Quote:
Originally Posted by
Gibonius 
Situps are not an effective way to get a six pack.
It's true. Simply focusing on abdominal workouts alone will not yield a six pack. The truth is, your abs are already there--they're probably just covered up by a thin sheath of fat. When you work out a muscle, it gets bigger. So, if your abs are covered up, but they're getting bigger, it will essentially make your gut look larger. Who knew?
What you want to do is build upper and lower body strength. The more muscle you have, the faster your basal metabolism (resting metabolism) will be. This last summer I got on this workout routine that had me doing 5 sets of 15 pushups with 4-5 different variations, so you end up getting up to about 300-350 pushups in a given session. Obviously, work into this! And on the alternate day, I would do pull-ups. The workout also calls for 5 sets of 15, which I found that I couldn't do (I'm currently working at sets of 12), so instead I got on a LAT pull machine and worked up my shoulder strength before hitting the pull-up bar.
Here's the link for the "Gorilla Workout": http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1608/is_3_18/ai_83343019/
Additional notes: I find that pull-ups are the single best abs workout, as well as just killer for the full body. I did push-ups on Monday, Pull-ups on Tuesday, rested on Wednesday, and then Push-ups on Thursday and Pull-ups on Friday. Men's Health also has great ideas for whole-body circuit workouts. Those are great because they also keep your heart rate up so that you can get a good cardio/lift session. Also, make sure you flex your abs and butt when doing these push-ups. Engaging your core in this way will keep your form good. And that's very important.
Best of luck in your washboard endeavors!
Edited by DJ Jazzy Jeff - 12/23/11 at 11:12pm
