The quickest way to get visible six, or even eight pack abdominal muscles and a flat stomach is to:

1. reduce your body fat percentage (Can be tough)
2. exercise your stomach (Easy)

To make your abs visible in the fastest time possible, you really… no, you HAVE to lose fat, or more accurately, you HAVE to reduce your body fat percentage. Development of the ab muscles does not require much time or effort in comparison to reducing body fat, so I have kept the focus of this article on body fat. However, tips on training the abs are provided on the linked articles at the end of this article.

Body Fat Reduction to Make Six Pack Abs Visible

For your abs to be visible:

• Men – body fat percentage needs to be less than 11%
• Women – body fat percentage needs to be less than about 16%

Weigh yourself first thing on a morning before breakfast and also calculate your body fat percentage. Body fat measuring scales are reasonably accurate if you follow the instructions. Other ways of measuring body fat percentage are reviewed here. Now you can work out how much you need to reduce your body fat percentage by to see your abs.

The amount of time that this takes obviously varies per individual. The majority of people reading this article are probably less than 35 years old and have a bodyfat percentage of less than 25% (men) and 30% (women). For that category of people typical body fat reduction of 0.5% to 1% per week is possible.

Further Information About Ab Training and Fat Loss

Rather than re-write existing articles that make perfect sense, please refer to our Supplements for Six Pack Abs article, our How Do You Get a Six Pack article and our 11 Tips For Sustained Weight Loss. These articles will give you the information needed for you to implement a training and diet programme that will lead to the quickest way to get six pack abs. Remember though, consistency with your diet and training is the only way you will ever achieve this goal. Let me know how you get on, or if you have any questions, leave your comments below.

Regards,

Martin.

So You Want a 6 Pack?

Six Pack Abs

The average person probably does not want to look like a bodybuilder, probably far from it. In general, the majority of people probably just want to increase their overall tone, strength and fitness. Having toned six pack abs is probably the biggest goal for most people. Training for a six pack is easy and it only takes a few weeks for the muscles to develop… the hard part is burning off the fat above your abs to make them visible. To make your abs visible, your body fat level needs to be reduced to around 8-10%.

Reduce your body fat using these Diet Tips

To reduce your bodyfat to reveal your abs, you have to do the following with your diet:

1. cut out all sugars from your diet
2. consume the same amount of calories every day (about 12 times your bodyweight in pounds)
3. split your daily calories over 6 equal calorie meals
4. increase protein intake
5. drink 8-10 glasses of water per day

Bingeing on sugary foods, drinking beer, missing breakfast, etc. will stop you getting any results, so don’t do it. Consistency is the main thing when reducing body fat. Aim to lose around 1% body fat every fortnight and do not judge results by your weight. You may lose 2 pounds of fat, but gain 2 pounds of muscle in a week, resulting in zero weight loss, although this would still be good progress.

Getting there now… Just add a little Exercise!

The above diet advice, when followed 100% would improve your physique. However, the diet would work better still when combined with exercise. Subtle changes could make all the difference. Here are some tips:

1. Perform aerobics 3-5 times per week, first thing on a morning before breakfast, but after a cup of green tea (no milk or sugar). This could be as easy as taking a brisk walk to work instead of driving – aim for 20-30 minutes.
2. Perform anaerobics 3 times per week. This means go to the gym and lift medium to heavy weights. Only use multiple joint exercises, performing just 10-12 high intensity sets per workout. Each set should be 8-12 reps, each lasting 4 seconds, with no stopping or locking out. Complete your workout within 45-50 minutes and consume a post workout shake immediately after your workout.

If you feel as though you are getting too muscly, just raise the number of reps that you do on the weights to 12-15, meaning you will then be targeting different muscle fibers that do not get as big.

…And finally, use Supplements to make your goals more Achievable!

There are 3 parts to this advice, i.e. diet, aerobics and anaerobics. Your diet is probably the hardest part to follow and is where most people would fail. To counter this, I would suggest eating a small bowl of unsweetened porridge with semi skimmed milk and/or water every day for breakfast and using a low calorie meal replacement shake for when you do not have the time or effort to eat a proper meal. It is surprising how well meal replacement shakes can satisfy your hunger, so give them a try if this is something you struggle with. I personally recommend CNP Professional’s meal replacement products, with Pro-MR suitable for men and Pro-MS suitable for women. Let me know how you get on, or if you have any questions.

(Note: the above advice is based upon vast amounts of research and experience, both personal and external and will work. I haven’t backed up my recommendations because it would have made this article 4-5 times as long and people would lose interest)

Regards,

Brian

Made simple, you need to do 2 things to obtain chiselled looking 6 pack abs:

1. Reduce your body fat level to less than 11-12%
2. train your abs

Training your abdominals is quite easy, you just need to perform 2-3 resistance exercises to a very high intensity on your abs 2-3 times per week. Typical exercises include crunches, weighted crunches, dumbbell pullovers and leg raises. By the way, other exercises, such as deadlifts, squats, pullups and rows all involve the use of the abdominals as secondary muscles. Aim for 10-12 reps, with a smooth, slow rep cadence.

Reducing your bodyfat to under 11-12% can vary in difficulty depending upon the individual. If you are around 15% bodyfat, you should be able to train towards a good, visible 6 pack within 6-8 weeks. However, if you are more like 20%+ bodyfat, then it is obviously going to take longer. Either way, consistently following the Top 10 Fat Loss Tips will lead to continued fat loss, whilst retaining muscle mass, leading to a 6 pack in a matter of months.

Anyone can achieve a 6 pack, but it takes time and consistency with your diet and exercise. There are many myths going round about getting a 6 pack… here are a few of them:

Myth 1: Doing crunches gives you a 6 pack!
Whilst doing crunches can improve your abdominal muscles, no one is going to be able to see those muscles unless you reduce your bodyfat level as stated above.
Myth 2: Doing crunches reduces bodyfat on your stomach!
You lose bodyfat in a way that your body allows, usually from your stomach, then your arms, then your legs. Your body loses fat in this way to achieve optimum balance and centre of gravity. Although it was shown in recent studies that crunches can stimulate fat loss on your abdominals, the effect was shown to be insignificant. You would therefore be much better off following the Top 10 Fat Loss Tips for fat loss.
Myth 3: You can get a 6 pack in 7 days!
You see this sort of article all over the internet and in magazines regularly. It is obviously rubbish. The only possibility is that it could be written for someone with water retention, who already has a low body fat percentage and that it is promoting the use of diuretics, which may be unsafe. People write these articles to gain traffic on their websites, or to sell magazines. Don’t be fooled by them!

Regards,

Brian.