abdominal exercises

Toning Stomach Muscles

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If you are working on toning stomach muscles, here are a few things to think about.

  1. Not everyone is born with the same set of abdominal muscles.
  2. Toning muscles involves stretching as well as exercising.
  3. Swimming is the best single exercise for toning stomach muscles.
  4. It is easy to strain your back doing abdominal exercises

Abdominal Muscles:

That’s right. Some of us simply don’t have a pyramidalis muscle. This means that no matter how hard you go for the washboard effect, you will not have the same number of bulges. You’ll get the six pack, but not the 8 pack.

Why are abdominal muscles different in some people? Doctors simply do not know. Consider that this will not just influence the all over number of toned muscles, but the lack of a pyramidalis will influence your ability to strengthen lower abdominals, as well.

Stretching:

Building exercises and toning exercises are not exactly the same thing. While you won’t get toned stomach muscles without a workout that isolates this muscle group, you won’t get the tone without doing a lot of stretching, as well.

People often neglect this as part of a routine. These are some of the easiest and most rewarding exercises to do. They are great for warm ups. As any athlete or aerobics instructor will tell you, they keep you from straining. Arm stretches, leg stretches, bending and twisting are all good ways to limber up before you hit the weights or machines.

A little Yoga added to your routine, with its exaggerated movements, can save hours of discomfort with torn or strained muscles, later.

Swimming:

The best addition to any routine that has focus on toning muscles is swimming. It is not only an all over good workout, with fantastic cardiovascular benefits, but it stretches and works those stomach muscles like no stationary exercise can. Almost every muscle in the body is used in swimming.

If you think it isn’t what you want or you don’t have time to add it to your routine, just look at those professional swimmers’ bodies. They all have long, lean torsos, with well defined abdominals and v shaped bodies. They got those bodies by swimming!

Not only is swimming really good for you, it won’t hurt you. Swimming is considered passive exercise. That means less strain on muscles and organs.

Risk of Injury:

Most crunches can be brutal on your back muscles, so don’t add more than 2 additional repetitions to your current routine at one time. That is repetitions and not sets. When you add a new set to your abs routine, do it by adding 2 reps until you fill it out.

If your back hurts, use a brace, or switch to just ball exercises. You don’t have to stop completely, just modify. Check to see that you are doing your exercises correctly, as this can lead to strain faster than anything.

A little common sense and effort will keep you toning stomach muscles till they look great. Just keep these 4 important things in mind.

Build Lower Abs Fast – 3 Steps to a Full-proof Exercise Plan

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People come up to me all the time and tell me how hard it is for them to build lower abs. As I probed into their fitness regimen, I learned they all had one common mistake – they’ve got the abdominal exercises down, but they either leave out the cardio or neglect to eat the right kinds of food.

Any successful fitness plan would involve working the whole body and not just your abs. Also, exercising your butt off is never enough; eating healthy plays a big part as well.

You can have all the workout equipment on the planet, hire the best trainers, join all the prestigious gyms, and still not build lower abs if you don’t include ALL 3 steps in your exercise plan:

  1. Follow a low fat diet;
  2. Perform regular cardiovascular exercise; and
  3. Execute targeted lower abs exercises.

Doing one without the other two will do you some good. But that wouldn’t be enough, would it. Imagine what you can achieve when you do all three.

Cutting down on your fat intake will allow your body to burn stored body fat. Before your muscles appear to be cut and well-defined, you need to get rid of the layers of fat that are covering them.

To build lower abs effectively, include a lot of whole grains, lean meats, and a few good fats in your meals. Here are some food items that you can stock up on the next time you go to the supermarket:

  • Leafy greens
  • Colorful veggies (e.g. carrots, peas, cauliflower, bell peppers, asparagus)
  • Brown rice
  • Tofu
  • Fresh fruits (e.g. berries, apples, bananas, oranges)
  • Beans
  • Nuts

Stay away from fatty, processed, and starchy foods; they can only set you back from your goal. Here are some things you must avoid in your diet:

  • Junk food
  • Deep-fried foods
  • Soda
  • Candy
  • Beer

To reinforce your diet, you must stick to a good cardiovascular routine. Doing cardio 2 to 3 times a week will definitely help you build lower abs fast. These holistic exercises help build muscle mass and increase metabolism.

Full cardio workouts include running, walking, swimming, and yoga. If you feel like doing something new, try out a workout video. There are so many to choose from.

The last and final step to build lower abs is directly targeting the muscle group itself.

Standard crunches and full body crunches are two of the easiest, most effective core-specific exercises you can do. Performing these exercises 3 to 5 times a week at 20 to 25 reps per exercise will definitely speed things up.

If you’re really serious about your exercise plan, you can successfully build lower abs by including all three steps. Besides, it only takes about 30 minutes to an hour to complete your cardio and abs exercises, and even less to think about what to eat everyday. Stick to your program and you’ll get ripped abs sooner than you think.

The Best Exercise for Lower Abdominals

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What is the best exercise for lower abdominals? I’ll tell you right now, the secret doesn’t lie on the “what.” Instead, you should be asking yourself this: “HOW can I maximize my lower abdominals workoutso I could get six pack abs fast?”

The physical fitness industry rakes in so much money, it’s not even funny. Why? Because people like you and me will do almost anything we can to look good, and that includes spending money on gym memberships, dietary supplements, workout tools, and exercise equipment.

You’ve probably been so focused on your midsection that you’ve neglected other parts of your body. Any successful fitness goal – whether it’s building upper arm muscles or, in this case, toning the abdominal muscles – requires you to work your WHOLE body. That’s why some abdominal workout equipments don’t give the best results when used alone.

A complete fitness plan cannot only involve the best exercise for lower abdominals. To ensure well-rounded progress, you need to integrate all three aspects:

1. Low-fat diet;

2. Regular cardiovascular exercise; and

3. Core-specific exercises.

The way you eat will always affect the way you look and feel. If you exercise but eat fatty foods and neglect the essential nutrients your body needs to build muscle, you’re only setting yourself up for failure. This is why a low-fat, healthy diet is very important.

Eliminate or at least limit your intake of unnecessary carbs and fats. Instead, pack your diet with vegetables, fruits, lean meats, and whole grains. Stop obsessing about the best exercise for lower abdominals for a second and think about eating frequent yet small and healthy meals.

It is a fact that following a low-fat, low-carb diet alone is also not enough. You need to work out 3 times a week for about 45 minutes to an hour for you to increase your metabolic rate and, ultimately, build muscle.

Cardiovascular workouts, such as jogging and swimming, are vital to a complete fitness plan. I, myself, pop in a fitness video and workout from home if the weather isn’t ideal. You can easily do the same.

After considering your diet and your cardio workout, you are now ready to put those abdominal muscles to work. What then is the best exercise for lower abdominals?

Leg raises have been tried and tested by people from all walks of life. It’s very simple to do AND you can get so much out of it; it’s unbelievable.

All you need to do is lie flat on the floor, place your hands on each side, and raise both legs gradually until you reach a 45 degree angle. Then, lower your legs back down to your original position. Remember to tighten your abdominal muscles all through out the exercise.

To add a little variation, you can either push upward with your hips when your legs are completely perpendicular to the floor, or grip a ball in between your shins as you perform those raises.

Remember these 3 steps – diet, cardio, and the best exercise for lower abdominals – and you will surely get a solid fitness plan that WORKS.

Great Abs In A Month

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If you want to have great abs in a month, there are 3 things you need to do.

  1. Workouts
  2. Diet
  3. Activity

Most people believe they can get by with joining a gym. You can, if you eat moderately and work out four times a week for six months. But, if you want great abs in a month, you need to put in a little more effort.

Everyone else thinks that exercise and diet are all there is to it. That is the biggest part, but not all. There’s another great strategy – it won’t give you great abs in one month, but it will help. Let’s cover these 3 first.

Workouts

Always start by warming up. Body stretches that focus the abs with side twists and front and side bends are good. Don’t cut this short. At least 15 minutes of just warming up will double what you get out of your routine, and help you avoid muscle strain and soreness.

Throw in some aerobics. Pick something you can do in 20 to 45 minutes, that gets blood circulating and burns calories as well. Jumping rope, swimming, using the rowing machine and regular aerobics are all good for your heart and your abdominal muscles, as well.

Now you are ready for the leg lifts, crunches, ball crunches, curls, bicycles and weights. A good gauge of what you need is to try doing ten. Whatever you can do is a set for you.

Do one set of each. Rest, stretch, walk around, then do one more of each. The next time you start, your set will contain one more of each exercise. Repeat this till your up to multiples, then switch off to something more intense.

If you’re a female, you might try just leg lifts or reverse crunches instead of standard crunches. They are less hard on the neck, a frequent point of strain for many women due to anatomy.

And diet?

You are going to get out of it what you put into it. This doesn’t mean you should starve, but if you don’t reduce your caloric intake to less than you burn each day, you won’t lose a pound. Since most extra pounds are fat, you need to shed them to expose those abdominal muscles hiding underneath.

Recommendations:

  • give up desserts and junk food
  • reduce bread and other starchy foods, like pasta and rice
  • increase vegetable and fruit intake
  • increase your water consumption

Other activities

If you don’t know it yet, the gym or mat is not the only place to give yourself a good workout.

You can:

  • spend a few hours on a weekend morning walking the dog.
  • take up rowing, swimming, hiking, rock climbing, just for a start.
  • stretch every chance you get. This means at work, also – some isometric exercises require no more than resistance, like a wall, and they’re great for abs.
  • walk to the store instead of driving

Note: There is one more thing that is important, and that’s your posture. If you slump or lean when standing, you will never look fit, no matter how much time you spend exercising. Think good posture all the time.

  1. Sit up straight in your chair, at work and home.
  2. Imagine a cord that lifts you from the top of your head. Let it pull you up, stand tall and then relax.
  3. Think posture when you work out and you’ll get more out of your exercise and avoid back strain, as well.

Most exercise outside of the gym is free, and it will keep you healthy long after those abs have turned into washboards.

3 Advanced Techniques on How to Build Abs Fast

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How to build abs fast…frankly, there isn’t just ONE way to do it. If that was the case, no one would be clamoring for workout secrets anymore, and we’d all have killer six packs by now. Sadly, we are quite a ways away from that ever happening.

The truth is that there are numerous exercises created to build lean abdominal muscle, and each one is effective to a certain degree. Common human error states, however, that exercising is all you have to do to get six pack abs. This is where most people make that mistake.

There are a number of factors on how to build abs fast. “Targeted abdominal exercises” is certainly one of them. Your main focus should be with the PROPER EXECUTION AND FREQUENCY OF ABDOMINAL EXERCISES.

Each abs exercise targets a specific zone in your midsection, and doing them the right way will ensure your muscles are getting the attention they deserve. Perform these exercises correctly, 3 to 4 times a week — that’s exactly how to build abs fast. Just concentrate on keeping your abdominal muscles tight with every rep and set.

For you to effectively target your abs with these exercises, you will most definitely need to get rid of excess fat that surrounds your upper and lower abdominals. Before you can do a house paint job or renovation, for example, you will need to take out the “clutter.” This is where a LOW-FAT, LOW-SODIUM, LOW-CARB DIET comes into play on how to build abs fast.

Take a look at the way you have been eating and, more importantly, WHAT you have been eating, then ask yourself this: “Is my present diet holding me back from my goal?”

Aside from staying clear of bad fats, decreasing your sodium and sugar intake will also have a positive effect on your fitness goal. Drinking plenty of water and eating well-balanced meals can definitely help turn that flabby belly into toned, washboard abs.

To know more about healthy portions and well-balanced eating that’s ideal for your body time, I recommend a guide that’s NOT another diet book but rather a long-term eating strategy that’s both realistic and effective. Click here for a guide that shows you how to eat to automatically burn fat while eating REAL foods – not rice cakes and diet water…lol!

CARDIOVASCULAR OR AEROBIC EXERCISES is another good technique on how to build abs fast. Not only do these exercises burn fat fast and help tone your abs, but they are also very good for the rest of your body, like your heart and other muscle groups.

Taking your bike out for a spin or running around the block before you go to work are two simple yet easily adaptable cardio exercises you can do.

These three techniques, combined with much discipline and determination, will only take you to great heights. Six pack abs can be a reality for you. Who knows; maybe next time, you’ll be coaching others on how to build abs fast.