When looking to get a solid and visible six pack, it takes a lot of hard work and dedication so the last thing you want is to find out that you’ve been making big mistakes in your efforts to achieve your goals. Here are 6 of the top mistakes that people tend to make in their journey to rock hard abs.
1. Insufficient Resistance
As with your other muscle groups, the abs are best trained with resistance. Doing endless amounts of crunches is not going to build impressive abs. Weighted abdominal exercises that limit you to just 12 to 15 solid reps are very beneficial if you really want some solid definition in your midsection.
2. Lack of Intensity
Something you truly want is never easily earned and the same goes for abs. You need to work them hard with intensity to get results. The abs, like any other muscle, need to be trained with similar intensity to other areas of your physique.
3. Poorly Timed Reps
The best type of repetitions required to train the abs properly are slow, controlled reps. Pay careful attention to achieving a full range of motion from stretch to contraction, with a tight squeeze at the peak. Fast reps will do nothing to overload the abs and will more likely just result in injury as well as a complete waste of your time.
4. Wrong Choice of Movements
Just like when you train other muscle groups with various movements that work them through various planes of motion, the same needs to be done for your abdominals. A good ab training plan will incorporate exercises that hit the abs at different angles. They can start with the lower midsection before moving on to an upper ab movement and you should always include a twisting exercise at the end as it is necessary to develop the external obliques and intercostals.
5. Core Not Involved
You’ve probably heard this from others, such as personal trainers, but the most effective way to work your abs properly is to engage your core. Everything goes through your core and apart from other health and muscular benefits, involving your core in every possible way when training your abs will work them harder and make your abs visible much quicker.
6. Trapping Your Feet
When doing certain exercises such as crunches and similar movements where you lock your feet into place, you are actually shifting most of the emphasis away from the abs and onto the hip flexors. This can also result in lower back pain over time. Let your feet be free and focus on keeping them in place as your core works harder to help out.
