Have you ever had abs?

The abs is the one area where it would be worth the investment to hire a good personal trainer. I have been doing sit-ups for a long time now and not getting anywhere; I just got some advice on better ab exercises (the plank, for instance, which I think originated as a medieval torture device). A huge part of ab strength and look is the obliques and lower back, which no weight machines can really get to and none of our old gym class calisthenics addressed. There are so many newfangled exercises and core workouts that it's almost impossible to sort out what works from what doesn't on your own.

 

I have a four-pack right now, but can't get rid of enough fat to get the bottom two. And it's only when I tighten them -- if I just stand there, you see the vertical side lines, but not the horizontal. I figure I'd need to drop around 10 more pounds to get those final two. I may give it a shot -- just need to do more cardio I think. I've got a pretty good ab workout routine, so I know the muscles are well defined under that last layer of fat.

 

This.

Had a well-defined six-pack during the peak of my high school and college cross country running career. Stopped running after college and the sportswriter diet and all the beer have caught up quickly.

 

I still have 'em, but I am an avid runner who does a lot core training ( 500 sets of ab work at least daily, usually closer to 750 and sometimes up to 1,000), I watch what eat, don't drink that often and when I do I avoid hard liquor. The trick is to break up the ab workout (don't do just one routine) and do it quickly ( ie, not a lot of lag time between sets)

FYI, I was a fat little kid, and no man on my father's side of the family has lived past 70, so I have a little incentive to stay healthy.

 

Too endomorphic for abs. Abs are one of those things that is more about body type than anything else. It's a lot harder to build abs than it is arms/legs/shoulders, etc.

 

I read recently that, for what I guess you would call evolutionary reasons, the midsection fat is always the last to go. Makes sense to me — it's easier for the body to carry the weight at its center. Right now I'm trying to cut my caloric intake (and fats) and keep up the regular exercise. But no, I've never had abs, and while I'm trying to tone up, I don't expect to ever see them.

Also, everyone keeps mentioning ab exercises. But I've also read that, if you need to reduce your gut, those don't necessarily help. Those exercises build up the muscles there, so if you're not also losing gut with cardio, etc., the sit-ups and things won't do much good. Is that true?

 

I had a great six pack through high school, but it slowly started to fade away during college. Worked out less, ate like crap, and my metabolism started slowing down.

If I lose 10 more pounds, and work out a lot, I bet I could get them back. But maybe not. I'm not sure. I'm going to try though.

 

I never had them before, but I do now.

It has happened thanks to weight-loss surgery two years ago, followed by a regular, pretty hard six-day-a-week exercise regimen since then that is varied but includes lots of core and cardio work at varying paces.

That's also coupled with strict diet control (small meals of high protein, low carbs, even fewer sweets, and with no grazing, and never any alcohol).

 

In a word yes. It has to be a total package.