for your
health
Hello muscle,
goodbye fat
Shrink your waist for a healthier you
By Jorge Cruise
IF YOU’RE LIKE MILLIONS of other people,
I bet there’s one thing that has eluded you for
years: a flat belly. While we all want a trim
waistline because it looks good on the beach,
the quest shouldn’t be just about vanity.
Excess abdominal fat has been linked to serious health issues, such as type 2 diabetes, high
blood pressure, heart disease, cancer and
strokes. If you can get rid of belly fat, you can
reduce the risks of developing those mala-dies—and improve your overall health.
You’re probably thinking, “OK, but how
do I find enough time in my busy life to get a
flat belly?” The answer is a new exercise
method I developed called the 12-Second
Sequence™. Here’s a sneak preview.
Replacing fat with muscle
Your first goal should be to replace fat in
your body with lean muscle tissue. Why? Fat
is considered a “lazy” tissue because it uses
very little energy.
Muscle, on the other hand, is the most
metabolically active tissue in your body. The
more lean muscle tissue you have, the higher
your resting metabolism.
And here’s the good news: As you add lean
muscle tissue, you increase your resting
metabolism and burn more calories, even
while doing nothing at all! This includes burning fat in places like your belly. How do you
build lean muscle? It’s easier than you think.
How it’s done
The 12-Second Sequence will help you
shrink your waist in two weeks—all in just 20
minutes, twice a week. How does it work? It
combines proven resistance-training techniques to create a revolutionary method to help
you effectively and efficiently build new lean
muscle. Using what I call Controlled Tension™,
the 12-Second Sequence engages all of your
muscle fiber types when you work out.
The only way to create new fat-burning
lean muscle tissue is to fatigue all three different fiber types of skeletal muscle—achieving
what’s called full muscle saturation. When you
fully saturate muscle tissue, you create denser,
stronger muscle that increases your metabolism and gives you a firm, toned body.
Controlled Tension consists of two techniques: slow cadence lifting and static contraction. With slow cadence lifting, an exercise
movement is slowed to a 10-second count,
allowing you to complete an exercise with a
controlled, fluid movement. This technique
creates less stress on joints while increasing
lean muscle tissue faster than traditional resistance training methods.
Static contraction also helps you reach
full muscle saturation—not by working
harder, but by working smarter. It is based
on a “static,” or motionless, hold at a strategic point in an exercise movement—
referred to as the maximum tension point,
or MTP, with this program. This point is
simply the one that creates the most stress
on your muscle.
When you combine slow cadence lifting for
10 seconds with a “static” two-second hold, you
achieve Controlled Tension, the key element to
creating results with the 12-Second Sequence.
Attacking the abs
THE BICYCLE CRUNCH is a great exercise to at
tack
a big belly. Here’s how it works.
Lie flat on your back. Place your hands behind
your head and raise your heels about 2 inches from
the ground, keeping your chin up and abs tight
throughout the exercise. Bring your right elbow to
your left knee and feather your breathing (take a
deep breath and follow with short controlled
exhaled bursts; repeat throughout exercise) as you
rotate to the other side for a count of 10 seconds.
Hold and squeeze for 2 seconds at the maximum
tension point (where your left elbow meets your
right knee). Lower to starting position through a
count of 10 seconds. Without resting, repeat three
times.—JC
JORGECRUISE.COM, INC.
58 The Costco Connection JANUARY 2008
JORGECRUISE. COM, INC.
The Costco
Connection
The 12 Second Sequence
is available at most Costco
warehouse locations and
on costco.com. Also avail-
able is The 12 Second Sequence Workout
DVD Kit in the warehouses and online.
Circuit training for the whole body
The last component is the bonus part of
this program: circuit training. Circuit training
is when several exercises are arranged in order
and done consecutively without any rest. It
allows you to get a full-body workout in a compressed amount of time. Plus, it adds a fundamental cardio element, which keeps your heart
rate up and helps you burn more calories.
My firm belief is that you will experience
benefits from the 12-Second Sequence almost
immediately. Within the first week, you will
notice increased energy and your muscles will
feel more fatigued faster than with other exercise programs. After two weeks, you will
notice your waist shrinking and your pants
will start to feel a little baggy—a result of lean
muscle tissue sculpting and toning your body
and replacing bulky fat tissue. Complete the
eight weeks of the program and you will be in
your best shape ever. C
Jorge Cruise is the author of The 12 Second
Sequence and the New York Times bestsellers
8 Minutes in the Morning and The 3-Hour
Diet. See more at
www.12Second.com.