What Is The Best Ab Exercise?

I hear this question a lot, “What is the best ab exercise?“. Men and women are looking for the best ab workout possible — they want to get that chiseled “six pack” look.

My answer to this question is in multiple parts, first off…

You Can’t Get a Six Pack With Just Ab Exercises

Hopefully this should be obvious, but ab exercises won’t make your six pack “show”… you have to burn stomach fat in order to see your abs.

You need about 10% body fat for guys to see your abs (they really show at like 7-8%). For women you need to get your body fat below 16-19% (depends on the gal). Here’s the three best ways to burn fat:

• Eat Clean – you can’t out-condition the dinner table. Eat Clean and Lower your calorie intake.
• Strength Train – Get on the DoubleYourGains’ 3-5 Program.
• Interval Training - Do interval training for your health and to melt off that fat.

Ok, I still haven’t answered the question:

“What Is The Best Ab Exercise?”

My answer is in two parts. First, understand that the abs work primarily as stabilizers. That is they work to keep your torso upright and to keep your spine stabilized. But most people work them with exercises like crunches and leg raises — not strengthening them the way they weren’t meant to be used.

So the best ab exercises are ones that you make the abs stabilize your body. Here’s my top three ab exercises:

• Heavy Squats - Squats Force you to use your abs to stabilize the weight on your shoulders.
• Heavy Deadlifts – Deadlifts Force you to keep your back rigid, strengthen your “abs” like no other.
• Planks - On your elbows, side planks, one arm-one leg planks, etc.

So you see the best ab exercises are ones you’ve probably never thought of as “ab exercises”. It’s true though, after you work up to double bodyweight squats and deadlifts you’ll notice when you flex your abs you have a VERY solid core. And the planks will work your entire core and abdominal region effectively. So there you go, now you no longer have to wonder what is the best ab exercise.