[rastra]

anyone know some good workouts for these areas? i have a lot of trouble losing fat around there and regular situps do nothing

[y498yates]

Unfortunately, you can't target one spot like that.  Only diet and cardio will get rid of the fat…

With that said, there are some cool abdominal exercises that are more fun than regular sit-ups.  On of my favorites works like this:

1. Lie own on your back
2. Make sure you have enough room to tilt your legs all the way to the left and all the way to the right
3. If you have a partner – grab your partner's ankles and point your feet straight up into the air at a 90 degree angle
4. Ask your partner to try to push your legs to the floor and mix it up – some pushes to the left – some to the right – some straight down
5. Your goal is to bring your legs back up to the start position as quickly as possible
6. If you don't have a partner – try to simulate this on your own to the best of your ability – it still really works!

This hits all of your abdominals as well as your obliques.  It's a great exercise – especially for people who are tired of the traditional sit-ups and crunches.

[alisathemom]

If you want to take your hips out of the movement, try this:

Do standard crunch, but cross your legs, Indian style. You can also, do oblique crunches this way too. If you are like me, you might need to add some light weight to the movement. I use anywhere from 12-25 pounds. Just hold a dumbbell or plate across your chest. Make sure you are using your abs to lift your weight. Make sure you hold the contraction at the top for a count of at least 1 full second.

Also, doing standard crunches on an ab ball is awesome (and fun). My biggest problem with the ab ball is that my kids keep stealing it! My husband also dribbles it around our bedroom to annoy me.

LOL

[alisathemom]

Oh yes, to add to the comment about fat loss to abs…

overall fat loss is the only way to reveal the muscles that you have gained in your stomach. this sucks, but it's the way it is.

running is the best cardio. it's free and convenient. you can also keep yourself from being bored by running in interesting places.

[rastra]

ok thanks for ur help..ill try these out and see if it helps!

[y498yates]

If you live in a warm weather state, try swimming instead of running as often as possible.  Your knees and lower back will be much happier with you in the long run! [no pun intended]

You can also check out a site like ediets.com.  It's amazing how much you learn about portion control when you are strictly following a diet that has been designed for you.

[Anonymous]

As the smarty smart YATES already said, you can't target that area (and Yates, I was being serious, not sarcastic. You are no dummy!). You have to lose fat all over.

That said, I'll tell you what I do. If any of this sounds too simplistic or common sense, then I'm sorry. I'm just assuming that you know zip about abs and writing it so you aren't left with a million questions.

You will be training two ways: endurance/speed, and strength. You want the strength to make them show, but the endurance to make them useful. On endurance days, use NO weight, and do each exercise 20-30 times (20-30 reps), then rest for 30 seconds, and do it again. Do each separate exercise twice (2 sets).
On strength days, put weight on your chest (a plate weight will lay flat), and make sure it’s a weight that’s so heavy you can only do the exercise 5 times (5 reps). Take a 15 second break, then repeat. Do each separate exercise twice (2 sets).
The exercises are the same for endurance and strength, you just need to adjust the weight and repetitions based on what you’re doing. Do strength one day, endurance the next, and take a day off. Keep this pattern.

Upper Abs
Upper abs are easy to target: just do a half-crunch. Lay on your back, knees bent, feet flat on the floor. Put your hands on your upper abs (not your head or neck), and using only your upper abs, pull yourself up about 8-10” off the floor. Repeat.
Do one set like this, then do one set where you are laying at an angle with your feet above your head (you need an angled bench for this. If you don’t have one, put your legs over your bed or a chair, and then do this exercise).

Do 6 sets for your upper abs.

Lower Abs
There are so many exercises for this. They all involve lifting your legs, bending only at the hip, with your knees straight and toes pointed forward. On strength days, use leg weights.

Exercise 1: leg lifts. Lie flat on your back with your hands under your butt (palms on the ground). Lift your legs as high as they will go, then lower them slowly.
Exercise 2: leg hold. Lift your lower legs 6” off the ground, hold as long as you can.
Exercise 3: lady pleasers. Same as leg lifts, except you do the splits when your legs are up, then bring them together and return your legs to the ground.
Exercise 4: knee lifts. Hang from a pull-up bar with your knees bent. Lift your knees up so you’re in a sitting position, lower them and repeat.

To challenge you:
1. When doing reps, do not return your legs to the ground, stop them 6” above the ground and repeat your rep. Only touch the ground when you finish a set.
2. Lay on a bench with your legs hanging off, and do leg lifts and lady pleasers from below the horizontal.

Do 6 sets of low abs (do 1 set of each, then do 1 set of the hardest exercise for you, and 1 set of the 2nd hardest).

Obliques (side abs)
These are fun to work!

Exercise 1: Side bends. Holding a dumb bell in each hand, keep your back straight and lean to your left side. Then, using your right oblique muscles, pull yourself up so you’re standing up straight. Repeat on the other side to make one rep.
Exercise 2: twisted sit ups. Lay on your back, knees bent, feet flat on the floor. Put your hands behind your head (don’t interlock your fingers), and do a sit up. On your way up, twist your right elbow to meet your left knee. Go down, then come back up to put your left elbow on your right knee. This is one rep.

Challenge: When doing twisted sit ups, stick your legs out in front of you 6” off the ground instead of with your feet on the floor and do the same exercise with your knees meeting your elbows.

Do 6 sets of obliques (3 sets of each exercise).

All abs
Finally, you work them all!
Exercise 1: incline sit ups. On an incline bench, lay on your back with your feet at the high point and your head at the low point of the bench. Put your hands behind your head (don’t interlock fingers), and sit all the way up.
Exercise 2: advanced incline sit ups. Do an incline sit up, but instead of having your hands behind your head (or holding a weight), hold a heavy or light object (depending on the day) over your head with your elbows straight and biceps on your ears. Sit up, and keep your upper body totally straight.
Exercise 3: sit ups. These are the regular sit ups on the floor. During speed days, put your arms across your stomach with your hands holding the opposite bicep. When you come up, stop when your forearm touches your thigh, and when you come down, do NOT come all the way down, just stop when your shoulder blades touch. At FIRST, it will feel easier, but you will feel a burn soon.

Do 6 sets of abs (2 sets of each exercise).

Lower back
You have to work your lower back or else your posture will be awful.
Exercise 1: good mornings. Put a barbell across your shoulders, behind your head. Knees locked, feet together, bend at the waist with a straight back until you are at a 90 degree angle (or as far as you can go, just don’t go past 90 degrees). Come up slowly. This is one rep.
Exercise 2: dead lift. Put a barbell on the ground in front of you. Knees locked, feet together, bend at the waist with a straight back to pick up the weight (if you need to, bend your knees to reach the barbell, then lock your knees). Stand up slowly, come back down slowly, and repeat. This is 1 rep (it’s the opposite of the good morning exercise).
Exercise 3: superman. Lay on your stomach, legs and arms locked to make a straight line (like you’re flying forward). Lift your right arm and left leg slowly, then put them back. Lift your left arm and right leg slowly, put it back. This is one rep.
Exercise 4: low back extension. You need a setup for this. It’s a machine with no weights called the low-back extension. If you do not have access, you CAN make your own. Get a bench and a belt long enough to wrap around your ankles AND the bench. Lay on your stomach with your belly button hanging over the front (half of you is off the bench). Cross your arms over your chest, slowly go down, then slowly come up past the horizontal. This is one rep.

Do 6 sets of low back (do 1 set of each, then do 1 set of the hardest exercise for you, and 1 set of the 2nd hardest).

[Fonk]

I read that full sit-ups are better than crunches for your abs because they're going through a wider range of motion. It certainly feels to me that sit-ups work my stomach muscles more than crunches.

Good luck getting those stomach muscles showing! 🙂

[The_Pimp_NeonBlack]

I's have always favoured diet and exercises that focus on core strength in order to train and tame my's abdominals.

Dieting always go first because, in my's experience, if you do certain training and exercise reigimes before you diet and lose a certain ammount of weight, your abdominals tend to fill the area of the fat and still retain the same basic shape of the stomach fat whilst becoming stronger. This can be seen in many Western Martial artists and strongmen.

Core Strength training means exercises that focus on strengthing your chest, back and stomach through non-weight lifting methods. The basics of these can be found in many high energy martial arts -especially compedative Wu-shu and Capoeira– and dance were fast paced and acrobatic movement is essential.

My's favourite exercises including the "hang-lift" -where you strap some light weights to your ankles and suspend yourself from a bar via your hands, the crooks of your elbows or from artpits (with your arms going back over the bar) and hold yourself in a completely vertical postion for as long as you can. As you progress, you begin to lift your legs (using your abdominals and lower back only) or pull your arms up so your abdominals and back and tensed and hold yourself again. And "upside down press-up" -were you simply go into a hand stand and hold yourself for a minute. After a minuet has passed, you press yourself down like a push-up and then hold yourself again. The challange is to see how many you can do, going as slowly as possible.

Those exercises may not work for you or you may be, for whatever reason, unable to do them, but you have be supplied with many others that are bound to work. All you need to do is experiement with what works best for you and stick with it.
All the best to you, dear Rastra, in your endeavour.
Peace
The Pimp NeonBlack

[alisathemom]

I read that full sit-ups are better than crunches for your abs because they're going through a wider range of motion. It certainly feels to me that sit-ups work my stomach muscles more than crunches.

Good luck getting those stomach muscles showing! 🙂

Actually, you use your hip flexors in situps and take the intensity off the abs. Standard crunches are tops.

[Author]

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