Pants to get muscles working overtime

ShãToBu Get Fit shapewear, from £24.95, mytights.com

THE CLAIM: Branded as ‘the workout you wear’, these control-top pants have in-built resistance bands so ‘muscles are made to work harder during everyday activities’.

Dr Denise Perron, a U.S. chiropractor, devised these on the principles of resistance training — making muscles work against an opposing force to give a toning effect. lifting a weight or stretching a resistance band causes minuscule, harmless tears in the muscles. as they repair, the muscles firm and strengthen, improving tone and increasing metabolic rate.

Studies by the University of Virginia published in the Obesity and Metabolism Journal in 2010 found that when women wore these, their energy expenditure increased by between 3 and 16 per cent after walking on a treadmill for 15 minutes. EXPERT VERDICT: ‘Wearing any kind of band around your legs will increase calorie expenditure, no doubt about it, but the amount will be very small,’ says Professor greg Whyte, a leading sport scientist and author of achieve The impossible. He questions the toning effect: ‘ You’re effectively putting a girdle around your core muscles — which might even be counter-productive by removing the need for your tummy muscles to work. Think of the muscle wastage people get from wearing a cast on a broken limb.’

He also questions if they’re suitable for those with high blood pressure and lymphatic problems, because increasing pressure on lower limbs could make these worse. The benefits may also reduce through washing and long-term wear because the fibres may degrade.