Does the Ab Roller Burn Love Handles?

If you've incorporated an ab roller into your workouts, you likely have a love-hate relationship with the device. Although it provides a difficult workout that's tough to master, it also helps to strengthen your body. It's not, however, an effective way to burn off your love handles, as any form of spot reduction is a myth. However, a combination of aerobic exercise and your ab roller workout can help you lose your extra fat and tone your body.

  1. Ab Roller Workouts

    • The ab roller, which people often call the ab wheel, is a simple device that's a staple at many gyms. Although this piece of equipment varies by manufacturer, it typically features a wheel with a handle on each side. To perform an ab wheel rollout, kneel on the floor and hold the ab roller in front of your knees. With your core tight, push the wheel away from you as far as possible, and then return to the starting position to complete a full rep.

    Burning Love Handles

    • Contrary to the claims that can circulate around gyms and are prevalent on television, it's impossible to burn fat from a specific part of your body. This myth is called spot reduction. When you burn calories through exercise, the fat loss occurs throughout your body. Although ab wheel rollouts provide a challenging workout for your core, they don't target love handle fat, nor do they burn calories at a high enough rate to burn a significant amount of fat throughout your body. According to the American Council on Exercise, ab roller exercises are comparable to crunches in terms of effectiveness. HealthStatus notes that a 155-pound person will burn just 158 calories in 30 minutes of crunches.

    Aerobic Exercise

    • Aerobic exercise is an effective way to burn calories to reduce your love handles and eliminate other fat deposits throughout your body. Aerobic exercise takes many forms, but the common factor is that you're using multiple major muscle groups and moving in a continuous rhythm. Examples of this type of exercise are walking, jogging, swimming, skating, cross-country skiing, cycling and using exercise machines such as the elliptical trainer. You'll often burn several hundred calories in a single aerobic workout. For example, a 155-pound person who spends 30 minutes jogging at 6 mph will burn 372 calories.

    Ab Roller Muscles

    • By combining aerobic and ab roller exercises, you can burn away your love handles and have strong core muscles that will eventually become visible once you lose enough fat. Although ab wheel rollouts specifically target your hip flexors, this exercise hits a long list of muscles, including your rectus abdominis and obliques, which are located on the front and sides, respectively, of your torso.