45 Best Body Secrets

If you exercise or engage in any activity that makes you sweat, you need to drink extra water to compensate for the fluid loss. Drink an extra 400 to 600 milliliters of water for short bouts of exercise. During long bouts of intense exercise, it's best to use a sports drink that contains sodium, as this will help replace sodium lost in sweat. Continue to replace fluids after you're finished exercising!

Read up on why you shouldn’t use thirst as a guide for how often you should be drinking water.

Log off to get a better night's rest. The brightness of your computer screen stimulates the brain. Plus, it's difficult for your mind to stop fretting about your digital to-do list, even once you've logged off. Avoid late-night surfing and shut down your computer. Give yourself time to wind down without any electronics.

An estimated 65% of Americans said they encounter sleep problems a few nights each week — keep reading for more tips on getting the most out of your beauty rest.

Take a rest from Facebook-stalking your ex, and try your hand at Bejeweled 2 instead: A recent survey by PopCap Games found that 90 percent of female gamers considered puzzles and online word games a stress-reliever.

Blow off some steam with a game of solitaire, backgammon, or sudoku.

Research has shown that people who eat nut butters often weigh less than those who shun them. It's likely that the combination of protein, fat, and fiber keeps you full, so you'll eat less overall. Whole nuts are effective, too: Purdue University researchers found that people who added peanuts to their diet for 19 weeks boosted the amount of calories they burned at rest by 11 percent. Why? The unsaturated fat in peanuts and nut butters burns faster than other fats.

The ideal amount of nut butters in your diet and how to incorporate them in your meals.

The rower isn't a wimpy workout if you know how to use it right. Maximize the least-used machine at the gym and get sculpted arms, abs, and back muscles. The trick: After you pull the handle toward you, straighten your arms before you bend your knees.

Workout star Jackie Warner's tips for a smarter workout.

After the age of 30, your metabolic rate slows down and you lose bone density. This exercise can help reverse the effects of aging: Lay your forearm down on a countertop or other flat surface, and bring one leg up behind you, squeezing in your abdominals. Do 30 leg lifts to the side, and then 30 to the back.

Learn how to get your best butt yet with this simple and fun exercise.

Make the most of your workout: Have about 100 calories at least 15 minutes before your workout (try a banana or half of an energy bar). Then have a good breakfast afterward, making sure you get protein, carbs, and fat. (Good combos: fruit and cottage cheese; toast and peanut butter; protein-rich cereal with milk.) The key is not to eat more than usual, but to redistribute more calories to the early part of the day.

Celebrity trainer Tracey Anderson tells you the foods that will help you lose weight.

A wobbly surface like a stability ball makes you recruit more muscle, so you get more from your crunches. With your back on the ball, keep feet flat on the floor, knees bent. Place your hands behind your head. Contract your abs, lifting your shoulder blades and upper back off the ball. DO: Two sets of 20 repetitions, two to three times a week.

A flat stomach is as much about having a low percentage of body fat as it is about having lots of muscle tone. These five moves help you achieve both.

Bacon won't ever win any health prizes — in fact, nutritionists consider it a fat (and not a healthy fat!), as opposed to a meat. But it's not as bad as you might think. One slice, about 1 1/2 tablespoons crumbled, has about the same amount of fat as 2 tablespoons of feta or shredded cheese or 1 tablespoon of sunflower seeds.

It's not just the bacon. Many diet nightmares can be traced to the seemingly virtuous salad.

People who wear casual shoes burn more calories in a day than people who dress up, according to a recent study by the American Council on Exercise. Wearing comfortable shoes daily could burn an extra 6500 calories a year, thanks to the extra walking you'll do, says study author Katie Zahour, M.S., a clinical exercise psychologist at the Southwest Florida Heart Group.

Two more surprising things that make you fat.

To firm up the muscles beneath your love handles — known as the external obliques — try the Pilates "100s." This exercise was found to challenge more overall muscle in one shot (specifically, the muscles spanning the waist) than traditional crunches. To do the 100s, sit on a mat and make a V with your body (your butt forms the bottom of the V). Reach your hands past your knees, arms parallel to the floor. Pump your arms up and down 100 times, inhaling and exhaling every five counts.

Nine more shortcuts to sexy abs.

Colorful, all-vegetable salads offer good-for-you phytonutrients that aren't available in greens. For instance, powerful antioxidants (anthocyanins) in purplish vegetables such as eggplant help reduce heart-disease risk and improve brain function. Radishes offer cancer-fighting indoles; red tomatoes are the ultimate in lycopene, linked to lower risk of heart disease and cancer.

Is your salad less healthy than you think? Keep reading to find out if your salad needs a slimdown.

For strong biceps and a beautiful back, try this: Grab a pair of 5- or 8-pound weights. Start by standing with feet shoulder-width apart and your abs pulled in. Start bringing the weights up to your shoulder and then slowly lower them down. Do these biceps curls for 30 to 60 seconds, until you feel an intense burn. Then stand with feet a little wider apart than hips, bend your knees, and bring your torso down toward the floor about 45 degrees. Bring weights all the way to your rib cage, and then extend forward, for 30 to 60 reps.

Learn more moves for a strong and beautiful upper body with our step-by-step fitness videos.

Slow down at dinner — the longer you take to eat, the sooner you'll feel full. And focus on whole grains. It takes more white rice than brown to make you feel just as satisfied. That's because white rice contains no fiber, a food component that helps you feel full.

Swap out your sugar-free hot chocolate and 1 percent cottage cheese for these healthier picks instead.

On its own, your body is naturally conservative when you ask it to do something. If you lift a weight, your body recruits just enough muscle to do it safely, but not necessarily heroically. So when you want to outperform yourself, "you have to fool the body into recruiting more muscle," says Bobby McGee, a sports psychologist and running coach, which you can do with your mind. If you think you can't run a seven-minute mile, for instance, your body begins to switch off muscle, leaving you weak and fatigued. But if you think positively, your body will recruit more muscle to do it.

Your body won't stay strong and lean unless your mind tells it to. Our three-part plan puts all the pieces together.

All lettuce is not created equal. Arugula and watercress are superstars, loaded with cancer-fighting compounds. Spinach is another hero because of its cache of lutein, thought to protect against cancer and blindness. And baby versions of kale, mustard greens, and turnip greens are less sharp, tough, and bitter than the grown-ups but are outfitted with the same cancer-fighters. Dark-leaf, mild-tasting greens, including romaine, red-leaf lettuce, and many mesclun mixes, don't have a wealth of phytonutrients but have respectable levels of beta-carotene. Light greens, like iceberg and endive, are pretty much nutrition duds.

Fine-tune your food plan so that you also maximize your energy, mental clarity, and muscle mass.