core

[Guffy]

hi all I was wondering if I could get some input on a killer abs routine as my stomach is flat and no abs showing. I want to tray and change this as I am going to mexico in a few months, any advice would be appreciated.
thanks

 

[bigirck]

Bringing your bodyfat % down will give you the best visible abs. The skinniest guys can still have abs if they are lean enough. My advice is continue to train hard but focus on your diet and bring your fat mass down.

 

[Guffy]

ok well I am taking CLA and am at a calorie deficit. so getting by bf down a couple % shouldn't be too hard

 

[George Spellwin]

Hi guffy, bigirck highlighted the #1 step towards getting killer abs - focusing on your diet, which you seem to be doing. What's your body fat % like? You can have a flat stomach and still not be lean enough to show abs - 7-8% should get you there (or very close).

As for training, there's really no magical routine in my opinion, and I like to mix it up with a lot of different exercises. Not sure if you're mainly doing non-weighted ab exercises, but you'll want to work the medicine ball and weights into your routine to bulk those abs up if you want them showing in a few months.

 

[Guffy]

thanks ill start doing more weighted ab exercises and ill try and get down to 7ish percent I am currently at %12 bf

 

[H_T_]

Doing weighted abs won't do shit. Always annoyed me when I saw this. Guys with the 500 lb. Squat always have the stronger core, yet guys will sit for hours doing hundreds of reps not building muscle and not doing cardio....

 

[Bobaroman]

I had ok abs my whole life. I've done ridiculous reps (1600 sit-ups nonstop) before being introduced to weighted abs and more extreme abs exercises, that was when I was about 40. I've been doing abs like that ever since because that is what increased my ab muscle thickness.

One of the first weighted ab exercises was just adding dumbbells or curling bars while doing sit-ups, and doing crunches on the pull down machine.

Then I found the wheel. Started with 20 reps, then 30 and so on till my normal was 3 sets of 100. I maxed at 150 nonstop till someone said "hey I bet you can do those standing". Started at 3 or 4, worked up to doing 3 sets of 10, going further than 10 would tear me up so I'd be down for over a week on them. Then something happened this spring and my #s started going up. Current best is 21 straight at 54 yrs old. The last 3 are brutal.

About 7 yrs ago someone showed me a dragon flag. I've been doing those ever since. Same as the standing wheel rollout, was stuck at like 3 sets of 10 till this past spring when my numbers started going up. Current best is 25 in a minute. Here's a link that shows the dragon flag.

http://challengers.guinnessworldrecords.com/suggestions/4192

Current routine involves 3 sets of standing wheel rollouts, 3 sets of dragon flags, 3 sets of windshield wipers and then 3 sets of hanging straight leg leg lifts, all till failure.