Honed and toned legs?

[Bidenfairy]

If you’re prone to big thighs how did you slim and tone them?

[quote LeGrandBleu]@ArtieFufkinPolymerRecords
or a handful of berries as a snack instead, you will lose weight no no no.... you misunderstood, I am not talking about snack, but breakfast.
We do not snack. Ever. We don't carry food in our handbag, or car, or eat while walking or in front of the tv. It is not so much what we eat at meals time but what happens in between.
The kiwi and raspberries was breakfast!

I know it sounds stupid, eat better and eat less, but many will justify greasy bacon or a cheesy (not even real cheese but processed) fatty burger, or even the bacon with the cheese on a bun-less burger, on some book writer and theory that eating fat will make you slim.

I am older (in my 50s) and when I was in my 20s or 30s you didn't have these battles between nutrients. When the jeans was tight or the zip on a skirt struggled to come up, you did a week of tomates-concombres (tomatoes-cucumber) , and when they felt right again, you were back to normal eating . But our normal eating doesn't include crisps or chocolate biscuits, because they are not normal for adults.[/quote]
@LeGrandBleu, I found your posts interesting, thank you! Can you clarify the tomato, cucumber week? Is that replacing some meals or all of the meals with this?

And do French children generally eat foods like crisps/chocolate biscuits/processed stuff? If so, how do they stop eating it when they're adult if they are used to eating them?

Running has totally changed the shape of my body. I have never been overweight, or big, but my legs and bum are extremely toned (previously I had a flat bum!) along with my arms and abs. My body fat % is fairly low due to being a frequent (sometimes long) distance runner. I probably average about 20 miles a week. As PPs have said increasing distance and speed will help.

@Stumpedasatree French kids do not eat crisps as part of meals nor as snack. Crips are considered a party food or an apéro food. Crisps belong to the "cochonneries" category, crap and junk.
We do have biscuits of course, but children will only have them at 4pm for what is called the "4 o'clock" , le quatre heures, the afternoon snack after school.
Kids will either buy something at a bakery on the way back to school or have a couple of biscuits at the kitchen table before starting homeworks, and that's it, nothing till dinner around 7.30 . From the age around 14/15 , kids won't snack anymore because this is what young kids do and it is not cool.

I now live in Australie, and it is fascinating to compare. In France, go into any playground in the morning, not a single kid will have anything to eat. They play then go home for a real lunch , not a sandwich. Sandwiches are for travel and car journey when you don't have access to food. No parents gives a sandwich for lunch in a home , it is breakfast, la tartine.

Here food is everywhere, all day long. Well, can't really call it food, it is mainly cochonnerie.

The cucumber -tomatoes is what you have for a week until you drop your dress size. As many cucumber and tomatoes as you want with chopped onion if you like them, chopped parsley or basil, but only 1 table spoon of olive oil and again vinegar to your taste. (first slice the tomatoes, sprinkle salt, then the oil, add the onion and herbs, wait 10 min while you peel the cucumber and slice it, then the tomatoes will have juiced.) and you have that lunch and dinner . Or if winter, leeks soup or similar light veggie.

Totally disordered eating for a week, but it is when you feel the clothes get tight, we don't buy a size up, we eat less. IT might also be that we don't wear stretchy clothes or active wear, so you can't escape the trouser button or the skirt zip.

The diet you are describing doesn't sound like healthy eating to nourish a strong body though, rather it is restrictive eating to acquire/maintain thinness.
You are coming across as quite sneery about Australians (and presumably Brits) for putting 'crap' foods into their bodies, but French adults smoke far more, so hardly the healthiest specimens.

Sorry @ArtieFufkinPolymerRecords if I have hit a nerve and apologies if you are Australian and I have hurt you.

Nah, you’re right LeGrandBleu, there’s food everywhere here and my children’s love of snack drives me mad. I would love snacking to become uncool here too!!

@LeGrandBleu

Sorry *@ArtieFufkinPolymerRecords* if I have hit a nerve and apologies if you are Australian and I have hurt you.

Not at all. I’m neither Australian, nor hurt by your comments, just commenting that you come across as seeing French people as superior in some way, because of their diet.

If the French diet is in any way superior, inferior or equal to the Australian one and which impact it has on the population is absolutely open for debate, but not in a discussion about honed and toned legs.

Your only contribution in this discussion has been to pick at me. Repeatedly.

My point to the OP was that in addition to exercise, attention needed to be given to the diet. We are what we eat, increasing the greens, blah blah , all the common sense we all possess but fail to apply, possibly because of wrong habits embedded since childhood (weaning babies on crips and puffs ? ) and hard to shake off.

To those saying barre - what is that exactly? Can you do it at home?

I think is ballet?

Barre is one of the best forms of exercise you can do. I’m currently doing my classes by Zoom. They are also on YouTube.

Barre class is a workout technique inspired by elements of ballet, yoga, and Pilates. It focuses on low-impact, high-intensity movements designed to strengthen your body in ways that few other workouts can.

Thanks! Any recommendations for youtube barre videos gratefully received!

On YouTube POPSUGAR Fitness are good, some are only 10 minutes long so easier to fit into your day although sometimes 10 minutes of Barre is enough!

@parker231 Thanks. I'll check that out.

What do you use for a barre though?? Surely you need an actual ledge to hold/rest your foot on? I want to try it!!!

Barre, barre and more barre!

But with.proper form. Check out 1sculpt on Instagram

The New York City ballet produced a workout a long time ago

but I prefer real time barre work like the first 30 min of Royal ballet

For a barre at home a chair is fine as you can see in these videos (in French sorry)
She has a lot of pointes videos as well which one can do in relevé (lifting heels from ground) .
A lot of the ballet dancers shaping comes from lifting a leg, because it takes a lot of strength to lift it up (not kicking it) and keep it up.
Another advance of ballet videos are the jumps.

Have fun

Oh I'm definitely trying this! I am the least graceful person ever but I've always fancied myself as a ballerina 😆 I run a lot so my muscles are wide and short, I like the idea of long toned muscle. I did yoga every day during lockdown and I walked so much taller and moved so much more fluidly. I have fallen out of the habit since normality resumed.

Weight training and LOTS of spin classes did it for me.
Can't do the spin now because covid but lots of weighted squats and other body weight exercises.
The Women's Health magazine website has loads of targeted workouts that you can do at home with no equipment

I’ve been enjoying the barre classes on Les mills on demand as a total novice. That’s absolutely killer for legs.

I now live in Australie, and it is fascinating to compare. In France, go into any playground in the morning, not a single kid will have anything to eat. They play then go home for a real lunch , not a sandwich. Sandwiches are for travel and car journey when you don't have access to food. No parents gives a sandwich for lunch in a home , it is breakfast, la tartine..... Here food is everywhere, all day long. Well, can't really call it food, it is mainly cochonnerie.

Tbh, neither kind of national diet sounds particularly healthy. And as official statistics show half of all French people are overweight with 1 in 5, of total population, being obese, the end result shows that it's not necessarily great. There is no one special way to eat healthily apart from focussing on your nutritional needs and keeping your intake of processed foods, especially processed sugars, low enough that it doesn't mess up your relationship with your appetite. I know for me that I went through a period or real sugar addiction where I constantly mistook sugar cravings for hunger. When I quit processed sugar, I learned to understand when I was actually hungry again, and how I ate changed drastically.

The ultimate key to honed, toned legs is to lose any excess bodyweight. Even with a BMI in the healthy range, you may still be carrying too much fat for you personally. The second is exercise to build muscle in the legs, running, cycling, long distance skating, dance etc will all help with this. And the third is to build flexibility and strength in a range of motion. Exercises designed for ballet dancers really are great for the latter.

And lastly, even with well built, strong flexible legs and a diet that keeps away excess body fat, you have to accept that you have a natural bodyshape and your legs can only ever look their best within that shape. I have short legs, wide hips and naturally strong, muscular thighs. I'll never have long, honed, gazelle like legs. Unless I ever end up severely under-weight, I will always have "thick" thighs and even fairly pronounced calf muscles. So it's important to know what's natural for your body to look like at it's best and pursue that, rather than have ideal that isn't right for your shape.

Is anybody else trying this barre class? I’m going to give it a shot !

Hi Ladies

The best exercises for toning is the one that you enjoy / love and want to keep doing. So keep it fun for you.

If you are focused on burning calories then using strength training increases your muscle mass which in turn increases your basal metabolic rate (resting metabolism) when you are doing nothing. Your body uses energy in 3 ways: Resting metabolism, breaking down food and physical activity.

So with increased muscle mass your body burns more energy to function when you are sat around doing nothing, whilst physical activity is only about 10 - 30% of your today daily energy expenditure. Resting metabolism is approx anywhere up to 60 - 80% of your TDEE.

However whichever exercise you pick it is going to be great for your health! Whether bones, heart, lungs or mental health.

sorry this is rushed - I am between clients at the moment and had 5 mins free. Good Luck :)