PERFECT ABS NOW !

Most Effective Ab Exercises

here’s a quick look at the most effective ab exercises:

• Lying leg raises
• Hanging leg raises: knee ups, bent leg raise, hanging leg raise, feet-to-the-bar bent leg raises, swinging side-to-side bent knee ups
• Planks: regular, side
• Ab wheel
• Renegade rows
• Hip bridges & back bridges: not ab exercises, but useful to counteract the effect of bending the spine forward

All of the exercises listed above can be used in anyone’s workout routine.  There’s no reason why men and women can’t perform the same workout.  However, women generally seem to prefer a flat stomach with some definition whereas men want the fully defined six pack.

Best Ab Workout for Women

Here is the Flat Abs Workout from Abs Blueprint 1.0.  It might not look like much on paper but it’s pretty challenging and will help women develop that nice bikini body without getting overly defined abs.

• Lying leg raises: 5 sets of 20 reps
• Hip bridges: hold for a few minutes
• Planks: 2 minute regular plank, 1 minute right side plank, 1 minute left side plank

Best Ab Workout for Men

Here is the Deep Abs Level 1 Workout from Abs Blueprint 1.0.  The idea is to perform a stabilization and ab flexing combo exercise followed by a fatigue exercise and then a density exercise.  It concludes with a stabilization exercise and bridges.

• Feet-to-the-bar bent leg raises: 5 sets of 10 reps
• Swinging side-to-side bent knee ups: failure
• Renegade rows: 5 sets of 3 reps
• Planks: regular plank for at least 2 minutes
• Hip or back bridges: 5 minutes

My Ab Workout

Like all good workouts, Abs Blueprint 1.0 provides enough flexibility to structure your own routine.  I like to maximize the use of my time through supersets.  As a starting point, I include renegade rows as part of a superset with standing shoulder press.  Then I perform the following ab exercises and bridges:

Superset 1:
Feet-to-the-bar bent leg raises or hanging leg raises with weights: 3 sets of 10 reps
Stand-to-stand back bridges: 3 sets of 10 reps (these are outlined in convict conditioning)

Superset 2:
Swinging side-to-side bent knee ups: failure
Ab wheel or planks: at least 2 minutes

Superset 3:
Lying leg raises: 3 sets of 20 reps
Neck bridges: 3 sets of 1 minute

Improve Mind-to-Muscle Link

In addition to the above workout, I’ve decided to add in some morning abdominal exercises to improve my mind-to-muscle link.  This will naturally increase the tone of your abs.  Abs Blueprint 1.0 recommends performing this type of routine for no more than 3 weeks at a time to avoid overtraining. 

• Farmer burns stomach flattener
• Stomach vacuum
• Regular plank
• Side planks
• Shifting endurance planks