Monday, February 8, 2010

How to Do Ab Exercises the Right Way

Doing abdominal exercises begins with having an exact plan of action. You do not want to start by doing 500 crunches your very first day. Here is an easy way that you can implement a plan of action over the course of several weeks that will end up providing you with the results that you want.

Week 1
The first thing that you need to do is lay on your back in a comfortable. Make sure that your shoes are off as you do not want to add any additional weight for this first exercise. To warm everything up and get your metabolism running, start by doing a bicycle abdominal routine by rotating your right elbow to your left knee in a bicycle format.

Start by doing 20 of these at a time, each one accounting for a left and right touch. Rest for about a minute in between each set. Then resume until you have completed five sets or reached 100 total exercises.
You need to check yourself at this point and see if you think you can do more. If not, stick with this exercise for the rest of the week and then add an additional one.

Week 2
The next exercise is to do simple crunches. This involves using only her stomach muscles. Your hands should be locked behind your head only to give your neck support. You should think about doing 10 crunches at a time, resting about a minute in between each set, and doing between three and five sets your first week.

Week 3
The final exercise that you should do is alternating your legs in a leg lift position. You should have both legs on the floor and lift each one intermittently holding for about 2 seconds each area and be sure to have something beneath your buttocks I can support the strain.

You do not want to go longer than 3 seconds as you hold because you will not have the muscle to support the lift and it will inevitably lead to a strain.

Week 4
After the last few weeks of doing these exercises, you should have enough basic muscle strength throughout your body and in your abdominal region to try more extensive routines. You could do full situps, and even hanging sit-ups if you have a pull of our unnecessary safety requirements to hold your feet in place so that you do not fall on your head.

Thursday, February 4, 2010

Five Tips to Help You Get Motivated to Exercise

Everyone wants to develop a great physique, carry around six-pack abs and strut off a slim figure. However, not everybody can bring themselves to do what needs to be done.

This is where getting psyched up to exercise comes in.

Get a buddy or two
One of the most effective methods to get yourself motivated to exercise is to get a buddy. Exercising with someone else makes it a social event, not just a purely physical activity. You can chat things up while you workout together, compare each other's progress and just hang out with someone while you exercise. You could even bring along your special someone to bring you two a little bit closer together.

Check your progress
Speaking of progress, it also helps to see how far you can go with the passage of time. While a lot of people say that exercise only pays off in the long run, there are a lot of things you can improve with the passage of time. Even little things like a firm tummy, a growing bicep or even a slight reduction in waist size are great motivators for exercise.

Push the envelope
Progress yields results, and another great way to get motivated is to seek greater and greater challenges. Increasing the weights in half-pound increments, increasing the tension on the treadmill or going a few extra meters on your jogging course are just some examples of how you can go the extra mile to keep yourself motivated. Push the envelope, and you will find your body getting better and stronger.

Exercise intensely
One interesting twist to exercise is to actually give it all you've got. Draw power from your muscles, twist those joints and draw deep, heavy breaths to increase the intensity of exercise. This is one great way to make exercise a more energetic and life-giving process. That and you really feel like you're exercising when you do it intensely.

Enjoy the process
While building a killer body or shaving off a few dozen pounds might be enough to get you motivated to exercise, you will quickly find the energy seeping away from you once you achieve your original goals. Learn to enjoy the process of exercising, and you will find yourself keeping your body in tip-top shape for the rest of your life.

Oh, and one last thing about exercise. It is not just about shaping the body, but strengthening the mind and spirit as well.

Simply getting up and moving your body changes you on both a biological and spiritual level. Good exercise plus good vitamins and herbs produces a certain feeling of peace and contentment when you do it right, which is mostly due to the release of endorphins as your body sweats it out. However, the mere fact that you are doing something to strengthen your body goes a long way to making you feel more confident with yourself.
So remember to keep exercising, and you will find yourself a stronger and more confident person at the end of the day!

Wednesday, January 6, 2010

The Top 5 Six Pack Abs Workouts and the 5 Biggest Mistakes You Must Avoid

Six pack abs...everybody wants them. However, very few people know how to get abs without breaking their backs and spending way too many years wasting their energy with the mis-lead information from the 80's and 90's.

If you've been working hard to achieve a sexy six pack and you're getting sick of seeing no results for all the blood sweat and tears, then read on as I dispel some of the biggest time wasting myths when it comes to effective six pack abs routines.

In other words, you're about to discover which abs workouts will actually allow you to burn the fat and feed the muscle and save you months, or even years of wasted time...

Many people believe that certain abdominal exercises must be carried out in every abs workout routine. Sadly, these same common workouts produce the least visable results. In fact, the most common abs exercise is the traditional crunch, yet according to a recent study by acefitness.org, the abdominal crunch actually came out as one of the least effective forms of stomach exercises.

So, let's cut the fat and start speaking the truth about abs. Here's the top 5 abdominal exercises as testified by independent studies, in reverse order. (drum roll please...)
  • 5. Torso Track
  • 4. Vertical leg crunch
  • 3. Exercise ball
  • 2. Captains Chair
  • 1. Bicycle crunch
There you have it, the top 5 most effective abs workout routines, with the bicycle crunch clearly coming out on top. Notice there's no traditional ab crunch or ab roller machine in the top 5 list? These are based on the amount of calories burned vs time spent doing the exercise.

Of course, it's important to remember that ab workouts like these are only one part of the six pack abs puzzle. There's a few common mistakes that people make when trying to get a sexy six pack...
  • 1. Doing the wrong ab workout routines (we don't need to worry too much about that anymore)
  • 2. Thinking that getting a six pack is only about abs routines like the ones above
  • 3. Mis-informed diet plans and thinking that by eating rabbit food, you can lose weight consistently and keep it off
  • 4. Thinking that the gym is the answer to all your tubby problems
  • 5. Making excuses to put off the effort and getting upset when you look in the mirror and can't wear that nice shirt you just bought
So, if you can avoid the 5 common mistakes and adopt the 5 most effective workouts, you now stand a better chance of a gorgeous six pack of abs this summer...and keep that flat stomach toned for years to come.

Monday, January 4, 2010

Stomach Vacuum Exercise - How to Do This Exercise Effectively

One of the greatest challenges of working out and being in shape in the modern world is being able to fit in exercise into your hectic routine. The stomach vacuum exercise is an excellent way for you to train your abs during school, work, while you're watching TV, while you're on a bus, car, or train, practically anywhere and everywhere. It's one of the easiest exercises to perform.

How do you do the stomach vacuum exercise?

It's as easy as breathing so everyone can do this. You can do this either standing or sitting if you're a beginner, and later you can do this lying or kneeling. Just sit or stand straight, exhale to push all the air out of your lungs, suck in your stomach, and hold this position.

At this moment, your stomach muscles are contracting in a static, yet powerful way. Try holding your stomach in as hard as you can for at least 20 seconds and then release and start breathing normally again. Holding for 20 seconds counts as 1 repetition, so you're going to have to do this a few times more.

Naturally, this is an exercise that takes some getting used to but it can be very effective. Most people tend to disregard the stomach vacuum as something that can't really deliver results. I'm here to tell you that it can prove to be a valuable addition to your workout routine.

The best thing about this exercise is how you can do it on dead time. When you're sitting at your desk at work or when you're driving your car, do some stomach vacuums and build stronger abs. Why not make use of this time to your own advantage. Even if you're with people, no one will notice when you're doing this exercise.

Naturally, don't make the stomach vacuum your one and only exercise. It is effective but you need to work your abs in a variety of ways to have real results. In addition, some people become addicted to this exercise and over do it. Take it gradually, build up the time on each rep, and you will slowly get better and better results.