Friday 2 October 2009

The Abs You Want and How to Get Them

By Courtney M Chason
Forget basic ab routines that consist of crunches, crunches and more crunches. For six-pack abs you must curl them, bend them and twist them, this will work all angles and keep your abs guessing and keep progressing. You must think about what your abs or core go through everyday, they are used for everything you do from standing to sitting, bending over, twisting etc. If you think about it that way, you have to see that it would take a lot to shock these muscles. You can not just do endless sets of crunches and think they are going to respond. This may build endurance in the muscle but it is not going to challenge the muscle into growing and become stronger.

Also building your abs and your core muscles will also help other muscles become stronger. If one part of your core is weak this can hinder other lifts that require you to have weight above your waist such as dumbbell presses, squats etc. This can also lead to injury, which no one wants because then you will have to take time off and then start all over again.As you can see, by leaving no angle untrained will help in the overall development of not just your abs or core, but the entire body.

Instead of focusing on specific areas of your abs, the real key to developing them is by choosing exercises that cause you to bend, twist, and curl all in the same workout.This workout lets you thoroughly engage all the muscles by letting you pick your own exercises for the midsection.By doing this you will have worked your abs through all planes of motion which creates a better ab workout that gets results.

For this workout you will need to pick one exercise from each category to make up your routine. Once you have done that here's how to perform the routine.
Do your first move for as many reps as you can, then immediately move on to the second and third exercises, performing as many reps as you can for those exercises. Repeat this cycle 2-3 times.Switch up the moves about every third workout to keep the abs guessing, also do not be afraid to add a little weight.

CURL IT:

Elevated Ball Crunch
Double Crunch
Standing Cable Knee Raise
Weighted Bench Crunch

TWIST IT:

Bicycle
Twisting Sit Up
Weighted Crunch With Twist
Windshield Wiper

CURL IT:

Side Bend
Side Plank
Side Bend With Weight Overhead
Oblique Crunch

Good luck with your new routine and look out abs!

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