Ab Myths

Abdominal muscles are really important to train. Strong abs will help improve posture, reduce lower back pain, and enable you to lift more weights for lower and upper body workouts.  

Here are some common myths that seem to float around the gyms:

Myth- I can workout abs everyday.
Truth- Abs are skeletal muscle just like arms and legs. If you do an ab workout correctly your abs need time to recover, just like arms and legs. If you work them everyday, you are actually not given them time to rebuild and get fitter.

Myth- There are specific ab exercises that help to get rid of belly fat.
Truth- Your body will lose weight where GENETICALLY you lose weight first. You CAN NOT spot reduce with specific exercises. Working total body with both strength training and cardio will help to reduce belly fat.

Myth- There are specific foods that will help get rid of belly fat.
Truth- Though some foods help to reduce bloating, no food targets weight loss on specific parts of the body.

Myth- I should avoid building ab muscles since it will make my belly stick out if I don't lose the layer of fat first.
Truth- It is very rare that you will build up your ab muscles so much that it is makes your fat bulge. Do full body strength training including ab exercises to burn calories and raise your metabolism all at the same time!

Myth- I have to do really long sets of "crunches" in order to get a good ab workout.
Truth- If you are able to do any more than 20 of an ab exercise, it is too easy. Aim for sets of 8-15, if you can do more, you need to find more challenging ab workouts. Which means if you can do 25 crunches...they are way too easy, challenge yourself!

Myth- I can soley isolate my lower ab muscles.
Truth- Even though some exercises have been shown to produce more activity in the lower abs, no exercise can isolate the lower abs without contraction of the entire rectus abdominis.

Myth- I have to do big movements to give my abs a good workout.
Truth- Abs only need to move in about a 30 degree angle to get full contraction. Doing big ab movements allows abs to become uncontracted and will result in less of an ab workout. One of the best ab workouts is a plank hold on forearms and toes not even moving!

Myth- Sucking in my abs is contracting them.
Truth- Sucking in abs is holding your breath! Contracting is tightening the ab muscles. To practice this lay on back with knees bent, put your hands on your stomach and hold a "crunch" position, this is contracting them.