When was the last time you saw a male model without perfect abs? The famous "six-packs" ... Even women are becoming trendy with a six-pack. It has become a must in this world where “how you look” is the most important thing... This shows that you are young, fit and ready to make an effort to get what you want. In any case that's what many people think .. But is this really the case?
Alas, equality is not of this world, even less as regards the abdominals. Some can eat fries without this veiling their belly, others will never see them without a super strict diet and a maximum of sports. Where do you stand? This is the right question to ask before embarking on the quest for this mythical goal.
Know that there are several factors that will influence your abdominal visual performance. First, genetics: Each of us has a basic metabolism, consisting of a caloric intake that allows us to stay as we are and meet the energy needs of our body. It is different for each of us and varies according to our profession, our occupations, in short our daily calorie expenditure.
How can we know that? The best solution is to go see someone who can help you determine it. It's possible to do it yourself, but it's not easy to do. You must proceed by trial and error. There is no recipe to determine a basic metabolism, but we can look at the person's morphotype, his level of sports training and his eating habits. From there, according to his experience, determine a diet according to the objectives of the person. So it's totally empirical. Moreover, I do not think that there is currently a way to scientifically determine, absolutely and without mistake, the basic metabolism of an individual. After 15 days of dieting, you have to check the body measurements and the body fat percentage of the person and correct it slightly to stay on track with the original goal.
So, if you choose to be followed by a dietary coach, choose someone experienced, who has already proven results if you do not want to wait too long before seeing your abs.
Once you have determined the number of calories you need, just be a little bit below to lose fat. If you are too much below, you will start losing as much muscle as fat, if not more. In fact, a body that feels lacking will protect itself. You do not meet its' needs. From then on, it will eliminate everything that costs it energy to adapt to the caloric intake you give it. And what costs it energy and can be safely eliminated is the muscle! It will also eliminate the muscle before touching the fat stocks that represent a long-term security. Do not forget that it is the muscle that burns your fat. So the less you have, the less you can burn your fat supplements!
We must try to deceive this mechanism of muscle catabolism. How can we do it? First, stay just below your caloric needs, perhaps, a hundred calories depending on the individuals. Then, depending on the results, decrease very gradually your calorie intake.
Also try to stimulate muscle growth by practicing bodybuilding.
Use cardio to burn fat. Preferably after training or while fasting in the morning. I do not know of any studies that confirm that cardio while fasting works better, but I can tell you that a lot of athletes have progressed with this option. Sometimes we have to trust the experience of our elders rather than one or the other random study published on the internet. However, cardio is better after training than before, Indeed, your body has 4 energy sources at its disposal: ATP (adenosine triphosphate), creatine, sugars and fats. Overall, you use each energy source at different levels depending on how long the effort lasts. First, the ATP, the first few seconds, then the intramuscular resuscitator empties quickly. Then it is the creatine who intervenes to make this ATP essential to the muscular contraction, but after ten seconds, all the stocks are also emptied. Carbohydrates, or sugars then take over to produce energy. These sugars are present in muscle, blood and liver. They manage to fill energy demands up to 15-20 minutes of effort. After, finally comes the fat.
To do a good bodybuilding workout, you need ATP, creatine and sugars. So when you have exhausted your reserves in your bodybuilding session, you will soon burn your fat when you do your cardio. Conversely, you will have to wait a little longer to get fat burning when you start your session with cardio. And you will have exhausted a good part of the energy sources needed for a good session of muscle afterwards.
What cardio should you do to be effective? This is a question that is often asked. Forget the cardio "good conscience". Have you ever seen these people in your room? They pedal on their bike reading a book, typing sms or surfing the internet. For me, it does not help much, they are not even breathless. When asked why they are not trying harder, I always hear the same answer: "I stay at 60% of my maximum heart rate to burn more fat." Get out of your comfort zone, because this statement that we hear for years is false! It may be true that you are burning fat directly, but it’s so little with such intensity of the effort! A real cardio is a cardio where you do not watch your heart rate, but where you listen to your breath. If you can still speak normally, it's because the intensity is not strong enough. Because, sure, it is true that you will draw on your reserves of sugars, creatine and ATP, and also fat. But for your body to bring back this kind of energy and burn the stocks, it will have to burn a lot more fat than with a moderate effort. It does not matter whether you're cycling, jogging or cross-training, it's intensity that's the key word!
It seems obvious that apparent abs cannot be obtained without local bodybuilding. Basically, to have abs, you have to do crunchs! If you have abdominal fat, and it has been around for a while, it may be that once the blood has brought the fat into the fat cells and they are filled, the body will close the small cappillaries leading to the cells and thus prevents the fat from emptying from these cells. So local toning is needed to reopen these small capillaries. It is useless either to do 5000 crunches per day without doing the rest.
If you want to speed up the fattening process a bit, you can also take a fat burner or carnitine. The RIPTEK V2 thermogenic fat loss activator in this perspective is a non-negligible aid. But if you do not do the rest, you throw your money out the window hoping for a miracle.
In conclusion, to get a nice "six-pack", you need to train, control your diet, do cardio and make crunches, if, of course you do not have the chance to have one naturally.