Its three o'clock in the morning and you can not seem to sleep. So you turn on the TV and see an infomercial for some fitness equipment. You might be seeing a celebrity who you know and like endorsing the product. Or, you will see unbelievable before and after photos of people who like you struggled with getting fit. You see women who have struggled with weight all their life, or have recently had children and can't seem to get fit again. These commercials make promises that you too can lose weight without doing any work by buying the product. But do these products work or are they preying on you and your struggles?

One of the most played infomercials you might see are for Electrical Muscle Stimulators (EMS) these are the commercials that show women and men with rock hard abs and give the impression that you can lay out in the sun all day wearing an EMS around your abs and in no time, you too will have flat, hard rock abs. Guess what, there is no evidence that EMS will improve strength or weight loss and to say that you can flatten your abs without any exercise is simply not true.

You will also see infomercials for fitness products that promise you results by working out for three minutes a day. The truth is, there is just no way you can lose weight with only three minutes of activity a day. Recent studies have shown that you have to exercise for at least 45 minutes a day to burn fat. Some studies even recommend that you double that amount to at least 90 minutes.

Perhaps one of the biggest infomercial scams has to do with abs machines. There is not a woman out there who has not wished they had the rock hard abs they see on celebrities and models. Due to this, there is an overwhelming amount of abs equipment on the market today and infomercials are taking full advantage of this and making empty promises. There is no way possible one machine would can get give you rock hard abs. Also look at how a lot of the machines are designed. A majority of them mimic the motions of crunches. Plus you can not tighten your abs alone with just doing one thing. Sure those machines might help build a lot of muscle, but you need to get rid of the layer of fat that is overlaying them. In order to do that you need to have a good cardio routine.

Not all infomercials are scams though. There is some really good as seen on TV fitness equipment, especially if you are tight on cash and want to have some fitness equipment. Some of the Elliptical trainers you will see will give you a good low impact cardio work out. Some of the weight training equipment will work good for you also.

A rule of thumb is to avoid anything that promises your pounds to melt away in just minutes a day. You can not lose weight in just minutes. No infomercial is going to give you the secret to getting fitness results. You already have the secret, do not let the infomercials tempt you with short cuts.

Copyright (c) 2007 Jess Harley