Ab workouts - Finding The Best Ab Workouts

By Vince DelMonte

When trying to achieve the illusive six pack, it' easy to get confused by all the "best ab workouts" available. You'll likely notice that there a multitude of ab workouts to choose one, so deciphering which ones will work the best can be tricky. The thing to remember is that whenever you are trying to work your core, everything works, for a certain period of time. Everything from high reps, low reps, weighted work, bodyweight work, stability ball exercises, and BOSU ball exercises - it all works until your body adapts and says, "This is easy, I'm not going to change unless you give me a new reason to adapt." Your ab training should be progressed from stable floor work with your body weight to a unstable surface with weighted work. Progressing to movements that will reduce your base of support as much as possible are the best ab workouts because they will call into play all the muscles within the core, especially those really deep that stable floor work can not target. Such examples of floor ab exercises that would do this would be crunches, sit ups and leg raises. Eventually you want to do these same exercises against gravity, then a load and then on unstable surface like a stability ball. Body weight exercises like "front planks" and "side planks" should be the foundation of a core program and progressed to one arm planks in the frontal and side planes and then eventually on a stability ball or BOSU ball for further recruitment. The best ab workouts to make your abs "pop" would be a variety of weighted movements. I'm sure you've skinny guys with a flat stomach but no "eye popping" abs, which is because they have not developed the actual abdominal muscle, just like every other body part. Part of getting nicely chiseled abs is going to be developing the muscles underneath the fat, and weighted ab crunches with cables or on a stability ball with a heavy dumbbell will do this best. During all your ab workouts be sure to get a full stretch during the eccentric phase of your ab exercises. Going through an entire range of motion on the way up (if doing a crunch on the floor or ball) is not necessary, however, you should be "crunching" your upper abs onto your lower abs during each rep to maximize the burn, recruitment and full development. The one weighted exercise you will not find in my programs is weighted side bends, as this could make you look wider in the waste, distracting from creating a lean image. One concerning question most people have is regarding lower ab workouts, typically the most troubling spot. Yes, hip flexion (emphasis more so on lower abs) is important to perform and should be done first in the workout but the reality of the matter is that you cannot specifically separate your abs into upper and lower components. Whenever you perform any type of ab movement you should automatically be focusing on working both the upper and lower portion at the same time. Good exercise to definitely direct a little more force into the lower area would be the progression of lying leg raises, lying leg raises on a incline and eventually hanging leg raises fully vertical. Lying leg raises on a stability pull is also an extremely challenging and advanced exercise to create razor sharp abdominals. Finally, the last thing to consider is when you are going to perform your ab workout is training frequency. Again, generally speaking, the more the better assuming your abdominals have recovered. Whether you want to perform it at the end of your workout, before your workout, during your workout or on a day of it's own is up to you. My ab workouts incorporate all methods depending on if you are a beginner, intermediate or advanced. Some theories of that warn you not to start with abs is because abs work as a synergistic muscle for so many of the other exercises you'll do, if you pre-fatigue them before the start of the workout, you may not progress as much during the rest of your workout. I don't agree with this and if you're abs are your weakest link then they should be given first priority when you are the most fresh, the start of your workout. Incorporating a specific ab workout is only a small part of the battle - diet, lifestyle and overall caloric expenditure through weight training and cardio are the true building blocks to creating a sexy and desired mid section.

---------------------------------- About the Author: Vince DelMonte is the author of Your Six Pack Quest found at http://www.YourSixPackQuest.com He provides chubby guys and gals with the best ab workouts to get a six pack without gimmicks, supplements or dieting.

Six-Pack Abs - How To Get Six Pack Abs

By Vince DelMonte

One of the most popular requests among people in the gym is to get six pack abs. There is no doubt about it, obtaining this elusive goal not only takes hard work, but also demonstrates that you clearly know what you are doing in the gym. Learning how to get six pack abs is definitely not the easiest thing in the world but it's also not the hardest, as long as you follow the right steps. So, what should you be doing to get results? Focus on your diet. Without a clean diet, six pack abs will never be yours. One thing you must realize is that while exercise is important, it's only going to take you so far. No matter how many crunches or sit-up variations you perform, if you've got a solid layer of fat covering your stomach, your muscles are not going to be seen. Try and focus on consuming enough protein to keep your appetite under control, supplemented with healthy fats for satiety and fruits and veggies for energy. It is important, however, that you are running a calorie deficit, because regardless of the food you eat, if you are consuming more than you burn off that day, you aren't going to lose weight. Perform a variety of exercises Next up on your quest for six pack abs, you need to make sure you change up the exercises you perform on a regular basis. While it's fine if you have some that you generally like to stick with as you really feel it when you do them, try and alternate between at least a few from week to week. The main reason for this is because your abdominal muscles adapt to change very quickly. As soon as they are finished adapting, you are going to stop seeing results - this is the truth about six pack abs. By keeping them guessing as to what's coming, you keep the results coming as well. Don't make the mistake of doing the same boring workout, day in, day out. Get Your Cardio In Line Finally, step three for getting a nicely chiseled stomach is performing cardio properly. This isn't to say you should run out and start doing hours upon hours on the treadmill. We aren't aiming to turn you into a hamster here. All you really need is a few quality sessions of cardio work a week. What's high quality? Sprint sessions. Skipping. Hill running. Anything your body is not efficient at. Yes, these are going to be much more intense than plodding along at a moderate pace while you read the fitness magazine of the week, but trust me, you will get results a thousand times faster. Crank that intensity up for twenty to forty seconds and then back it down again for another minute. Repeat this process eight to ten times and you'll have a workout that'll shed that body fat in no time. So, next time you're admiring your physique in the mirror and are still longing for a better mid-section, take these three factors into consideration and you'll discover this is the truth about six pack abs.

---------------------------------- About the Author: Vince DelMonte is the author of Your Six Pack Quest found at http://www.YourSixPackQuest.com He specializes in helping chubby guys and gals get six pack abs without gimmicks, supplements or dieting.

How To Get Ripped - Yes, You Can Do It.

Are you also looking at those people with those ripped bodies with envy? Do you think it will never be possible for you to look that way? It must be in your genes?

 Well I have some good news. Tom Venuto recently wrote an excellent article on "How To Get Ripped Like A Bodybuilder, Fitness Model Or Action Movie Star". Read this article and learn about what it takes to get ripped. As Tom Venuto says, he doesn't claim it to be easy. It will take hard work and discipline, but if you really are serious about getting ripped or getting into the shape of your life, it is well worth the effort.

Hey, nothing really worth your while ever came easy. If that was the case, everybody would have been ripped. But it is not impossible. When you read this article you will find out how normal people like you and I already achieved amazing results. In this article he is referring to 50 year old men, menopausal women, busy executives, and soccer moms who has done it.

Obviously nutrition plays an important part, but he also warns against these miracle diet programs we so often fall victim to. One of the examples given is that of lt. commander Ian, achieving fantastic results while doing service in Iraq, with limited  healthy food availability but junk food everywhere.

Read this article and learn how to get ripped. It is not so impossible after all. 

Tom Venuto is a well known and highly respected fitness and nutrition expert.

Miracle Working Bodyweight Exercises for Time Crunched People.

Many times people think you only make excuses when you tell them you just don't have the time for a proper work out.

If this really is just an excuse, this article is not for you, but if time is really a problem for you, do yourself a favor and read this article by Mike Geary.

Mike Geary is a certified nutritionist and a certified personal trainer. In this remarkable article Mike is giving a sample exercise routine which you can use if time really is an issue for you. If you have your own private office you can do these exercises in your office without anybody even knowing. If you share office space, get your friends to join in the fun. All you need is about 2 minutes every hour. Just enough to get your muscles pumping without even working up a sweat.

Mike also recommends this routine if you just need a break from your general gym routine. Do this for about 3 - 4 weeks and return to your normal gym routine. It is a great way to break out of a plateau or to stimulate new results.

Click here to read the article and try it for yourself. I am currently in need of a change, so I am going to do it for the next 4 weeks. No cost, no extra time to be spent (as a matter of fact - I can have some spare time).     

3 Best Bodyweight Exercises

By: Craig Ballantyne, CSCS, MS
www.TurbulenceTraining.com

Here are 3 kick-butt bodyweight exercises you can do anytime, anywhere to burn fat, stay energized, and avoid overeating.
Bodyweight exercises help you burn fat shockingly fast, without any fancy equipment.
1) Any Single-Leg Exercise
The pistol (single-leg squat to the floor) is the most advanced
1-leg exercise. But you can also do assisted single-leg squats with a band, or onto a bench, or even with a Stability Ball between your back and the wall.
If you aren't ready for single-leg squats, you can use Bulgarian
Split Squats, Reverse Lunges, regular split squats, or lying 1-leg
hip bridges if you are a beginner.
2) Decline Push-ups
These are harder than normal pushups, thanks to your elevated feet. And in this position, you can still use a close-grip to fatigue
your triceps, a "piked-hip position" to build your shoulders, or
even the Spiderman leg motion to work on your abs.
3) Bodyweight Inverted Rows
I choose these over chinups and pullups because bodyweight rows let your chest rest, while your back is strengthened. It's the perfect compliment to a pushup.
Do 8-12 repetitions per exercise. Don't rest between exercises. Go through the circuit up to 3 times, resting 1 minute after each
circuit.
For a once-per-month challenge, do each exercise to failure in your final round through the circuit.

Get in shape fast with Turbulence Training,  
Craig Ballantyne, CSCS, MS
Author, Turbulence Training

About the Author

Craig Ballantyne is a Certified Strength & Conditioning Specialist and writes for Men's Health, Men's Fitness, Maximum Fitness, Muscle and Fitness Hers, and Oxygen magazines. His trademarked Turbulence Training fat loss workouts have been featured multiple times in Men’s Fitness and Maximum Fitness magazines, and have helped thousands of men and women around the world lose fat, gain muscle, and get lean in less than 45 minutes three times per week. For more information on the Turbulence Training workouts that will help you burn fat without long, slow cardio sessions or fancy equipment, visit www.TurbulenceTraining.com

A “Mind Training” Technique That Makes You Stronger

By Tom Venuto
www.BurnTheFat.com The word “visualization” sometimes conjures up images of new age gurus teaching esoteric techniques for personal enlightenment and “attracting” what you want into your life. This causes many evidence-based types to scoff. However, piles of research has shown that mental imagery (aka “visualization”) can improve performance. The latest study suggests that a certain type of mental imagery can also increase your strength
Olympic champions and professional athletes have used visualization and mental rehearsal techniques for decades. Not only is visualization one of the most widely accepted techniques in sports psychology, it’s supported by scientific research.
Nevertheless, many people remain skeptical.
Some people agree that mental rehearsal might enhance specific skills, like a golf swing or a basketball throw, but they question whether it could make you stronger, increase muscle growth or help you lose weight.
A new study published in the Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research suggests that indeed, mental imagery can make you stronger. This study also begins to explain how mental imagery works on a neurological level…
Twenty two sports students, with a mean age of about 20, participated in the 6-week long experiment. Prior to the study, none had done mental imagery before. The students were divided into a control group and a mental rehearsal group.
The goal was to see if mental imagery could increase bench press and leg press strength.
Each participant was given very specific instructions on how to perform the mental imagery. During the rest period between sets, they were to vividly imagine the exercise movement and the muscle contractions generated from each rep.
After 12 workout sessions, the mental imagery group had significantly increased their strength more than the control group, especially in the lower body (leg press).
The researchers concluded:

“The results provided evidence that mental imagery did contribute to improve strength of the leg muscles without any macroscopic structural change”

What they were saying is that the duration of the study wasn’t long enough that there was any major muscle size increase, so they credited the strength increase to non morphological adaptations.
It’s well known in exercise science that gains in strength occur from changes not just in the muscle fibers and surrounding tissues, but in the nervous system.
That gives us clues about how mental imagery works.
Put simply, mental training techniques, (since they’re working with your brain/nervous system - as the name implies), can trigger some of the same neurological adaptations that occur from physical training.
Apparently, mental imagery can increase synchronization of motor units in muscles, having large corresponding cortical areas in the primary mortor cortex.
There are also psychological benefits, such as increased motivation, improved focus during the set, technique improvements, more confidence and less apprehension or anxiety. But clearly, there’s more to this than just “psyching up.”
Here’s something else interesting. The researchers even suggested that mental imagery could decrease strength loss when athletes are inactive due to injury.
This recent study is a practical one because it gives us one specific technique that you can apply to your next workout: vividly imagine a successful lift for the upcoming set while you’re resting between sets.
NOTE: it’s important to mentally see (visualize) the exercise and mentally “FEEL” the muscle contraction. This is multi-sensory - both visual and kinesthetic.
In some of my previous articles, I talked about density training and superset training as excellent techniques for busy people because these methods reduce rest intervals, making the workout time efficient.
But the rest time between heavy sets doesn’t have to be wasted - now you know what to do with that time…
Instead of chatting with your gym buddies, or scoping out the attractive bods in the gym, you can be mentally rehearsing your next set… and enjoying the strength increase that follows.
Most fat loss programs only focus on diet or physical training. If you want to learn more about how you can add “mental training” techniques to increase fat loss, muscle growth and muscular strength, then be sure to check out chapter one in my ebook, Burn the Fat, Feed the Muscle.

Tom Venuto, author of
Burn The Fat Feed The Muscle                       
www.BurnTheFat.com

Founder & CEO of
Burn The Fat Inner Circle
= = => Burn The Fat Inner Circle

About the Author:

Tom Venuto is the author of the #1 best seller, Burn the Fat, Feed the Muscle: Fat Burning Secrets of the World’s Best Bodybuilders and Fitness Models. Tom is a lifetime natural bodybuilder and fat loss expert who achieved an astonishing 3.7% body fat level without drugs or supplements. Discover how to increase your metabolism and burn stubborn body fat, find out which foods burn fat and which foods turn to fat, plus get a free fat loss report and mini course by visiting Tom's site at: www.BurnTheFat.com

Ab Exercises - The Best Ab Exercises

By Vince DelMonte

When it comes to getting a solid six pack, doing the right ab exercises is crucial. You can spend hours doing needless sit-ups that aren't really going to have all that much benefit, much to your disappointment. Taking the time to choose smart ab exercises will save you not only gym time, but a great deal of frustration as well. In this article we will discuss the best lower ab exercises and the best home ab exercises as well. The best movements for the abdominal muscles are going to be ones that reduce your overall stability. The reason for this is because this will require all your muscle tissues, even the ones deep within the core, to contract in order to maintain balance. When you perform regular sit-ups, for example, they are really only going to target the more superficial muscles; one that will still help, but not get you near the results you could be seeing. So what ab exercises are ones that reduce your balance? Basically, anything done on an unstable surface is going to get the job done. This would include movements such as walking across a balance beam, performing one leg squats, one arm shoulder presses, or bent over dumbbell rows standing on one leg and of course, utilizing an exercise ball for any laying abdominal movement you perform. Working on a BOSU ball and stability ball ab exercises are also excellent options. As long as you have a set of free weights and stability ball then these would qualify as your best home ab exercises as well. By far the most effective lower ab exercises are hanging leg raises while you use your lower abs to rotate your pelvis which is the secret to performing this effectively. Lying leg raises, lying leg raises on a 45 degree incline and cable crunches are also rock hard ab exercises. Another area you might want to venture into with your ab exercises are those that utilize heavy weights. While this will not necessarily get you 'cut' so that all your individual muscles are showing - that takes having low levels of body fat, what weighted movements will do is help further build the muscle tissue and make your abs "pop". The more muscle mass you have, the faster your metabolic rate will then be, so in an indirect way, that could in fact help you burn off excess body fat. Furthermore, doing weighted movements will also increase your strength greatly, reducing the risk of injuries from any other type of exercise you may attempt. Weighted ball crunches with a stability ball on your chest is my favorite home ab exercises. When choosing when to perform your ab exercises, if you are looking for performance, do them on a separate day from all your other work. Just like any muscle group, you want to be fresh when you do them. If, on the other hand, you are more just doing them to help build some strength, but more to round out your exercise program, then you should be doing them at the end of your workout session. This will prevent them from fatiguing early, because they are going to be predominately used in all the other lifts you perform (heavy squats for example). In many cases this rule can be bent though. For example, if a client comes to me and their abs are the weakest muscle group then performing them at the end of the workout makes no sense because they will be pre fatigued from the workout and you will not be able to train them as intensely so prioritizing your abs at the start of the workout can become the exception in this case. So, next time you are creating your workout and are picking out ab exercises, keep these points in mind. Having good dedication to performing these exercises on a regular basis and then following a clean diet based around raw vegetables and proteins are the two main components to developing that six-pack you're hoping for.

---------------------------------- About the Author: Vince DelMonte is the author of Your Six Pack Quest found at http://www.YourSixPackQuest.comhttp://www.YourSixPackQuest.co He specializes in helping chubby guys and gals get six pack abs without gimmicks, supplements or dieting.