In the last post we discussed the many reasons full body resistance training ought to be included in your flat abs workout plans. In this post we’ll talk about the other side of the weight loss workout equation, interval training. But before we discuss how interval training flattens the abs, let’s look at how it differs from the traditional long cardio sessions. 

Traditional cardiovascular exercises like jogging, biking, and rowing at moderate speeds were considered the optimal ways to lose belly fat. The reason? Doing stuff for a long time burns more calories than not. Pretty simple. And most of us are aware that people that tend to do long cardio sessions on a regular basis tend to have flat abs. Why then would I recommend your workout plans take a different format that this? Because having flat abs and getting flat abs quickly are not the same thing.

First of all, it requires a great deal of strength and fitness to carry ones body at a moderate speed for 40 minutes to an hour without stopping. Most of us could not dream of this without considerable resistance training for strength and working up to that duration over several months. Fortunately for those of us who would want fast results and get bored with doing the same thing for an hour, long cardio sessions are not the quickest path to flat abs.

Interval training blows traditional cardio workouts out of the water when it comes to fat loss. Most of us know that if we walk quickly for an hour we burn around same amount of calories as if jog at twice the speed for a half an hour. So we try to take the easy way out and go the low impact route. What they don’t tell you is that calories burned while training isn’t the whole story. It is possible, and indeed probable with interval training, to burn fat around the clock from a 20 minute session rather than simply to burn calories while at the gym. This should excite those whose workout plans aim to produce flat abs in the shortest amount of time and with as little time training as possible.

Interval training is a combination of moderate and intense cardiovascular training within the same session. If running, a typical interval session may begin with a 5 minute warm up, followed by 3 to 5 sets of a 1 minute sprint (a speed you can sustain for only a minute to a minute and a half) 2 minute jog combo, and finally a cool down of 5 minutes or so. If you’re doing 3 sets of the interval segment, this workout takes less than 20 minutes. But this is an intense 20 minutes, and much harder than jogging for 40 minutes to an hour at moderate speeds; at least on the body if not the mind.

The real benefit of including interval training in your workout plans is that it puts your body in a fat burning state long after you’ve finished training, at times up to 48 hours after training. And assuming you have a healthy heart, interval training will serve to make it stronger, as well as tone the legs, midsection, and other locations with saggy skin. Clearly a fat burning program that works around the clock is more conducive to getting flat abs than 50 minutes of fat burning at the gym.

Our bodies will, after some time, adapt to out cardio training, just as it will to resistance training. The only way to avoid adapting, and so plateauing, is to increase the intensity or structure of the workout. Interval training allows us to structure and restructure our workout plans frequently in order to keep our bodies from adapting to workouts. This keeps the body growing, adapting, and drawing on stored body fat to meet inconsistent energy requirements.

So not only is interval training effective, it’s also efficient. Three to four sessions a week will result in flat abs in no time. It can be done by jogging outdoors, on an elliptical, circuit training with moderate weights, a bicycle, or kickboxing, so there is no good excuse not to include it in your flat abs workout plans.

Good flat abs workout plans will not actually focus on the abs. The abdominals are important muscles to develop, but they are unique in that they receive indirect stimulation from nearly every other exercise. Despite this fact though, people still attempt time and time again to bring out their abs through countless crunches. And again, if focused on sexy abdominals, flat abs workout plans must be designed to reduce all around body fat, rather than act as a one step solution to midsection woes.

So what do flat abs workout plans need to include exactly? There are two indispensable components of training for flat abs. The first is resistance training for muscle development and increased metabolic rate. And the second is interval training, which will be the key component in fat loss, as well as an over all metabolic supercharge. So what kinds of exercises are best for resistance training?

The best kinds of exercises for all around fitness, and for flat abs in particular, are total body compound movements. In fact, there are probably only 5 essential lifts that take care of more than 80 or 90 percent of your resistance training needs. These 5 will stimulate virtually every major muscle group, as well as most stabilizing muscles. The easiest way to conceive of them is by understanding what our bodies are designed to do.

Our chests, arms, and back, are designed to push and pull respectively. Our legs are designed to squat and stand, and our shoulders are designed to lift our arms over our heads. The 5 major lifts work every muscle involved in these basic movements. The first lift is the good old fashioned bench press… or pushups for someone with less strength. For the back one can choose either pull-ups or bent over rows. The arms are worked in both of these movements, as the triceps support the pushing movement, and the biceps support the pulling movement.

For the legs we use the squat. This can be done with bodyweight or a bar bell. Your body should drop so that your thighs are parallel with the floor. This exercise works every major muscle group in the legs. This exercise is supplemented with the dead lift, a total body lift which provides the simple task of picking heavy things up off the floor safely. This exercise works the hamstrings and quads, the lower, middle, and upper back, and the traps.

And the last lift is the shoulder or military press. Grab a barbell and starting at your collarbone, push the bar straight overhead. These 5 exercises, if done in sets of 3, 8 to 12 repetitions, are enough for anyone to stimulate muscle growth as well as set the path for flat abs. At more advanced levels these exercises should be combined into supersets, where two exercises are performed back to back before a 1 minute rest is taken.

Notice here that I don’t have any abdominal exercises. That is because they are rather unnecessary in producing flat abs. Low body fat is 95% of the flat abs game. And if you reach a low enough body fat, abdominal exercises may help you to build a little shape, but they will not help you flatten the midsection. In the next post we’ll look at the other component of our flat abs workout plans, interval training.