There are 5 main components of fitness. Each component is as important as the other; all components must be utilized in order to see maximum results.

#1: Food Intake
A healthy diet isn't about eating less, it's about eating smart and making healthy choices. Understanding what your body needs and learning how to eat better is extremely important when it comes to weight loss. A combination of education, moderation and the proper exercise regimen equals results.

#2: Cardio
Aerobic training and other cardio exercises help you maximize your results while boosting your calorie burn, heart function and immune system. By managing your workout frequency, intensity, time spent and type of exercise, you can hit your target heart rate and devise the perfect cardio plan.

#3: Vitamins and Supplements
Getting all the required vitamis for optimal health through your daily foods can be difficult. Taking proper Vitamins and supplements can help boost your overall health.

#4: Resistance
I am sure you have probably heard that the more muscle you have the more calories you will burn thought the day. This is absolutely true, building strong muscles through strength training will help you burn fat, increase your metabolism and maintain healthy bones. Using resistance training machines, free weights, cables, tubing and exercise balls are all great ways to build muscle.
  

#5: Professional Personal Training
Having a personal trainer help you combine the above 4 components and come up with an exercise and meal plan that is right for you is very important and can help you see results much more quickly.

Additional Fitness Tips

Choose weight bearing activities.
There is no best way to lose fat. Each person responds differently to a training program. However, activities that incorporate many muscle groups and are weight bearing - such as fast walking, running or cross-country skiing - use more calories per minute and are therefore better suited for fat loss than non-weight-bearing activities that do not use many muscles. 

Choose the right workout intensity.
Some people assume that low-intensity exercise is best for burning fat. During exercise at a very low intensity, fat does account for a higher percentage of the energy (calories) used, while at a moderate intensity, fat accounts for only about 50 percent of the energy. However the number of calories used per minute is much greater during a moderate to high-intensity workout than during a low-intensity workout of the same length. Therefore, the total number of calories burned is greater during the high-intensity workout, which means the number of fat calories burned is also greater. Because you can perform higher-intensity exercise if you break up exercise periods with rest periods, interval training is a great way to perform high-intensity workouts and help decrease body fat.

Spot reduction.
One of the most popular exercise myths is that you can lose fat in an area of the body by exercising that specific part. The truth is that "spot reducing" does not work because you cannot choose where your body will get the fat it uses for energy, nor can you change fat into muscle. Doing triceps press-downs will not decrease the fat on the backs of your arms and doing 100’s of sit ups a day will not decrease the fat around your stomach. "Flabby arms" are somewhat a product of age. As you get older, your skin becomes less elastic and this conforms less to your arms. However, and exercise that decreases your body fat percentage will help you lose fat on your arms, stomach as well as other body parts.

How do I get a flat stomach?
Genetics plays a role in whether you can achieve a "six-pack" look. Having said that, the abdominals are like any other muscle group. For their definition to become visible they must grow larger and the fat that lies over them must decrease. You will get a flat stomach only if you combine strength training with cardiovascular exercise to get rid of the fat. Most people do not do nearly enough cardio exercise to decrease their body fat enough to see their abdominals.
Performing abdominal crunches is just as effective as using equipment to train the rectus abdominal, the main muscle in the abdominal region. As you improve abdominal strength, you can make crunches more demanding by performing them on a movable surface, such as a resistance ball. 

Cardio versus strength exercise.
Should you do cardiovascular training or strength training to burn fat? Both types of exercise decrease body fat percentage. However, aerobic exercise appears to have a greater impact on fat loss than strength training does. A combination of endurance and strength training results in more fat loss than either exercise program alone, possibly because people who do both activities spend more time exercising.

Common Dumbell Exercises:
Click for a poster of dumbbell exercises