by Jeff
(Texas)
QUESTION: I exercise a lot. I have reduced my obliques and abs, but want tighter abs. What can I do to get that washboard stomach. I'm a male, 36 yrs old.
ANSWER: Glad to hear that you've had some success in reducing your obliques and abs. That's a good start. In order to take it to another level you'll need to continue to lose fat. The key to getting washboard abs is a low body fat level.
Diet is 90% of a six pack. I like the Abs Diet For Men, but whatever healthy eating plan that can get you down to a 10-12% body level is fine.
Getting tighter abs is the easy part compared to the diet side of the equation. I don't know what kind of ab workouts you're doing now, but like most people, it probably includes a lot of crunches.
Believe it or not, you can get a six pack without doing a single crunch. My own ab workout includes only one set of crunches on a stability ball. Research has shown that in most real life activities the ab and core muscles work much more as stabilizers to stiffen the torso and prevent motion in the trunk, rather than movers of the trunk and spine.
So I would focus on ab stabilizer exercises. They are more functional and effective. Exercises such as the plank, the side plank, plank on a ball, and the ab wheel (or ball rollout) are the key ab stabilizer exercises. They make up 90% of my own ab workout. I also do the swiss ball jackknife and mountain climbers, along with push ups with my hands on two medicine balls. This works your core to an incredible extent.
In 5 minutes of work these kinds of exercises can strengthen your core, tone your abs, and protect your back more than 10,000 crunches can.
You can see how to do some of them in the video on this page- Best Ab Workout
Spend 10-15 minutes doing these exercises, 3 times a week and you can have a strong core, toned abs, and a six pack.....IF you can get your body fat low enough. That's still the key.
Get started and good luck.
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