"Love handles" are those bits of flab that sit just above the waistline, usually on or above the hips. Genetics and hormones do play a part in where you store your fatty deposits, however the presence of abdominal fat such as love handles, muffin tops and/or beer guts tends to indicate you are carrying too much body fat than is considered healthy.

Spot reduction of specific areas of fat, such as abdominal fat or love handles cannot be achieved. To reduce abdominal fat or love handles your body needs to create a way to use the fat stores as energy.

Converting abdominal fat into energy for use by the body occurs when we use a combination of cardiovascular exercise at the correct level or intensity combined with time. However, this on its own is not enough to guarantee our bodies use our abdominal fat stores first.

To obtain an overall reduction in size, and slimming the hips by reducing the size of our love handles means combining good nutrition, sufficient cardiovascular exercise and some weight bearing exercise (such as weight training) to allow our bodies to use the abdominal fat for energy. There is an additional benefit when combined with strength training as it helps to sculpt our body's shape and improve skin texture.