Thursday, January 29, 2009

The Best Ab Workout Is A Full Body Workout

By Jose Loni

The best ab workout is a full body workout. We are always exposed to media ads of ab exercises and machines that promise great looking abs by training the abs directly. The fact of the matter is, the best ab workout is a full body workout that emphasizes increasing the body's metabolism, by training with weights, interval training, monitoring what we eat, and managing our stress.

Training the abs is good to help increase the strength and stability of the abdominal and lumbar area. However, spot reduction is not effective to achieve six pack abs. By training many segments at once, we force the body to burn fat, which will help expose the underlying abs in the stomach area.

Using resistance training to train many body segments at once will help to increase the body's metabolic activity. The resulting lean body mass causes the body to utilize and burn excess body fat to fuel the increased muscle activity.

Interval training has been effective in increasing the metabolism of the body to utilize the excess body fat and burn it as fuel. The quick, high intensity intervals force the body to increase its metabolic activity. It makes the muscles more efficient at burning fat, which continues to burn fat well after the training session has stopped.

Controlling what we eat will help our body's metabolism by helping it utilize the food we eat to fuel our physical activity. Eating food made up of complex carbohydrates and lean protein allows our body to fuel its metabolic activity. By avoiding fatty foods, sugar and carbonated beverages we can monitor the calories we take in and allow our body to use it as fuel. If we take in too many calories, the excess calories are converted and stored as fat.

Another way to keep our energy level constant throughout the day is to increase the number of meals we eat to 5-6 small-portioned meals. In doing so, we stabilize our blood sugar level and be better able to fuel our physical activity.

Decreasing the stress in our lives is an effective way to prevent further fat storage in our belly area. When we experience stress, our body releases Cortisol, a hormone that causes fat to be stored in the abdominal area. This fat is stored there to be used during a time of emergency.

A full body workout is much more effective to get ripped abs than isolated exercises that just target the abs. By making changes to our exercise program and incorporating resistance and interval training, monitoring what we eat and managing our stress, we can truly achieve six pack abs.

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