If your body type can best be described as "thin waist, thick thighs," then you probably want to know how you can lean out your thighs. Keep in mind that you may never have the super-thin legs of a supermodel, and your body shape may always lean toward "pear," but that doesn't mean you can't tone up and lose some girth around your legs.
Losing Size in Your Thighs
Whenever you're trying to lose weight from any area of your body, you'll need to increase the amount of cardiovascular exercise that you're performing. Cardio blasts calories and keeps your metabolism revving for hours post-workout. This increased calorie burn will contribute to full-body weight loss, including the stubborn fat on your thighs. Remember that if you're naturally a pear-shaped woman, the fat around your thighs may be more stubborn than the fat in other areas of your body. Just keep at it and eventually you'll see a difference.
Choosing Cardio
When choosing cardiovascular exercise, choose exercises that will tone your thighs, like walking, running, stair-stepping or cycling. You may think that as you add muscle to your legs, your thighs will get bulkier if you perform these types of exercises. While that may be true in the short-term, as you start losing fat from your thighs, your legs will actually lean out, and that extra muscle that you've developed will just look toned and fabulous, not bulky and big. Aim to perform between 30 and 60 minutes of cardio on most days of the week to achieve fat loss and to improve your overall fitness.
Lifting Weights
Lifting weights will help you add muscle to your frame which will help you burn calories throughout the day, leading to further weight loss. Plus, you want your legs to look strong and healthy, and lifting weights will help you achieve that goal. To tone your thighs, choose exercises that target the major muscle groups of your legs and perform several sets of each exercise using a lighter weight. For instance, you could perform the following four exercises back-to-back as a superset to trim your thighs:
- Dumbbell squats: Hold a dumbbell in each hand and perform squat exercise reps for one minute.
- Dumbbell walking lunge: Hold a dumbbell in each hand and perform a walking lunge for one minute.
- Wide-leg plie squat: Hold a single dumbbell between your hands, spread your legs wide and perform a series of plie squats for one minute.
- Dumbbell dead lift: Hold a dumbbell in each hand and perform dead lift reps for one minute.
After performing a superset that targets the major muscle groups of your legs, you could add exercises that target each individual muscle group of your thighs. For instance, you could target your quadriceps with a leg extension, your hamstrings with a leg curl, and your inner and outer thighs with an adductor and abductor exercise.
Balancing Out Your Upper Body
Most pear-shaped women who have the "thin waist, thick thighs" build often have a smaller upper body. To balance out your thicker thighs, make sure you also perform weight training exercises to build muscle in your upper body. Unlike the exercises you perform when you target your lower body, you'll want to choose heavier weights and perform fewer repetitions when lifting your upper body. This will help you develop muscle mass, and as your thighs lean out, your body will start to look more proportionate.
Making "Thin Waist, Thick Thighs" Work
As you morph your body into the shape you always wanted, make sure you're also dressing in a way that will make your thighs look leaner. Choose solid colors on your bottom half and tops that draw the eye toward your neckline and face. You can also balance out a wider lower-half with cardigans or jackets that offer a puffed sleeve or an interesting collar. Even the best exercise program takes time, so give yourself a leg-up and make people think your thighs are leaner as you work to make it a reality.
