Flex Belt Review

On my about me page I wrote that I lost 25 pounds and was down to 165lbs and approximately 15% body fat, but that was three years ago. I went on a bulking phase, got up to 200lbs (the heaviest in my life) and about 19.9% bodyfat. Yikes!

Even though some of the weight gain was muscle (I even was told I look like I gained muscle) enough of the weight gain was fat especially around my mid section.

I'm predominately an endomorph, so it seems any extra calories I eat gets stored as fat and at my age (48) it's getting harder and harder to lose weight……SO NO MORE BULKING FOR ME!

Whatever muscle is under this layer of fat is what Mother Nature gave me, so now I want to see it!

My plan is to do three full body workouts per week, along with three cardio sessions and one rest day. Of course I’m cutting my calories below maintenance, and definitely watching the carbs.

I want to see abs for the first time in my life. (I caught a glimpse of them around age 18).

I also plan on doing NO DIRECT AB WORK. You indirectly work your abs with exercises such as the front squat, but I’m not doing any exercise directly hitting the abs like crunches, knee raises etc.

Why no direct ab work? I want to put the Ab Belt by Flex Belt to the test. Yes, I know it’s one of those gimmicky ab things, but the Flex Belt is not a gimmick – it is 100% medical science. It is the first EMS (Electric Muscle Stimulation) product of its kind cleared by the FDA as a class II medical device for direct to consumer sales.

The technology used in the Flex Belt Belts has been clinically demonstrated. An 8-week clinical study showed:

1.4 inch (3.5cm) average waist reduction
49% increase in abdominal strength
72% increase in sit-up performance

100% of subjects reported firmer and flatter abdomens

The makers of The Flex Belt are a medical device company headquartered in Galway, Ireland with 40 years of expertise designing, manufacturing and marketing EMS devices for medical and consumer use. Their EMS medical devices are used and prescribed in 5000 clinics worldwide.

The Flex Belt website claims you can get an effective abdominal workout that targets all the muscles in your abdomen – all in just 30 minutes a day – while watching TV, sitting at your desk, cutting the grass or even lying down in bed!

Signals from the ab belt reach out to nerves where they are most concentrated. These nerves branch out to reach all the abdominal muscles (not just those under the pads) causing them to relax and contract naturally, working all the muscles at the same time.

I plan on putting it to the test.

Here’s the Flex Belt out of the box:

The package includes:

The Flex Belt® and Gel Pads designed for both men and women and fits waist sizes 24" – 47"
The Rechargeable Power Supply Unit
A belt extension for those with a waist over 44 inches
An Instruction Manual
Carrying Bag

Flex Belt Review: First Use

The Flex Belt comes with a 22 page instruction manual (with really small type). The first two pages have nothing but warnings and precautions because after all it is an electrical muscle stimulator so you can’t use it if you have a pacemaker or any form of abdominal implant or are pregnant (wait until the kid is out before you shock them, it’s funnier! Kidding ;-)

First you need to charge the batteries which the instructions say take 2-3 hours. You’ll know when the charge is finished when three bars on the control unit are full. Well after 3.5 hours the bars were still not full and I thought "great I got a defective one". I unplugged the charger from the wall and then the control unit displayed three full bars, OK.

You need to place three gel pads on the belt. The gel pads are medical-grade devices but feel wet and very sticky. These pads must be in contact with your skin so that signal can be sent to your muscles.

You then connect the control unit to the belt and you’re ready to go.

To be quite honest I wasn't expecting much from this device; but it comes with a sixty day money back guarantee, so I put the belt on and sat down to watch a hockey game (Blackhawks all the way baby!)

As soon as you turn it on it's automatically set to the easiest program. You control the intensity with two buttons, one for the left side/right side of the belt (why you would need varying intensities is beyond me). I didn't feel anything until around the intensity level of 11. Felt like a pulsing sensation followed by the tightening of the abdominal muscles.

The instruction manual says you should aim for an intensity level of 25 on your first workout (the belt goes up to a level of 150), so I cranked up to 25, not too much stimulation, just a pulsing sensation. Once I reached level 40 I could feel and see my abs contract…COOL!

I made it up to level 51 in my first workout. I don’t want to say it was painful, but I was a bit apprehensive between contractions.

Now I know what pregnancy contractions feel like ladies, you hold your breath waiting for the next one!

And guess what, the next morning I was sore! Damn thing really works!

The Flex Belt plan calls for you to use the belt 5 times per week and record the intensity level you reached. Use the strongest training intensity you can – the harder you work your muscles, the better the results you will see.

Of course you could use the Flex Belt for months and see zero results if you fail to get you’re eating habits under control. Surprisingly the instruction manual barely mentions diet; it only states "Improve your diet and try to increase the amount of exercise you do".

Conclusion

Will the flex belt finally reveal my abs? Only time and strict calorie reduction will tell. All I know is that my abs were sore the next morning and all I did was wear a belt and watch a hockey game!

There are some impressive (and not so impressive) testimonials/transformations on the Flex Belt site. I hope to be one of them sometime in the near future.

Check out the Flex Belt Here

Need a Flex Belt Coupon Code? These codes were set up for the readers of this site, one for 10% off and one for FREE shipping: FLEX10OFF or FLEXFREESHIP. Enter one of these codes into the promocode box on the Flex Belt order page