Complete abdominal routine

Over the last year or so, I have been approached by several people asking about my ab routine. Training questions come in a variety of forms:

How many sit-ups do you do a day?
How often do you work your abs?
Do you combine cable crunches with leg raises?

Sometimes questions come with a little flash. For example, “do you eat… do you eat food?” or “so how big is your waist?” Theatricality aside and regardless of form, people are essentially asking the same question: how can I get abs worthy of the stage or the beach?

In the vast majority of cases, I think interested parties seek me out to recite a list of exercises like an infomercial seen on late-night TV. Do 1000 cable crunches, 1000 scissor leg raises, 9 minutes of front and side planks and finish with an hour of shirt soaking HIIT cardio 3 times a week AND YOU WILL HAVE ROCK HARD ABS TOO.

Honestly, I think the aforementioned ab routine, as crazy as it sounds, would be easier to digest than the cold reality I hit people with. And this is the reality: great abs are made in the kitchen and NOT in the gym. Boom!

After dropping this bomb on people, you can see the light in their eyes disappear. Well, not really, but you can clearly see the disappointment. Leading a healthy lifestyle is hard work. It takes dedication, consistency, and a willingness to give up adult treats and drinks. Sounds fun, right?

Infomercials have done an amazing job of making people think they can get rock hard abs in less than 6 minutes a day. The truth is, you can’t just hack your way into an awesome core. It is impossible.

If you are still reading this article, don’t give up. I’m not all doom and gloom, as the recipe for building great abs is pretty straightforward. And, it all starts with diet. In fact, many people, including myself, believe that 80% of building a great body is diet.

So here are the steps:

Step one: Determine the number of calories you need to “run” your body
Second step: Create a caloric deficit to burn body fat
Step three: Participate in exercises that develop your abs.

Now that we know the process, let’s go through each step in detail.

Step one: Determining your calorie needs

Are you ready for a tougher love? I hope so because it’s about to get rough.

Food is fuel. Period. Food is not a pleasure, nor is it a consolation. You need to start thinking of food as the building blocks of fats, carbohydrates, and proteins. And, each of these macronutrients is made up of calories. Fats are 9 calories, while carbohydrates and proteins are 4 calories each. Once the depersonalization of food is complete, you are ready to organize these building blocks for your diet.

Cover model extraordinaire Greg Plitt has a great video online that explains how to determine your calorie needs. The video can be found at http://vimeo.com/17389252. In this video, Greg provides calculations to determine his base calories, which is the sum of his static calories plus his metabolic rate calories. Before starting the video, he may want to grab a pencil, paper, and even a calculator if his math skills are rusty. And, if you’re like me, you’ll have to stop and rewind the video several times to get the calculations right.

After doing the calculations in the video, I determined that I needed to contribute 3,140 calories per day. Here’s an example of how I spread those calories out over 8 meals:

Only me: 10 egg whites, 2 whole eggs, 2 slices of Ezekiel bread, 2 tablespoons almond butter, coffee
Meal two: 3/4 cup of oatmeal and 2 scoops of protein power
Meal three: 9 oz turkey and broccoli or asparagus
food oven: 8 oz chicken and broccoli or asparagus (1 sweet potato on high carb days)
meal five: 1/2 oatmeal with honey
Meal six: 3 scoops of protein
Seventh meal: 9 oz turkey, chicken, or fish and broccoli or asparagus
Meal eight: Depending on the calories needed: protein shake, eggs, or even a tablespoon of almond butter
Water: 1-2 gallons per day

Depending on various factors (eg allergies, personal preferences, cooking skills, etc.), your diet may look drastically different than mine. However, there are some fundamental principles to keep in mind when developing your own diet, including the following:

1. Make sure you consume at least 1-1.5 grams of protein per pound of body weight
2. Stay away from processed foods
3. Drink at least a gallon of water per day
4. Eat every 2-3 hours

Step Two: Create a Calorie Deficit

Once you determine your base calories, you can subtract 500 calories to lose weight. For example, if my daily calorie goal was 3,140, ​​my new goal would be 2,640 calories. By creating a caloric deficit, your weight and body fat will decrease over time.

When I’m trying to lose body fat, I reach my caloric deficit through a combination of reduced calories and increased cardio. For example, I will decrease my food intake by 250 calories while doing cardio to achieve an additional 250 calories of output.

Step Three: Build Your Abs

There are a plethora of exercises you can do to develop your abs and strengthen your core. The core is “complex” and must be trained directly and indirectly. Indirect exercises would be compound movements, such as squats and deadlifts, in which the torso is involved to stabilize and protect the spine.

When performing direct exercise, you should focus on all three parts of your abs: upper, lower, and sides. Some of my favorite exercises to work the abs are:

Cable Sit-ups (top)
Scissor Leg Raises (bottom)
Side planks (sides)

If you follow the steps above… YOU WILL ALSO HAVE ROCK HARD ABS.

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