace the Mr. Olympia stage.

Now that I've explained what abdominal distention is, let's look at what can be done to get rid of it.  The first thing you should do is adjust your dietary program.  Try eating evenly balanced, smaller meals spread throughout the day and keep each meal low in fat.  Avoid eating large quantities of food late at night.  If your last meal tends to be high in fat and calories, adjust it by lowering the fat and pull back on the carbohydrates.

 Pay attention to your posture.  In most cases the pot belly is a lazy stomach.  The person has simply allowed the stomach wall to relax and has never bothered to hold it in and stand upright.  Think about it, anyone with a flat stomach can relax their stomach enough to look pregnant.  Many people that have protruding stomachs also have weak lower back muscles and are subject to more back injuries and chronic pain due to their poor posture.  As the stomach wall pulls forward, the lower back gets pulled inward as well.  To compensate, the person usually tends to roll their shoulders forward.  This poor posture leads to more strain on the lower back.

 Don't eat a meal and go directly to the gym.  Give your food time to digest before working out.  Remember to breathe during each exercise.  This is particularly important when squatting; doing leg presses, and bent over rows.  Focus on abdominal work as well as hyperextensions for your lower back.  These will improve your posture.  And of course, pay closer attention to standing-up straight.

Once you have a distended abdominal cavity you'll always have a wider girth than everyone else.  You may be able to lose some size in your mid-section, but don't set unrealistic expectations and think you'll have a really flat stomach.  Perhaps the most important thing you can do is prevent it from happening in the first place.  Avoid the mega calorie approach to gaining weight.

Finally, if you suffer from abdominal distention, you will need to focus on more aerobic activity.  If you are really serious about getting rid of your midsection, you have to build-up to an aerobic program that consists of five sessions a week and lasts for at least 45 minutes.  The increased aerobics is the only way that I know of to get rid of the internal fat that is stored around your intestines.  In fact, if you can eventually build up to a slow jog, five days a week, you will be amazed at how many inches will drop from your waist line.