Six Pack Abs - Don't Go Through Life Without Them!

Why Are Six Pack Abs So Rare?

A washboard stomach is a rare thing these days. Although you see a lot of people in magazines and movies with great abs, you rarely see a regular guy or girl walking around with a six pack. Most people eventually give up on their quest to get a defined midsection. They believe that it is only something for movie stars or super models. I'm telling you to quit thinking that way!

Lifting a Large Amount of Weight is Not As Impressive as Toned Abs

There are many, many more guys who can bench 315 pounds, than there are guys with a tight midsection. Many women can jog over 6 miles, but not many women have 6 pack abs. If you want to be exceptional, than having a defined midsection is the way to go. If you are spending any time in the gym at all and you don't have a 6 pack, then you are spending your time doing the wrong things. You will need to shift your focus if you want great muscle tone in this area of your body.

When Your Abs Are Defined, Your Whole Body Will Look Great

The fat around your stomach area is usually the last to go. If you get to the point where your abs are showing, then I guarantee you that the rest of your body looks amazing as well. I believe that this is the reason that people find toned abdominals so sexy...they know that the rest of the body must look toned as well! So if you focus on a 6 pack, everything else will fall into place.

Getting a Washboard Stomach is Mainly About Diet and Cardio

I swear that you could drop all those crunching and sit up movements and get amazing abs. How do I know this? Well, I haven't done a crunch in over 5 years and my abs are more defined then ever. Have you ever seen the TV show "Survivor". By the end of the show almost every person has really defined six pack abs and I know that none of them got there by ab exercises. You don't want to go to that extreme, but it does show you what low body fat will do.

Ab Exercises Probably Account for Only 10% of the Results

I don't think you need to directly target the abs to get a great mid section, but if you want pick one and hit it for 4-5 sets. The majority of your time should be spent on a bit of lifting for the rest of your body and intense cardio. As far as choices of cardio go, running on a treadmill or running outside is the way to go. Your abs work harder with running, because there is a certain amount of balancing involves between your legs and upper body. If you are on an exercise bike, your abs don't have to work at all. Your body is being stabilized by the seat.

Summary: You probably just need to increase the cardio and decrease the calories if you don't have six pack abs. I know it sounds almost too simple, but believe me it will work for you.

About The Author: Rusty Moore is the author of the controversial fitness blog...The Fitness Black Book. Learn advanced aerobic exercise and lifting routines that give you a sexy lean body instead of a bulky one! Too much muscle is "cheesy"...find out how to look attractive! Visit his site today... Fitness Black Book

Lose Your Belly Fat & Get Six Pack Abs - 4 Things You MUST Learn & Know

I Learned that the food we eat can have huge affects on how our body works. Some diets which are meant to help us to lose weight are actually stimulating hormones in our body to store fat and can be very dangerous to our bodies. There are key foods which unlock fat burning hormones in our bodies, this is the way to know how to keep yourself healthy and slim. Losing weight could not be made any easier-- all one needs to do is to eat the correct foods.

Exercise is a great way to keep healthy, I personally only exercise 1 1/2 hour per week. By eating the right healthy foods I am able to keep my toned body with barely any exercise. If you use the right foods and use more intense workouts you can achieve a perfect muscled body. Know a routine that will make you lose weight or build muscle weather your male or female.

I am going to tell you about the true problems of unhealthy foods and how you can learn more about eating healthy and staying in shape. Many diets out there are not good for you, I learned secrets to burning fat with healthy foods which allowed me to loose weight, keep fit and healthy.

I have been eating health for the past 2 years and have felt great for doing it with more energy. We all should know food is good for us, it is knowing the right stable diet of these foods which will make huge changes to our body. Helping it work properly and making you healthy while losing weight and with exercise achieve a body not only healthy but strong.

The Four Tips That Work

1. Eating foods which help your body to promote fat burning and weight loss, foods are the strongest weapon against losing weight. Using some weight loss products may not be doing what you think they should, instead it promotes your body to hold on to food and store as fat.

2. Exercising is a great way to lose weight but some exercises can be doing yourself harm. Old fashioned exercises that actually damage our bodies. Learn safe easy exercises that will work to lose that belly or build 6 pack abs.

3. No taking fat loss pills, pills may have worked for some people but they are not natural and can damage our bodies. Tablets never cure a problem they only cover it up in order to treat the root of weight loss using health foods works every time.

4. Learning to create a routine for exercising, but be healthy and fit doing different activates. Walking, Running, Climbing, Camping, Swimming there are thousands of ways to keep fit instead of doing the same exercises over and over. Have fun in life To learn more about fat burning foods CLICK HERE!

I personally use this system and love it, as I have very little time on my hands. This is a way for me to get the most out of my body, and not feel guilty as i did before about not being in shape which can have a very negative affect on your personallity. I personally felt ugly and to feel like that about yourself is not right. But now i am so positive in all aspects of life.

So if you feel unhappy about your health, weight or want to build muscle and look the way you want I would definity sugjest this system for you. Click Here More Infomation!

Thank you and i hope you achive what you want out of life.

How To Get Better Abs In A Hurry

I am going to assume you already have some muscle tone in your abs. I am also going to assume you are fit enough to do the types of exercises that create a defined six pack like ab crunches and sit ups. If other parts of your body look great but your abs are still a little out of shape, here are some good ideas you can consider.

It's important to realize that the abdominals is a fairly large muscle group and respond quite well to stimulation in most people. A tight set of abs on a muscular body is the center piece of that body. Aesthetically, the eye goes to the abs for one reason. You may think it is because they are so big and developed. But the opposite is true. The abs attract the eye because they are so SMALL in contrast to other body parts like shoulders arms and chest. This is the ultimate truth about a nice set of abs and can confuse people often.

When deciding you want a better set of abs the first thing you do is start training them. This enlarges the muscle group. If you train them too much you lose the V shape you are after. The shoulders being wide and the torso small.

The biggest factor that gives a torso the visual effect of being smaller is detail. It is an optical illusion. when there is not detail on the torso, no bumps and ridges, the mid rift looks bigger. It literally appears larger because the eye has nothing to look at so it travels to the outer edges of the torso, looking for definition. When there is detail, when the 6 pack shows, the eyes is satisfied and looks at the interior. This is why a torso looks smaller. You want your torso as tight looking as possible so your shoulders appear bigger.

So ultimately the key is making the skin layer covering the abdominals as thin as possible. That means cardio and limiting calorie intake. When that skin layer is supple and tight across the abdominals, you will get the detail and therefore get the visual effect you need.

If you would like to get a six pack in 23 days or less, buy The "Abs In 23 Days" training program. You can learn more about this award winning, abdominal pumping, fat stripping product by clicking HERE

Abs, Diet, Food and Nutrition

Most people think that doing thousands of sit ups and crunches will give them a perfect midsection. Unfortunately for most people, this won't work. To get a nice set of abs you have to work hard in the gym as well as in your own kitchen. You don't have to start working out on your kitchen counter but you do need to eat the right foods.

The reason that the midsection is such a big problem for so many is because this is where the majority of people store fat. To get your abs to show you need to get rid of this fat through diet and exercise. The simplest way to put it: you need to consume less calories than you burn so that your body uses your fat stores for energy.

One common misconception is that eating fat makes you fat. The truth is that eating too much of anything (fat, carbohydrates or protein) will make you fat. Fat is no different. You shouldn't totally avoid fats but you should reduce your intake of saturated and trans (bad) fats.

Sugar is a big concern if you're trying to eat for your abs. Sugar is digested very quickly and if you don't use all of those calories right away, (which you likely won't) all the extra calories will be converted and stored as fat.

Stay away from foods that are high in sugar such as candy, soda, sugary snacks and other junk foods. If you really want to eat these, do so in moderation. Don't eat the whole bag of cookies in one sitting.

In addition to sugar, you should also stay away from refined carbs. These include white bread, white rice and white pasta (or anything with white flour). Like sugar, these are digested quickly, and if not burned immediately, are stored as fat.

You shouldn't cut all carbs out of your diet. Whole wheat bread, whole wheat pasta and brown rice are all digested slowly. These will release energy steadily throughout the day and give you more flexibility on when to burn the calories. Eat foods that are high in fiber, low in calories (fruits, vegetables, salads, whole wheat flour) to make you full for longer and keep your total calories down.

To get results in the shortest amount of time you need to put yourself on a good exercise regimen that will burn calories and build abdominal muscles. Diet alone won't give you the perfect set of abs.

Guide to Getting Nice Abs and Six Packs

Health, Exercise and Dieting - Straighthealth.com

Straight Health was started in July 2006 to spread accurate and easy to understand information about health, diets, exercise and nutrition. At StraightHealth.com you can read articles and tips, use the tools and gain a further understand about the world of health.

Bodybuilder Six Pack Secrets Revealed - Tonned Abs As Easy As 1 2 3

As you may already be aware, abdominal muscles are crucial for stability and wellbeing. Its crucial that we all take this muscle seriously as under developed abs will lead to medical conditions such as muscle strain, back pain & many other conditions. After adding abdominal workouts into your life you will find yourself sitting straighter, lifting more at the gym and working with confidence.

The Abdominal region is broken up into 4 different muscle groups ! What you will find is that you will have stronger and weaker regions in your abdominal area which is due to your current lifestyle physical activities. I personally used to suffer with one side of my body being significantly undeveloped due to being on the shovel a lot of the time.

Ok so what are these abdominal muscles called you ask ?

Transverses abdominus, rectus abdominus, external oblique muscles, and internal oblique muscles. They are present in between the ribs and the pelvis.

The first part of the Abdominal process should be diet ! You must get the old school theory out of your head that three meals a day is enough, simply put its sending your backwards.

After a couple hours of not eating your body goes into starvation mode and slows down your metabolism as it has no idea when its going to get its next meal. You must fix this as this is your easiest ticket to getting your stubborn fat of your belly. You can almost eat anything if its in moderation and spaced throughout the day. Try to stay away from Carbohydrates just before you go to bed as this will most definitely end in a flabby stomach.

The Second for abs development is exercises. The essential exercises include basic crunches, abs rollers, abs trainers, hip-lifts and leg raises. It would be a great idea to create a workout diary so you have a system to stick to & just as importantly be able to monitor your progress.

Rock hard abs are the result of diet, discipline, correct workouts and using the right tools, learn about Abdominal Exercise and correct eating plans at http://www.truthaboutabprograms.com

The Top Fat Loss Secrets for Flat Six Pack Abs

I had the pleasure of being interviewed recently by a fitness professional from NYC, Geovanni Derice, of 4evertoned.com. The interview is below and I think you're going to like it...I reveal some of the hardest hitting strategies for getting rid of body fat to uncover those six pack abs that everyone wants.

"GD: Welcome Mike Geary to 4everToned's Fitness Journal. For those who do not know you, please tell us a few things about yourself.

MG: Thanks for having me, Geo. Well, to go back a little, I have been heavily involved in fitness and sports for about 15 years now, ever since I was a teenager. Being involved in sports in high school got me interested in strength training and conditioning. At that point, once I started feeling more energetic, getting stronger, and looking better, I was instantly hooked for life. I'm 30 now and still addicted to the way living a healthy and fit lifestyle makes me feel energetic, confident, strong, and youthful on a daily basis. I decided earlier in my 20's that I wanted to make the commitment to help other people experience the excitement of being fit and getting in the best shape of their lives, especially since we've reached an epidemic of obesity, heart disease, diabetes, cancer, depression, etc.

That's why I became a fitness professional. It just gives me so much satisfaction to help others, who have struggled for years to get in good shape, and show them that it can be done, and it can be fun in the process. I've expanded over the years from just reaching local individuals with personal training, into being able to help people all over the globe achieve their fitness goals with the reach of the internet. I only hope that my passion for fitness inspires people to take action and improve how they look and feel for life.

GD: Now Mike, there's so many things out there as to what works and what does not work...if you had to pick 3 things that work time and time again to get flat abs, what would they be?

MG: The first and most important thing to get control of in order to get flat abs is cleaning up your diet. Exercise is important, but your diet is king when it comes to losing body fat so that you can see your abs. There's so much confusion these days about what a healthy diet that promotes fat loss really is...after all, we are bombarded by conflicting messages in the media about what is healthy and what is not, and you have all of these gimmicky diet books about low carb, low fat, high protein, vegetarian, fasting, atkins, south beach, liquid diets, and hundreds more. There's so much conflicting info, that the average consumer doesn't even know where to start when it comes to eating for fat loss.

The second thing that works time and time again, is to focus on the intensity of your workouts and focus on working the body as a whole in order to get the best metabolic response to lose that stubborn body fat. In order to really get lean, the workouts should have a high intensity, with short rest periods, working the largest muscle groups of the body, instead of trying to isolate specific small muscles like the biceps, triceps, or calves.

For the third thing, let's talk about actually training the abs specifically. When it comes to training the abs, if you want real results, I always recommend forgetting about the crunches and situps for the most part. They are ok for someone that is really deconditioned, but most people that already have some training under their belt need a much better stimulus for their abs than crunches. Crunches are one of the abs exercises that actually provide the least amount of resistance, and remember that resistance is what develops and tones the muscles. I provide a ton of great abs exercises in my book, but one of THE highest resistance exercises for the abs, is hanging leg raises (but NOT the way you see most people at the gym doing them). The key to doing these and actually working the hell out of your abs is to curl your pelvis up as you raise your legs. Almost nobody ever does this right. To be honest, the majority of people cannot do this at first, but I provide some strategies in my book as to how to progress to doing these correctly.

GD: What are people doing wrong when it comes to developing the coveted "6 pack abs"?

MG: Well Geo, I know this sounds funny to most people, but the MAIN thing that people are doing wrong to get those 6 pack abs is...are you ready for this? They spend entirely too much time focusing on training their abs! Sounds crazy, but it's true. Remember, having a visible six pack of abs is all about getting down to a low body fat percentage. In order to do that, your workouts must focus on stimulating a fat burning hormonal environment in your body, and increasing your metabolic rate. That just does not happen when you focus too much time training a small muscle group like the abs. Instead, you must use the majority of your time focusing on training the largest muscle groups of the body like the legs, back, and chest. That's what stimulates your metabolism and the fat burning hormones that will get you truly lean and sporting a sixxer!

GD: Which exercises are the top exercises that people need to do if they are to get maximum defintion with their midsection?

MG: When it comes to developing the abs themselves, I again refer to any kinds of hanging abs exercises, as well as some good floor exercises like lying leg thrusts (all described and illustrated in my book). However, maximum definition in the midsection comes from losing bodyfat, and the most effective exercises featured in my program for that goal are various forms of swings and snatches (unique dumbbell or kettlebell exercises that almost nobody ever does in normal gyms), squats, deadlifts, lunges, step-ups, clean & presses, mountain climbers, sprinting, and other full body exercises and calisthenics. If you want great looking abs, focus on those instead of focusing so much on training the abs directly!

GD: When it comes to diet Mike, people really have tried millions of ways to get one thing...and that is fat loss. What recommendations have you used to successfully help your clients lose fat and keep it off?

MG: I have included a fully comprehensive discussion of this topic in my book, which accounts for almost half of the book, but I'll try to make some nice simple generalizations to get people started on the right path immediately. The most important thing is that your diet is as natural and unprocessed as possible. It almost always comes back to the overprocessing of food that makes it unhealthy, and makes it totally wreck your metabolism and hormone balance in your body. For example, why eat refined grains, when you can eat whole grains. Why eat refined sugar, when you can get natural sources of sugar from a high nutrient whole food like fruit. Why eat highly processed, refined, and hydrogenated vegetable oils (these are THE worst thing in the modern diet), when you can eat natural sources of healthy fats like nuts, avocados, fish, eggs, coconut milk, organically raised meat, and so forth. The point is to not fall for some gimmick like low carbs, low fat, high protein, or any other combination that has you focusing on one macronutrient vs. another. Your body needs all macronutrients to thrive and obtain a variety of vitamins, minerals, antioxidants, etc. Trying to cut an entire food group out just works against what your body needs. I get into much more detail on this vitally important topic towards losing body fat for life in my book.

GD: Thank you very much Mike for sharing with us all of this great information. For more info on Mike Geary and his internationally popular Truth about Six Pack Abs book, please be sure to visit his site below. Remember that 6-7 weeks from now, summer will be here, and if you wait until then, I'm afraid to tell you, but it will be too late!"

Visit http://truthaboutabs.com/freenewsletter.html to receive a free copy of the innovative ebook, Training & Nutrition Secrets for a Lean-Body, as well as your own free personalized metabolic rate calculator.

Michael Geary is a nationally dual certified personal trainer and author of the internationally-selling The Truth about Six Pack Abs ©2004-2006. Also, be sure to visit http://4evertoned.com for more valuable fitness tips.

Develop A Strong Core And Six Pack Abs Without Situps!

As a London Personal Trainer I often get asked how to develop a strong core and 6 pack stomach muscles. It seems that so many people are still practicing old exercises and cranking out hundreds of situps on a daily basis in the hope of reducing stomach fat and developing their 6 pack abs.

Doing regular sit ups or crunches will not only give you back problems but doesn’t really help in develping your core and revealing your stomach muscles. Our core / stomach muscles are more complex than you may think and need to be worked in three different planes of motion for optimal results. Doing regular situps and crunches is both unnatural and only addresses one plane of movement, and it’s not very good at doing that.

As well as taking the core / stomach muscles through 3 different planes of movement the body fat covering the abdominals must also be addressed. Forget the old wives tale about spot reducing fat, this simply isn’t the case, hundreds of situps won’t burn stomach fat - fat naturally comes off in layers from all over the body. The only way to reduce stomach fat is with a good total body exercise programme and by eating a healthy diet.

Remember that we all have stomach muscles waiting to be seen under our belly fat but in order to increase their size and make them more visable they need to be trained like any other body part. So, a combination of the correct abdominal / core exercises, a healthy diet and a good all over body routine will bring your 6 pack abs out for all to see.

I have found the following 6 exercises to be the best for stabalising your core and reducing potential back pain whilst bringing your abdominals / obliques to the surface.

Bird dog, Front plank, Side plank, Mountain climbers (front, out and inwards).

For full details of these exercises with photos please visit my site below.

GB Personal Training is run by Greg Brookes a fully certified Health and fitness consultant. Based in Hampstead North London NW3 he offers personal training and advice to people wishing to make the most out of their health. http://www.gbpersonaltraining.co.uk

Beach Body Abs

With the return of warm weather in the spring, thoughts can never be too far behind of the approaching summer and the many wonderful outdoor activities that we’ll often associate with it and among our top favorite summertime activities will always be the trip to the beach. Warm blue skies, refreshing ocean breezes, hot sand, cool waves and the many attempts at constructing the perfect sand castle; you can swear you’re almost there just thinking of it. But that mental image just wouldn’t be complete without also including images of hard, bronze bodies in attractive swimsuits soaking up the sun. Let’s face it, attractive physiques will always be a top draw at the beach and the abs, or midsection, is the first thing that everyone notices.

But showing off beach body caliber abs certainly don’t come easy. Successful ab training is a combination of a healthy, lean diet, consistent cardio work, and a comprehensive abdominal training plan. While all of that may sound daunting, it is certainly within your ability to attain a chiseled midsection that other beach goers will positively ogle at, and you certainly still have enough time to do so. This article will provide you with the steps you’ll need to take to help you look your beach-body best.

Diet

The first thing you’re going to have to change will be your diet. It goes without saying that even if you had the best abs in the world, it will still look pretty ordinary if a layer of bodyfat covers it. Diet plays a crucial role in defining your midsection so some modifications will be required in order for your body to look it’s best. To begin with, get into the habit of using a diet log to keep track of your meals. Everyone is less likely to cheat when they know they have to write down everything they’ve eaten each day. An elaborate journal isn’t necessary either; a simple notepad can work just fine. Also, begin switching to six small meals a day now instead of three larger ones to help rev up your metabolism as well as prevent the stretching of the stomach and the abdominal walls which occurs when one gorges themselves in food.

Next, you’ll want to start creating a slight caloric deficit each day to help burn away the bodyfat. It is recommended that you work on losing only a pound or two, a week, of bodyfat. The weekly loss of any more weight than this, for the typical person, probably includes substantial amounts of water weight and muscle tissue and can wreck havoc on your metabolism. Remember, it’s the bodyfat that’s covering your abs that you’ll want to lose so a good rule of thumb is to cut back your daily energy requirements by only around 500 calories a day.

Now if you’re not sure what your daily energy requirements are for your current bodyweight (or the amount of calories you will have to consume each day to stay at your current weight), you can use this easy-to-remember formula as a guide. To estimate your daily total caloric needs, multiply 24 times 1.0 (if you’re a man) or 0.9 (if you’re a woman) by each kilogram of bodyweight you weigh. Then multiply that result by 1.7 (for a moderately active man) or 1.6 (for a moderately active woman).

(Men) 1.7 x 24 x 1.0 x bodyweight (in kg)

(Women) 1.6 x 24 x 0.9 x bodyweight (in kg)

To determine how many kilograms you weigh, divide your bodyweight in pounds by 2.2. Remember though that this formula is only a guide. It is highly recommended that you use the formula as a starting point, and then pay close attention to your body in order to fine-tune your calories according to how your body responds to your efforts. Look at your body in a mirror, if it doesn’t appear (or feel) as if your body is losing any weight after a week or two, then reduce the amount of calories you ingest even more.

Cardio

You’ll next want to start including cardio (aerobic exercises) into your weekly routine. There are few short-term options that can burn calories and strip away the bodyfat better than sessions of aerobic activities. It is no coincidence that even top-level bodybuilders will steadily increase their cardio workouts as a contest approaches to help really bring out their muscle definition. Begin by working out 3-4 times per week for 20 to 30 minutes at a time on a treadmill or a stationary exercise bike. Then work your way up to more intense sessions of at least moderate intensity for 45 minutes or longer by weeks 3 and 4. The last few weeks before you hit the beach, you’ll want to include interval training into your routine to really help blast away the last few pounds of bodyfat.

Exercise

Spot-reducing your way to abdominal definition is a myth. It is impossible to localize fat loss over any one specific area of your body and is the reason why it is important for you to also watch your diet and include aerobic training if you truly wish to showcase some beach-body abs. But the inclusion of some solid abdominal training is still important for great abs. Strengthening the abdominal wall will tone and help reduce, if not prevent, any unnecessary sagging of the belly. Also, abdominal workouts will certainly develop the muscles of the ab (particularly the rectus abdominus and the external obliques) and enable them to easily become more visible, sharper and tight.

While there are literally hundreds of abdominal exercises to choose from, it is important that several considerations are first kept in mind before performing any of them. First, it is strongly recommended that you learn how to focus on feeling the contraction of your abs when exercising and really squeeze the muscle at the top of any rep. There are many individuals out there who lay claim to performing several hundred sit-ups per day, but it is the quality that counts here and not necessarily the quantity. Become more efficient when performing your abdominal exercises and allow the muscle do the work and do not use the mechanical involvement of other bodyparts or even momentum to help swing the body in order to complete any reps. Additionally, make sure that you maintain continuous tension while performing your reps and never allow your body to rest at the bottom of a movement. Finally, be sure to breathe in during the relaxation phase of your movements and exhale during the contraction phase of the reps.

Having now prepared yourself, choose three exercises to perform for your abs and complete 2 sets, of 15 – 20 reps on each exercise, three times a week. Once again, focus on squeezing the muscle at the top of the movement and go in a slow, deliberate manner during each repetition. Recommended abdominal exercises for beginners during their first week would be crunches (with legs supported on a bench), seated twists, and knee-ups or lying leg raises. As the next few weeks progresses and your conditioning improves, you will need to increase the intensity factor for the abs to really shine. Begin by increasing the number of sets of each exercise from two to three and then add additional, more advanced, movements to allow for up to five exercises for your abs. Recommended abdominal exercises during this stage could include reverse crunches, crunches on an incline board, vertical leg raises, medicine-ball twists and decline-bench twisting crunches. You literally have from hundreds of movements to choose from. During the last two weeks before you hit the beach, begin cutting back on the rest time between your sets and also start to include supersets of your exercises in which you complete one set of each exercise without stop.

While there are still other factors that could be included for consideration of your ab training, consistently eating a lean diet, performing cardio work and exercising your abs with sufficient intensity will always remain at its core. Put in the work on those three tenets of abdominal development and you’ll be sure to possess a beach-body that will look great in a bathing suit and absolutely turn heads this summer!

Nathan Boyd is author of the highly rated ebook, "The Fitness Lifestyle" and the current Director of Pro Fitness of Texas. Nathan encourages everyone in their pursuit of becoming physically fit and maintaining it for a lifetime. All questions and comments are always welcomed!

http://www.weightloss-cookies.com/

weightloss@weightloss-cookies.com

Learn the Truth About Weight Loss and Getting Great Abs

Debunking The Ab Myth

Ab training has been done to death but it's time to take another look. Why? Because people are still training their abs wrong so all that ab training information must not be doing the job.

1 - No Spot Reducing - Endless crunches will not melt away the fat from your midsection. It just doesn't work that way. And despite the "burn" of high rep ab exercises, you barely burn any calories while doing those endless crunches.

Your fat burning time is best spent elsewhere on more effective training. You also don't work the ab muscle intensely enough to develop it.

So endless high rep crunches fail on both counts - poor muscle building and poor fat burning. Two thumbs down as the cliche goes.

2 - The Abs are a Muscle and should be trained as such. You don't need high reps and lots of sets to work your abs. This just leads to overtraining.

Now, abs are a more endurance oriented muscle so slightly higher reps may be more effective. However, you should keep the reps at 20 or lower and work on increasing the resistance.

Yes, you should be increasing the weights on ab exercises, just like your other exercises. The stronger your abs, the better they will look when the fat is stripped away.

Ever see a really thin guy with a flat stomach but no abs? The abs haven't been trained and aren't developed enough to stand out even when the fat is stripped away.

3 - Don't train the abs - What the heck do I mean by this? Well, your abs get a lot of indirect work from other exercises so you really won't need more than a couple of hard sets of weighted crunches to work your abs.

Your abs are a factor in exercises such as squats, deadlifts, seated or standing presses, dumbbell pullovers, pulldowns, etc. Don't believe me?

Next time you work out, do a few hard sets of standing stiff armed pulldowns on the lat machine and tell me your abs aren't sore the next day. I did them yesterday and my abs are more sore than my back today.

If you want to develop a flat stomach with your abs visible, you need to treat your abs like a muscle and train that way. And you need to strip away the fat with a proper training and nutrition program designed around total fat loss, not trying to spot reduce through endless crunches.

Is there anything out there in the fitness world suffering from more misinformation that how to get abs?

The number of ab machines constantly coming to market is mind boggling. Especially considering that they aren't needed and won't give you the results that you want.

Let's set the record straight on ab training right now and give you the real information you need so you can say no to the next infomercial ab machine and yes to actual abs.

1 - Training your abs consistently will eventually give you the flat stomach or six-pack that you want.

No. It's not gonna happen if your abs are covered by a layer of body fat and doing endless sets of ab exercises is not the way to rid yourself of that excess body fat.

2 - Train your abs everyday for best results.

Again, no. Your abs are a muscle, just like your chest, lats, arms and so on. You should train your abs just like these other muscles, with progressive resistance and high intensity - then allow them to rest and recover. Never train your abs more than 3 days a week.

3 - You need to do hundreds or reps and feel the burn to get great abs.

Yep, again the answer is no. The abs a muscle just like I mentioned above. To get six pack abs you need to strip off the fat, but you also need to build the abs to get them to really pop out.

If the muscle isn't developed, you'll just have a flat stomach but no abs. The name of the game is progressive resistance for sets of 8 - 20 reps, just like your other muscles.

4 - Train the abs with lots of sets and high reps to burn off stomach fat.

You guessed it. This is also false. Spot reduction just isn't going to happen as much as we'd all like it to. You can't burn fat on your stomach by doing endless crunches.

You need to put together a proper weight lifting program, nutrition plan, and cardio in order to rid your stomach of that stubborn layer of fat and bring yout your abs.

Gregg Gillies

Gregg Gillies is a speaker, consultant, fat loss expert, trainer and author. He teaches fitness via his articles, books and courses at his web site http://www.buildleanmuscle.com . He is the author of two books: Complete information on his books, along with lots of free articles are available at his site. And while there, don't forget to sign up for his free newsletter, "Fit Physique".