With this article, I want to show you why you might be struggling to lose that stubborn stomach fat that is covering up your abs. These are the main reasons most people just can not seem to get those six pack abs that everyone desires. If you haven’t already seen me around online somewhere, I’m the creator of one of the most popular abdominals and fat loss programs on the internet. So in this article I want to highlight for you the main points and strategies that I use to make this program one of the most effective programs in existance for fully developing your abdominals as well as getting rid of that stubborn stomach fat that is covering them up. Pay attention, because once you get this stuff right and start using these techniques regularly, you’ll be showing off your ripped abs in no time flat, whether it’s at the beach, at the pool, in the bedroom, wherever… Just think how great it’s going to feel when people are complimenting you on your washboard stomach! Alright, here’s what make’s The Truth about Six Pack Abs different: I know that sounds counterintuitive, but the fact of the matter is that abs exercises are ok, and you do need to do a certain amount of them to develop the abdominals as best as possible. But to be honest, most people that are trying to get better looking abdominals waste WAY too much time training the abs directly. What you really need to focus on is burning off the extra fat that is covering them up. Let’s get this straight right now… Abs exercises do NOT burn fat away from your abs! This can only be accomplished through a much more effective full body training routine that maximizes both your metabolic response and your hormonal response to your workouts. This is the main focus of my Truth about Six Pack Abs Program. Now don’t get me wrong. It wouldn’t be an abs program if I didn’t show you the most effective exercises for developing your abdominals. I also give you detailed instructions and photos on how to do them right. But like I said, the main focus of this program is the secret method that I use to compile the full body training routines and maximize your fat burning effect. This is the main reason that this program will be MUCH more effective for you than any other abs programs you’ve ever tried before. You’ve got my word on that. In fact, you don’t have to do any typical cardio if you don’t want to! I actually recommend against it. Seriously, almost every program out there tells you that you MUST do endless cardio exercise regularly to lose the body fat that is covering your abs. Most of them tell you to do 30-60 minutes of cardio exercise 3-4 days/week in addition to your strength training routines. The truth is that this is not only unnecessary, but it can actually be counterproductive if you’re really trying to get as lean as possible, as quick as possible. I go into this in much more detail in the book, but basically this all comes back to the aspects of your metabolic rate, how much lean muscle you have, the hormonal response in your body from the exercise, and the residual calorie burn in the hours and days following your workouts. And normal boring cardio routines are ALL WRONG when it comes to maximizing these effects! Now you’re probably thinking that since I’m against typical boring cardio routines, then that must simply mean I’m a proponent of interval training. Yes, as a matter of fact, I believe interval training is MUCH better than typical cardio. However, I also use a special exercise combination and sequencing in my Truth about Six Pack Abs Program that gets even more powerful fat loss and muscle defining results than interval training. And that’s saying something, because interval training kicks butt! You’ll find out how this system works inside the program. Want proof that you don’t need typical long-duration steady-pace cardio? Well, first of all, I actually took a course recently that was devoted to scientific research into why steady-pace cardio exercise is actually not that effective at strengthening the heart. The focus of the research basically boiled down to the fact that the heart needs to be trained in a wide variety of ranges to actually be truly strengthened and ready for all the various stresses that life throws at it. Not only that, but steady-pace cardio was also proven in the research studies to be far less effective in the long term at reducing body fat stores. To give you a real life example… Personally, I haven’t done what most people would label “cardio” in probably well over 5 years, and I’m actually leaner now and have a lower bodyfat % now than years ago when I did cardio regularly. Not only that, but my heart is in the best condition ever, as I now consistently have the resting heart rate of an elite athlete at about 50 bpm (remember that lower is better). My resting heart rate used to be in the mid to upper 60’s years ago when I used to do typical cardio and strength training routines like most people do. This improvement in both body fat % and reduced resting heart rate is the direct result of the unique training methods I used in developing the programs in The Truth about Six Pack Abs. Trust me when I say that for the most part, about 95% of supplements are a complete waste of your hard earned money. I’ve been approached by supplement companies in the past looking for me to promote their products for them, and offering me a lot of money to do so. Well, you know what I do? I tell them to shove it! Seriously, I won’t promote something to my readers that I don’t honestly believe in. The fact is, I’ve learned over the years through my own experience, as well as hundreds of my clients and friends experiences with supplements, that they are really just selling you the dream that their pill or powder will be some “magical” solution to your struggle with getting that lean ripped body that you’ve been wanting for years. In reality, most supplements do nothing at all to help you improve your body. Don’t get me wrong… I’m not totally bashing supplement companies, but like I said, about 95% of the products they promote are worthless, and won’t create any noticeable changes in your body. I will admit that there can be a place for meal replacements for people that can’t find the time to prepare or pack all of their real food meals. I also admit that I do think a high quality, fast digesting protein like whey protein can be useful to mix into your post-workout smoothies. But the fact is that real food is always better for you than processed supplements (as long as you pick the right “real foods”). Anybody that tells you otherwise has either been brainwashed by all of the propaganda and super-hyped up ads that the supplement companies have spread throughout every magazine on the planet, or they have financial ties to selling supplements in some way themselves. I have dedicated myself to not being lured into the lucrative world of selling supplements. Even though I could make a lot more money selling supplements than by selling my abs program, it’s just plain against my morals to rip people off like that. Frankly, it amazes me that most people are more willing to spend $30, $40, even $50 or more on a bottle of pills or powder than to spend $30 on a comprehensive training and nutrition guide like this Truth about Six Pack Abs program, which will set them up for life on training programs and dietary secrets that will keep them lean and ripped for life. The only thing that bottle of pills or powder is going to do is give you expensive urine! You make the choice. In case you were suckered into buying any of these worthless ab belts, loungers, rockers, or any other worthless ab gadget or machine, I have bad news… You were ripped off! The truth is that most of these machines and gadgets are not the best way to develop the abdominal muscles. Sure, some of them may help a tiny bit with strengthening the abdominals, but they are far less effective than some of the best floor, hanging, and standing abs exercises. Also, more importantly, virtually all of these abs machines, belts, and gadgets do absolutely NOTHING to burn fat off of the abdominal area! Again, losing the fat that’s covering up your abs can only be accomplished with a smart nutritional program, and a well designed progressional training program that increases your metabolism and stimulates your fat-burning hormones in your body. Achieving this is simple once you understand the secrets I reveal in the Truth about Six Pack Abs program. None of that here. I promise you won’t be given any more crap about needing to eat “low-carb” or “low-fat”, or low or high anything, for that matter. The nutritional secrets I reveal in this program go against all of the authors and companies out there that are trying to lure you in with another one of their gimmicks. The fact is that they need to come up with some sort of different “angle”, so that their diet program appears unique and gives the media something to talk about. That’s why there’s always some gimmick, like low-fat, or low-carb, or high protein, or the “colors diet”, the “low glycemic index diet”, the fasting diet, the cabbage diet, and so on. Instead, I wanted to give you the TRUTH about what it really takes to eat a nutritious diet that not only will have you burning off that stubborn belly fat, but will also have you feeling full of energy every single day. If you don’t already feel energetic and alive every single day, then you are missing out, because it is an awesome feeling! The great thing is that once you start eating balanced and healthy all the time, you virtually eliminate cravings altogether. Personally, I used to crave sweets constantly before I adopted the nutritious diet that I currently eat. Now, I can honestly say I can’t remember the last craving I had. It had to be more than 5 years ago… no joke! Not only that, but I actually enjoy everything I eat way more than I used to years ago when I ate a lot of junk. Does that mean that I never eat burgers, or pizza, or beer? Of course not… We all have a social life. In fact, there are actually very healthy ways and variations to preparing healthier burgers and healthier pizza that I occasionally use. I hope this article has given you some insight as to where you may be going wrong with your exercise and nutrition plans in striving for those elusive abs. See below for more info on losing stubborn stomach fat and developing ripped six pack abs. Check out the Truth about Six Pack Abs Program at TruthAboutAbs.com Michael Geary (CPT) is a recognized International Fitness Expert, contributing writer for Muscle & Fitness Magazine, author of the internationally-selling book, The Truth about Six-Pack Abs ©2004-2006, and owner of BusyManFitness.com. Also see Mike’s Six-Pack Abs blogPsychic Readings by phone by an experienced Psychic

  It seems that everyone is always asking me what the best ab workouts are to get a flatter stomach. The common belief that ab workouts will help you to lose belly fat is one of the biggest misconceptions I deal with daily as a fitness professional. Almost everyone has varying degrees of excess body fat in the abdominal region, and the best way to burn off that extra stomach fat continues to elude most.   The problem is that most people are searching for the wrong exercises and workout types to lose stubborn belly fat. Most people are searching for some miraculous combination of abs exercises combined into the best ab workout ever invented that will burn off their belly fat faster than you can read this article.   Unfortunately, ab-specific workouts do NOT burn fat off of your belly. They only tone and strengthen the underlying abdominal muscles. What you really need to focus on is a full body strategic workout that will cause a much greater metabolic rate increase and fat-burning hormonal response from your training program as a whole.   In addition, simply doing cardiovascular workouts will not necessarily create the greatest metabolic response or hormonal response either. What you really need is a much more rounded training program that focuses on training the entire body with resistance training and multi-joint exercises in a higher intensity fashion.   This type of high intensity full body training combined with a healthy balanced diet full of nutrient density on a regular basis, is the real key secret to losing the extra stomach fat that covers up the abs. This is a much better plan of attack than just trying to do ab workouts and hoping that just doing a bunch of ab exercises like crunches and leg raises are going to make you lose your belly fat.   The amazing thing is that the majority of the population still believes that in order to get rid of belly fat, you need to do ab workouts every day using hundreds of reps. I see people giving this type of erroneous advice every day on all of the fitness forums. Please do not waste your time with this type of advice!   Now before you say “how can an abs expert not recommend abdominal exercises”, realize that I do strongly believe that a certain amount of ab-specific exercises mixed into your routines are beneficial. Ab exercises will help you strengthen and tone the abdominal muscles and are useful for other purposes such as a healthy back and posture when done correctly. But the fact remains that ab exercises are not necessary for fat loss.   A much smarter full body resistance training routine and a clean healthy balanced diet are the most important factors. Many of the full body exercises also indirectly work the abdominals and core due to the stabilization required in some of the more difficult variations.   Thompson Stephen is dedicated to helping people stay informed about health and fitness.For more information and in-depth,unbiased reviews,please visit http://dailytruthaboutabs.comWordpress Autoblogging Plugin

Q1: How do I get abs like Dexter Jackson?Getting visible abdominal muscles or “abs” depends on reducing the amount of fat covering the abs, see Question 3. Getting hard, lumpy abs depends on developing the underlying muscles, for details, read on… ——————————————————————————–Q2: Should I do lots of situps to reduce fat around my middle?No. Exercising the area from which you want to lose fat is called “spot reduction”. Spot reduction is now believed to be a myth. Research shows that fat is lost all over your body, not just in the area that you work. Situps are also bad for your lower back (see Question 5). ——————————————————————————–Q3: How do I reduce the fat covering my middle?The answer comes in two parts: diet and aerobic exercise.DIETTwo principles loom large when trying to “sculpt” one’s body:* Calorie accounting: To lose fat, one must reduce calorie intake and/or increase energy expenditure so that stored fat is utilized as fuel for the body.* Biology is destiny: fat cells, whether increased in size, number or both, cannot turn into muscle cells.Reducing the fat accumulation in one area of the body is not easy. The usual measures to lose weight (including reducing calorie intake, increasing exercise or both) may lead to weight loss but not necessarily in a single area. In fact, short of having cosmetic surgery (such as liposuction), you cannot easily choose the area from which the fat will be lost. This is the reason that some women notice that their breasts (which are largely composed of fat) get smaller when they diet.And weight loss is more than just reducing “calories in” compared with “calories out.” The difficulty many people have in losing weight probably relates to a well-established phenomenon that seems terribly unfair: As you take in fewer calories, the body’s metabolism changes, so that fewer calories are burned with normal body function. In studies of persons losing 10 percent to 20 percent of their body weight, “calories out” diminished, despite similar activity levels, which slowed further loss of weight.Given this grim reality, you cannot readily transform an abdomen with excess fat into the physique of your dreams simply by doing lots of sit-ups. You’ll lose the fat by diet and/or exercise, and you’ll increase muscle mass by exercising those muscles. Of course, there may be other reasons to do sit-ups — for example, strong abdominal muscles reduce the chances of back problems; but shrinking your abdomen is not one of them.This is controversial, but most people agree that eating very little fat and lots of complex carbs (like rice, pasta and potatoes) helps ensure that you don’t add additional fat. Then you have to work at using the fat you already have stored which involves…EXERCISEAgain a bit controversial, but it’s widely agreed that regular, moderate, aerobic exercise 3-4 times per week works best to burn fat that’s already stored.”Moderate” because intense exercise burns glycogen not fat, so keep the intensity at about the level where you are beginning to puff a little.”Aerobic” means (very vaguely) the kind of exercise that requires you to inhale more. Some suggest that building more muscle through weight training helps as well, since muscle burns fat just by being there and moving your body about; so some weight training couldn’t hurt and will probably help.Many misc.fitness people agree that exercise periods of more than 20 minutes work best. But note that the longer you exercise, the more prone you are to injury since your muscles also begin to weaken. Two things which help prevent injury are:a good warmup 5-10 minutes of light exercise to warm your muscles, try to break a sweat stretching cautious 20-30 sec stretches for every muscle .——————————————————————————–Q4: How do I exercise the abs?The abs are designed to perform one main task, to shorten the distance between your sternum, or breastbone, and your pelvis. The only way to do this is to bend your spine in the lower back region.In short, any exercise which makes you move your sternum toward your pelvis or your pelvis toward your sternum is good. To do this safely, the lower back should be slightly rounded, not arched.In general when exercising the abs, try to maintain the natural arch of you lower back. The lower back will round slightly as you perform the exercises. Don’t fret about pressing your back into the ground. ——————————————————————————–Q5: What’s wrong with situps?Traditional situps emphasize sitting up rather than merely pulling your sternum down to meet your pelvis. The action of the psoas muscles, which run from the lower back around to the front of the thighs, is to pull the thighs closer to the torso. This action is the major component in sitting up. Because of this, situps primarily engage the psoas making them inefficient at exercising your abs. More importantly, they also grind the vertebrae in your lower back.They’re inefficient because the psoas work best when the legs are close to straight (as they are when doing situps), so for most of the situp the psoas are doing most of the work and the abs are just stabilising.Putting the thighs at a right angle to the torso to begin with means that the psoas can’t pull it any further, so all of the stress is placed on the abs.Situps also grind vertebrae in your lower back. This is because to work the abs effectively you are trying to make the lower back round, but tension in the psoas encourages the lower back move into an exaggerated arch. The result is the infamous “disc pepper grinder” effect that helps give you chronic lower back pain in later life.Q6: What are good ab exercises?We’ve divided the exercises into upper and lower ab exercises. Note that there aren’t two separate muscles that you can truly isolate, so all the exercises stress the whole abdominal wall. However there are “clusters” of muscle separated by connective tissue (these make up the “washboard” or the “six-pack”). You can focus on the upper clusters by moving just the torso and the lower clusters by moving the pelvis.For the lower abs, in increasing order of difficulty:lying leg raises reverse crunches vertical lying leg thrusts hanging knee raises hanging leg raises For the upper abs:ab crunches 1/4 crunches cross-knee crunches pulldown crunches Lower Ab ExercisesLying Leg RaisesLie on your back with your hands, palms down under your buttocks. Raise your legs about 30cm (12″) off the floor and hold them there. Now trying to use just your lower abs, raise your legs by another 15cm (6″). Do this by tilting the pelvis instead of lifting the legs with the psoas. Make sure your knees are slightly bent.If you’re big or have long legs or both, you should probably avoid this exercise. For people with legs that are too heavy for their lower abs strength, this exercise pulls the lower back into an exaggerated arch which is bad (and painful). For reasons why it’s bad, see Question 5. If you have this problem you can either try bending your knees slightly and making sure you keep your lower back fairly flat, or just try another exercise. Reverse CrunchThis exercise can be done on the ground or on an incline situp board. All you need is something behind your head to hold. If you use the incline board, use it with your feet lower than your head.Lying on your back, hold a weight or a chair leg (if lying on the floor) or the foot bar (if using the situp board). Keep the knees slightly bent.Pull your pelvis and legs up so that your knees are above your chest and then return to beginning position.This exercise is very similar to a hanging knee raise, but a little less intense. Vertical Lying Leg ThrustsInitial position:Lie on your back. Put your fists under your buttocks to form a cradle. Raise your legs in the air 20-30cm (10-12″) off the ground, knees slightly bent. If you feel any strain on your lower back, bend your knees a little more. Raise your head and shoulders off the ground slightly if you can to help keep the abs stressed. The exercise itself has four phases:Raise your legs until your feet are above your pelvis; focus on contracting the abs. Thrust your heels to the ceiling, breathe out, keep contracting the abs raising the pelvis out of the cradle of your fists. Lower out of the thrust back to your fists, leaving your feet above your pelvis. Lower your legs back to the initial position. Legendary Abs II recommends these as safer than Lying Leg Raises. Hanging Knee RaisesYou need a chin-up bar or something you can hang from for this. Grab the bar with both hands with a grip a bit wider than your shoulders, cross your ankles and bring your knees up to your chest (or as close as you can get). Your pelvis should rock slightly forward. Pause at the top of the movement for a second and then slowly lower your knees by relaxing your abs. Don’t lower your legs all the way. Repeat the movement using just your abs to raise your knees.Make sure that you don’t start swinging. You want your abs to do the work, not momentum. It’s important that you don’t move your legs too far or your psoas muscle will be doing a lot of work and possibly causing back problems as in a situp.Make sure your pelvis moves, your lower back stays neutral or slightly rounded, not arched, and that your abs are doing the work, not your hips. Hanging Leg RaisesJust like knee raises except you keep your legs straight. This requires good hamstring and lower back flexibility.Although Legendary Abs recommends these, The American Council on Exercise’s Aerobics Instructor book warns that they have the same back problems as conventional situps. This makes sense since, like situps, the legs are kept straight and the hips move. The Aerobics and Fitness Association of America (AFAA) also regards hanging leg raises as dangerous.For safety you should probably stick to leg thrusts and knee raises.If you do do hanging leg raises, make sure your lower back stays neutral or rounded.There is an isometric variant done by gymnasts called the “L-Support”, which basically consists of taking the leg raise position with the legs held straight at a level just above the hips. The position is held for 10 seconds. When you can complete this easily, try a higher position. The same cautions about back position still hold.Upper Ab ExercisesAb CrunchesLying on your back, put your knees up in the air so that your thighs are at a right angle to your torso, with your knees bent. If you like you can rest your feet on something, like a chair. Put your hands either behind your head or gently touching the sides of your head.Now, slowly raise your shoulders off the ground and try to touch your breastbone to your pelvis, breathing out as you go. If you succeed in touching your breastbone to your pelvis, see a doctor immediately.Although the actual movement will be very small (your upper torso should move through less than 30 degrees) you should try to go as high as possible. Only your spine should bend, your hips should not move. If the hips move, you are exercising the psoas.Do these fairly slowly to avoid using momentum to help.You can increase the difficulty of the exercise by extending your hands out behind your head instead of keeping them at the side. Make sure you don’t jerk your hands forward to help with the crunch, keep them still. 1/4 CrunchesSame as an ab crunch except that you raise your shoulder up, instead of pulling them toward your pelvis. You can do these quickly, in fact it’s hard to do them any other way. Cross-Knee CrunchesLike ab crunches, take the lying, bent-knee position, but this time crunch diagonally so that you try to touch each shoulder to the opposite hip alternately. At the top position, one shoulder and one hip should be off the ground. Pulldown CrunchesDrape a towel or rope around the bar of a pulldown machine so that you pull the weight using it instead of the bar. Kneel facing the machine and grab hold of the towel and put your hands against your forehead. Kneel far enough away from the machine so that the cable comes down at a slight angle.The exercise is the same movement as an ab crunch, but using the weight instead of gravity. The emphasis is still on crunching the abs, pulling the sternum (breastbone) towards the pelvis and making sure you exhale all your air at each contraction. ——————————————————————————–Q7: Is there a specific order I should do exercises in?According to Legendary Abs, you should exercise the lower abs before the upper abs and do any twisting upper ab movements before straight upper ab ones. Twisting exercises work the obliques as well as the upper abs. ——————————————————————————–Q8: How do I structure an ab routine?According to the guidelines in Legendary Abs:Try to do sets in the 15-30 rep range. Follow the ordering rules in Question 7. Pick easy exercises to start with and when you can happily do about 2 sets in a row of an exercise, try harder ones. Only rest when you absolutely must, so take a short (10-15sec) rest between two sets of the same exercise, but none between lower and upper abs. Try to take about 1 second for each rep, except for ab crunches which you do slower (2 secs/rep) for a better contraction and 1/4 crunches which you should do fast (2 reps/sec) because you’re hardly moving. Chris J WatsonFlat stomach workouts for all body types ex girlfriend

I received a question today from a Sergeant who was looking for high intensity workouts with some work for abs, core, and full body to take his team of 30+ soldiers to a new level of fitness in preparation for their PT testing.
He basically said that the men had reached a plateau in their training and needed something really high intensity to take them to the next level.
My response is below…Keep in mind that this workout I gave him uses bodyweight-only exercises, however, it is VERY intense and for people looking for advanced fitness levels.
With that said, keep in mind that if you’re not yet at an advanced level, you can still use this by simply using the basic format of the workout, and just do less of whatever exercises you struggle with, or choose an easier alternate exercise that’s similar.
Here goes…
“Hi J****. To get your soldiers to that next level in their workouts, we’re going to keep the intensity super high here and use the whole body. Keep rest periods short, and use full-body multijoint movements as much as possible.
I’ll give you a killer workout idea below that not only incorporates abs and entire core, but the entire body as well in an intense fashion. Not sure what (if any) equip you have available, so I’ll give you a great workout that’s bodyweight based. Here’s an example to take your men through:
Start with a 2-3 min warmup of light jogging, jumping jacks, or jump rope.
Then, move through these exercises in circuit fashion, one right after the other with only 10 seconds rest between each (repeat the circuit 3-5 times for a killer total body workout):
1. bodyweight squats – 12 reps
2. plyo pushups (clapping) – 10 reps
3. walking lunges up 6 steps and back 6 steps
4. floor mountain climbers for 30 seconds
5. lunge jumps – 6 reps to each side
6. lying leg thrusts (abs) on floor – 12 reps
7. squat jumps – 8 reps
8. side plank hold 30 seconds one side, then 30 sec opposite side
Rest 2 min after each circuit; repeat circuit 3-5x
If that doesn’t get them through the plateau and ready for the next PT test, nothing will!
If you want to check out a site that has over 5,000 workouts for every goal imaginable, check this out: Thosands of Workouts
Also, grab a free report on the truth about losing body fat and abs workouts at Abs Workouts Secrets,Abdominal Exercises Thompson Stephen is dedicated to helping people stay informed about health and fitness.For more information and in-depth,unbiased reviews,please visit http://dailytruthaboutabs.blogspot.comWordpress Autoblog Plugin