mrbroker00

Hey everyone I'm a newbie here and am very excited about the people I've already met. Anyways I needed some advice on working out my abs and the whole abdominal area pretty much. I'm about 6'0 tall and weigh about 190 and am fairly slim by nature but I guess over my past 3 yrs of college and drinking i've obtained a nice little beer belly. It wouldn't look so bad if I was a little bulkier but naturally I have kind of a basketball player frame. I love sports mainly basketball and tennis which i play regularly, but it hasn't done much for that area. I've tried doing crunches but that doesn't seem to work either. Any advice? I've heard that men who easily have fat build up in the stomach area may have it linked to genetics. I don't know??

rockzilla

You can't spot-reduce fat. Doing ab excercises won't make your gut go away, it'll just build muscle beneath it (but that means you'll have a six-pack ready to go once you've lost the fat).
If you want to lose the weight, the only answer is cardio and a good diet. There are a lot of threads here about nutrition, if you read a little, you should be able to find out a lot.

skinnymofo

rockzilla has it down - cardio and diet are key for abs followed by building ab muscles

Ala. blacksnake

I want to work out only my abs...do you think its a bad idea to go to the gym just to do a few ab workouts 4-5 times a week? Some people say that ab workouts are more effective after working out other body parts, but I don't want to workout anything else. thx for the help

Trisk

I always think it's stupid when I see people going to the gym to just do one thing and then leaving. It's always going to be more effective to work your whole body. If you want to get better abs, it's good to do other things like running so that you can gain endurance and get rid of the extra fat(muscle won't look good with fat covering it up). Plus...a lot of times different excersizes work more than one part of the body. I don't see why you wouldn't want to work out any other parts of your body. Yeah, it takes work, but when you're done, you feel better about yourself, you look better, and you're healthier. *shrug* But that's just me.

Anyway...crunches *do* work but you can't expect to see results right away. And it's good to do several different types of things for each part of your body. I'm a girl and naturally, I don't gain muscle as easily as a man...but I used to do 60-120 crunches every night for about 2 years. It wasn't until the second year that I started to see defenition. The good news though, is that once you have it, it doesn't go away easily and it's easy to get back after a break.

So...as I said to someone else, getting a trainer once or twice is good just to get some guidelines on what excersizes you should do to improve certain things and how to do them.
Still...if you're interested, I can try to describe some of the stuff I do...maybe I could even look it up and try to get a guide with pictures if I'm feeling up to it.

apeman

plus i reckon abs are the one thing you can do really easily at home ...

you may as well do something else in the gym while you're there, if only to keep your heart and lungs ticking over ... they don't impress girls but they're useful

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coash

you want abs do overhead squats and deadlifts

Cross-Over

Abdominal excercises are excellent for both basketball and tennis. It gives you a strong central support, which should enable you to feel secure in your cuts and change of directions.

I don't think its bad that you are going to the gym to just to do abs for the time being. It's best to start with a easy routine and build from there.

perth1

http://www.fatlosstips.com

"abs are made in the kitchen, not in the gym"

get your body fat to below 10% and you'll have a nice 6 pack!

greyeyes

here is a little secret that I have been using for the past two months and it has worked out great. Along with my cardio (swimming) and regular workout rutine I take a dietary supplement called CLA it's supposed to deminish the fat in the abdominal area specifically and tests have shown that it's as harmless as water (it's actually supposed to help ward of some types of cancer but they say that about alot of things). it takes some time for the stuff to work but you will see it's effects in about a month. this stuff doesent help your muscles out but it gets the obnoxious layer of fat away from the area so you can actually see the muscles. there are different companies that make the stuff Tonlin was the first one to come up with it and it tends to be cheaper from them anyway though I've tried CLA from other companies as well and it works just as well. If you want more info on it check out this webpage: http://www.wellnesspartners.com/tonalin/?s=g&p=cla that's about it, good luck.

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stevie667

It depends on their goals. Body builders will do the gym 3/4 times a week and work on different body parts, where as peope looking to lose weight will just blitz.

As said before, you need to lose the b/f% to see abs. Instead of crunches though, try them with a bit of weight (books, weight plates e.t.c), which should really help build up their bulk.

sailor

Ah, but those guys are working other parts of their bodies. Going in and only working the abs, all day, every day, will accomplish absolutely nothing. Its not going to make you lose weight, its not going to give you a six pack--at least not until you lose the fat covering it. It isnt even going to give you "core muscle" benefits--there are other core muscles that also need workin. Working only one part of the puzzle doesnt work.

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stevie667

I agree with you there, working one muscle constantly will do nothing, and may actually be bad for any muscle growth in the first place.

st33lr4t

Nutrition is key. You need your body fat % in the single digits which can be achieved by proper diet and cardio. you also need to bulk your abs up which will be achieved by a proper diet and weight training.

train your abs just like you would train any other muscle in your body. i do 4 sets of decline crunchs for 8 reps and also throw in 1 set of leg raises for 8 reps two times a week. all these are done weighted by holding a plate behind my head or for the leg raises i use leg weights.

ive done the billion crunches everyday program and didnt see anywhere near the results that i am getting now.

go check out www.bodybuilding.com and read the forum for yourself.

limey

One thing I thought I should mention here is that you have to be careful how often you work your abs. Alot of people will tell you that they work their abs everyday and do 100's of crunches each time. While this may be good for some people, it has to be said that abs are like any other muscle that you work on. They need to be worked using good form, technique and they need rest afterwards. To me, doing 100 crunches at a time, everyday tells me that you're not applying enough resistence or your form is not correct and you're deffinately not allowing them to rebuild and grow stronger. Putting several weight plates on your chest for resistence and really concentrating on holding the squeeze at the top of the mottion is key. Doing cruches slowly and really focusing in on the muscle is much more effective.
Having said that, if your doing something that works for you, then stick with it.