How To Actually Get Abs This Summer

Summer is almost here, which means beach body season is right around the corner.

Do you want to look great with your shirt off at the beach?

Imagine every time you walk on the beach and take off your shirt, you feel everyone around you staring at and admiring your body…

If this is something that interests you, (why wouldn’t it?) then we have some news for you.

If you want people to gasp when you take off your shirt then there is something that you need to have…

You need to have defined abs. 

Yeah, having huge arms, broad shoulders, and quads like tree trunks are nice to have.

Working on becoming more muscular is always a great goal to have.

But you can have the biggest, most well-defined arms in existence, and it still won’t turn as many heads your way as a sleek set of washboard abs would.

Here’s something that we (and everyone else at the beach) can all agree on:

Having defined abs is sexy.

There’s something about having abs that loudly proclaims: "Here is a person who is healthy, athletic, and on top of their game!"

However, there is a huge misconception about how to get abs, and how revealing them is done.

Contrary to popular belief, you already have abs, and if you can’t see them, how many crunches you do during each workout is almost completely irrelevant as to why.

This is because even if you know how to train your abs, it will do nothing about the fat sitting on top of your abs.

Typically 10% body fat is the benchmark where will you start seeing a six pack of abs popping out.

But not many people ever reach this level of body fat because they’re too busy wasting their time doing crunches, instead of learning how to cook and eat properly.

Now, this is the important part…

Your Abs Are Made In The Kitchen!

Even if you stopped lifting completely, you could maintain visible abs because of one thing specifically: DIET.

This is why super-skinny guys who don’t even work out are able to have a six-pack—because of their low body-fat %—whereas some other guys who hit the gym for years are never able to even get a little ab definition to shine through.

It doesn’t matter if you train your abs every single day for years doing thousands of crunches, leg raises, oblique crunches, etc.

If your abs aren’t visible, then you need to get your diet in check.

No amount of ab training will make up for the slabs of fat sitting on top of your ab muscles.

In reality, it’s not how strong you are that affects how your abs show.

All that is holding you back from seeing those chiseled abs that you actually have is a pesky layer of blubber.

So If You Want To Get Shredded Abs, Where Do You Start?

Fortunately, there is a simple solution to get shredded abs.

You are going to need to turn your body into a fat burning machine.

The most important aspect of doing so is to ensure that you are always in a caloric deficit.

There are 2 main ways to accomplish this:

1. Calorie Restriction (AKA eat less)
2. Increasing Calorie Burning (AKA exercise more)

Calorie restriction is when you eat less calories per day than normal.

Makes sense, right?

How you figure how how many calories you should eat per day is by first finding out what your maintenance calories are.

Use this calculator: https://www.freedieting.com/calorie-calculator

Type in your information and you will receive what your daily maintenance calories are.

For example, if you are 28 years old, 6 feet tall, weigh 185 lbs & exercise 5 days a week your maintenance calories = 2,711.

Your maintenance calories refers to the amount of calories you need to eat per day to STAY THE SAME.

To begin losing weight (healthily) you should take your maintenance level calories and subtract 300-500 calories from that amount.

Which using our example would be anywhere from 2,111 - 2,411 calories per day.

(For a more conservative approach, start with 300 calories, dropping weekly by 100-200 calories as weight loss stalls.)

How you choose to break up those calories are up to you.

You can go on a low carb diet, low fat diet, carnivore diet, keto diet, paleo diet, IIFYM, etc, etc.

Do whichever diet you like and whichever diet has the greatest chance of you sticking with long term.

The one thing I will point out is to make sure you're eating enough PROTEIN per day (shoot for 1g per 1lb of body mass) so that you don't lose too much muscle as you slim down.

Increasing calorie burning is when you exercise more per day.

There are many different ways to do this.

The most common (& one of the most effective) ways to do this is to simply start stacking cardio on top of your existing workout routine.

After lifting weights in the gym, hop on the treadmill or elliptical for 20-60 minutes, 2-3 times per week.

On your off-days from lifting make sure you get in 1-2 solid cardio sessions for 30-60 minutes. Keeping your heart rate elevated the entire time. 

Alternatively...

• You could opt to do daily 30-60 minute walks. 
• You could take the stairs instead of the elevator.
• You could do HIIT workouts, go swimming, go bicycling or whatever else sounds interesting to you.

The point is to raise your heart rate and keep it raised for an extended period of time. 

As you plug away each day, lifting hard and eating right while in a state of calorie deficiency, your body will start melting fat off your body.

Eventually, once your body fat levels have reached a low enough point, your abs will start to become visible.

(Usually starting at ~10% body fat and becoming more pronounced the leaner you get!)

This is not the result of doing millions of crunches, but rather it is the result of proper nutrition and getting rid of the fat that was covering your abs.

Moral of the story?

If You Want To Get Abs, Then You Need To Lose More Body Fat.

It’s as simple as that.