10 Minute Abs for Christmas!

Fit woman in Santa hat showing her abs.
Photo by wavebreakmedia @ Freepik.com

Who’s ready to shred their abs!?

Turn your core on fire after this quick 10 minute ab workout! This is a quick core training circuit to get your abs, obliques and lower back toned just in time for Christmas!

In today’s article, we present you a program that specifically targets the abdominal section and will provide you with great results in a very short time. We found this astonishing and extremely simple exercise that will help you dissolve your belly fat just in time for two weeks!

Could this promise possibly be true?

Scam 10 minute abs workout advertisement

My social media feeds are being littered with bogus ads such as the one above. If you think ten minute abs is too good to be true, move up to the front of the class. If you believe that you can achieve nice abs in ten minutes, I have a bridge to sell you.

Some of these ads might lead you to a website where they will give you some basic ab exercises, and some will lead you to downloading their app. Either way, before you click on any ad that seems to be too good to be true, it is. No one is ever going to develop abs with a ten minute workout. These people make huge promises, and then somewhere along the way, they take your money and disappear.

First and foremost, in order to gain visible abs, you can exercise for ten minutes per day, or 60 minutes per day. Either way, visible abs are going to require, most importantly, that you get your nutritional habits under control first. Everyone has abs, the problem is, they are hidden by a layer of fat. This fat must be burned off either through a caloric deficit by eating fewer calories, or you will need to burn those calories through exercise. The problem with burning fat through exercise is, most of you do not realize what it takes to burn enough calories to make a difference.

Your body fat has to be low in order to see your abs!

For men, if you’re around six to 17 percent body fat, your abs should be noticeably visible.

For women, the range is 14 to 24 percent body fat. Definition will start to show on the higher end (17 percent for men, 24 percent for women), and your abs will become more sculpted as that number lowers.

Short workouts are not going to give you abs!

Attaining actual visible abs is a result of a wholesome, healthy diet coupled with vigorous exercise. If there is a layer of fat covering your abdominal muscles, you could basically do leg raises and crunches every day for months and you will  never see a bit of difference. You can’t crunch away jelly donuts my friends!

 What you weigh means little when it comes to your abs. Getting six-pack abs is not just a weight-loss game, it’s a body fat percentage game, meaning if you want to see true six-pack definition you need to get that body fat number down. You can weigh within the healthy BMI range and still be what is referred to as “skinny fat”. Or in other words, your body fat percentage is still too high.

If you can’t achieve visible abs, it could be that you simply don’t have the genetics for it. Some people are naturally prone to carry more abdominal fat, and even if they get down to leaner levels with ripped arms and legs, the abs still don’t show through. Couple that with the fact that genetics plays a principal role in determining the shape of the abs and the way they look on the body, and you’ll realize that if you have genetics working against you, toning your abs is going to be an uphill battle.

Abs are made in the KITCHEN!

Your kitchen is a great place to start building abs. It’s important to fill your diet with lots of nutritious, whole foods, such as fruits, veggies, whole grains, healthy fats, and high-protein items. There is no getting around this. It’s highly important to focus on overall fat loss rather than spot reduction, which involves targeting a specific area of your body, such as your belly, for weight loss or fat burning. Targeting a specific area of the body for fat loss is not possible.

The easiest and most efficient method of getting visible abs is to quit your intake of sugar-sweetened drinks, fried foods, alcohol, sugary snacks, and refined grains. That might not be what you want to hear, but the bottom line is, this is what you are going to have to do. This is more important than doing crunches and leg lifts which really do not burn many calories over ten to even thirty minutes.

Exercise is an important component to visible abs.

Yes, exercise is important, but you have to keep in mind that you can’t out-exercise a bad diet.

Adding cardio to your routine can help burn calories and increase overall weight loss to help you get abs more quickly. Resistance training will take your efforts even further. When you workout, you are using your muscles. This helps build muscle mass, and muscle tissue burns more calories – even when you’re at rest – than body fat.

Your body fat percentage matters because ten pounds of lean muscle would burn fifty calories in a day spent at rest, while ten pounds of fat would only burn twenty calories. The most effective way to increase metabolism and burn more calories is through aerobic exercise and strength training.

Talk to your doctor!

If you are overweight, and out of shape, have a discussion with your doctor regarding your weight loss, health, and fitness goals.  If you have certain medical conditions or are taking certain medications, there may be activities that you should avoid.

Unfortunately, weight gain is a complicated process. It is often a combination of your genes, hormonal controls, diet composition and the impact of your lifestyle, including sleep, physical activity, and stress. All of these factors result in an imbalance in the energy equation of calories consumed verses calories burned. You gain weight when you eat more calories than you burn. This is true of almost everyone with the few medical exceptions such as Cushing’s Syndrome or Hypothyroidism.

While it is true that some people seem to be able to lose weight more quickly and more easily than others, everyone loses weight when they burn up more calories than they eat. To lose weight, you need to create an energy deficit by eating fewer calories or increasing the number of calories you burn through physical activity or both.

If you want six pack abs by Christmas, let’s think about next Christmas starting right now. If you want six pack abs by this Christmas, you missed the boat, it sailed away long ago.

Best Exercises for Six Pack Abs!

3 Comments Add yours

  1. I love to see you debunk those ads, David, and I love your concluding statement.
    Happy holidays to you and yours!

    1. David Yochim says:

      Thank you so much Dolly! I pray that you and yours have a great Hanukah!

      1. Already did, and I thank you, David.

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