BEST Way to Get 6 Pack Abs (AT HOME)

Check out my client Jeff’s transformation where he gained 6 pack Abs

If you really want to develop a 6 pack, but you don’t belong to a gym don’t worry. Because even though having a gym membership will give you access to a wider variety of machines,

most of the long-standing tried and true ab exercises that get you the best results don’t actually require a gym.

By performing the right exercises and by following a solid meal plan there’s no reason why you can’t develop and define your abs at home.

So today I’d like to show you step by step exactly how you would do that.

Before I go over the best ab exercises that you can do at your own house,

let’s start first with diet.

Usually, diet is ranked more important than exercise, especially when it comes to abs.

This is because in order to see your abs you’ll have to be at a low enough body fat percentage to not have a bunch of fat covering them up.

And the common assumption is that once you get under 12 percent body fat you’ll be able to see your abs.

Unfortunately, this is a myth. Some people will have to drop their body fat percentage much lower than 12 percent,

while others will be able to maintain their abs at higher body fat percentages than 12 percent.

But the bottom line is that without lowering your body fat percentage it doesn’t matter how bulky your abs are, they just won’t show.

So if you’re serious about getting abs and you want to do it at home, you can do it, but you’re going to have to eat the right way.

There’s no way around that. When choosing how to structure your diet you’ll first have to decide if you want to go for a strict or a flexible dieting style.

While a strict diet may produce faster results, a flexible diet will be far easier to stick to for a longer period of time.

If you can’t stick to your diet you’re not going to get any results, so any easy option that anyone can start with is and if it fits your macros approach.

You would simply track the amount of protein, carbs, and fats that you’re taking in daily and make sure that you’re hitting the right targets.

To find out your daily targets of how much of each macro you should be eating per day to hit your goal you can use the free macro calculator that I have linked up below.

Once your plan loads, the different options that you can select like the recommended option, ketogenic, and bodybuilder option

simply will offer you different macronutrient splits, based on the number of calories you’ll need to eat to hit your goal.

Now the reason why if it fits your macros is considered a flexible diet plan is because you can swap out certain foods on your plan for others, as long as you hit your daily targets for the day.

This can work out great when done correctly, but the problem is that many people will go overboard with this “eat what you want” mentality.

And I’ll tell you right now that’s not going to work and it’s definitely not going to help you get abs.

Sure you can swap out brown rice for pop tarts and hit your carb targets for the day that way,

but you’ll struggle to burn off that abdominal fat if you do that. And this because fat loss isn’t just about calories,

it’s also about the impact that those calories have on your hormones and your body in general.

In order to burn fat, your body needs to release an enzyme known as “hormone-sensitive Lipase.

and there’s a reason why it’s called “hormone-sensitive” rather than “calorie sensitive.” So to get abs yes you will have to be in a calorie deficit,

but you can’t be in a calorie deficit that’s mostly made up of junk food because this will negatively affect your insulin sensitivity,

you’ll be missing out on important vitamins and minerals, and your workout performance will suffer.

If you replace whole carbs like sweet potatoes and oats with sugary foods it may also make it harder to stick to your diet plan,

because you’ll begin to crave more sugar (1) and because your leptin levels will drop,

while your hunger hormone ghrelin will rise. (2) So the best strategy to make and if it fits your macros plan work is to only swap out whole food for junk food in moderation.

If the goal is to get abs it’ll help you quite a bit to follow the 90/10 rule. Where 90 percent of the time you’re eating a diet full of whole foods that are unprocessed and in their natural state,

and only 10 percent of the time you’ll be swapping in some foods that you crave. To apply this to yourself,

if you’re eating let’s say 3 meals a day, you’ll be able to swap for some junk food every 3rd or 4th day.

Remember to keep in mind that even when you’re swapping for the junk food you’re still trying to stay within your daily macro targets.

This allows you to satisfy your cravings without going overboard.

Now your macros can be consumed within 5 to 6 square meals a day or you can incorporate them into an intermittent fasting plan where you only eat only 2 meals a day.

Both can work as long as your meeting your daily macros with mostly whole natural food sources.

To give yourself bigger diet breaks, you can also cycle your calories and macros by reducing carbs and fats even lower to about a 30 percent reduction from maintenance calories for 2 weeks,

and then afterward bring your calories and macros back up to maintenance levels for 2 weeks.

All of these things can make it mentally easier for you to stick to your plan.

Depending on how much fat you need to lose it may take you anywhere from a few weeks to months to see your abs.

Now seeing your abs, of course, depends on the other half of the equation which is building up your ab muscles.

So I’m going to list out the best ab exercises and the best training strategies that you can get started with at home.

But first, remember that for these exercises to continue building more and more ab muscle you’ll have to progressively overload abdominal workouts.

Even if you don’t have access to a gym simply buying a 10 pound, 15 pounds, and 20-pound dumbbell can really help.

If you don’t have dumbbells or something else that you can use to add resistance, you’ll have to work on either increasing your time under tension

which would involve slowing down the speed that you perform your reps or you can work on increasing your rep count over time.

But the point is that you have to continuously increase the amount of tension placed on the abs to get them to grow.

With that said, one very effective but simple ab exercises you can do at home is the

raised leg crunch With raised leg crunches you would have your legs raised straight up at a 90-degree angle and your hands behind your head.

While looking up at the ceiling raise your shoulder blades up off the ground. You’re not going to be sitting up very high,

the goal is just to raise the shoulder blades off the ground and bring them back down.

Make sure you’re not pulling on your neck when performing the exercise and when you’re ready start adding weight by holding a dumbbell behind your head.

Another great home ab exercise you can do is jackknives.

You can do this exercise on a bench or on the floor. To begin you would place your hands behind your back close to your butt for support.

Also, extend your legs straight out while keeping your feet elevated off the floor. Sit your upper body up and bring your knees into your chest at the same time.

Then as you lower your upper body back down you want to do the same with your legs at the same time.

You can also do this exercise with your hands reaching straight ahead out in front of you.

To increase intensity you can add a lightweight in between your feet.

The next exercise is a leg raise to a pulse up.

If you have something sturdy that you can grab behind your head for the support you can do that but it’s not required you can also put your hands under your butt to support your lower back.

but regardless of where you put your hands, the exercise Remains the Same you start with your feet elevated slightly off the ground.

Next, Raise your feet straight up until they’re perpendicular to the ground and facing straight up towards the ceiling.

Then squeeze your abs and drive your hips up towards the ceiling making sure not to bring your feet behind your head.

You want your legs going straight up. And then you want to lower your hips back down slowly while squeezing your abs and then repeat.

you would be adding a dumbbell in between your feet for this one if you wanted to increase intensity just like we did with Jack knives.

Another great ab exercise is the V situp.

V sit-ups and Jack knives resemble each other and some people refer to V sit-ups as an advanced jackknife

but when doing v sit-ups you’re bringing your hands above your head and raising your feet slightly off the ground.

Then as you sit your upper body up you want to raise your legs off the ground at the same time to ultimately come up into a position that looks like a V with you reaching for your toes.

If you have a medicine ball you can also pass the ball from between your feet to your hands back and forth.

or you can hold a dumbbell in your hands or in between your feet to make the exercise more challenging.

The next exercise you could do is by far one of my favorites Navy SEAL sit-ups.

Now, if you can’t do this one don’t worry I’ll give a regression in a second.

But with Navy seal situps you’ll start with both hands at the sides of your head and both of your feet slightly above the ground.

Raise your upper body and your lower body up off the ground as if you’re performing a v situp except here you’re going to bring one elbow to the opposite knee,

then return back to the starting position and bring the other elbow to the opposite knee.

It’s important that in this exercise you bring your upper body and your lower body off the ground at the same time.

You can add weights and hold them in your hands as you get stronger with this exercise, but if it’s too challenging right now,

you can just start with the beginner version. Here you would lay down with both knees bent,

feet planted on the ground, and your hands behind your head.

Then just crunch up by raising one shoulder blade off the ground and bring that elbow over to the opposite knee.

Then just alternate sides for reps.

Another exercise that is easy to set up is an isometric v hold.

Here you would simply get into a v situp position with your legs elevated and your hands pointed towards your feet,

and you would just hold it for an isometric contraction.

This is great to do at the end of your workout for a few sets where you hold this position for 60 to 90 seconds.

Hold a weight in your hands to make it even tougher.

The next exercise is a reverse crunch.

This can once again be done on a bench if you have one or on the floor if you don’t.

Start with both hands under your butt, and both knees bent.

Roll your knees tight into your chest and raise your hips up making sure to squeeze your abs on every rep.

You can also add a pike at the end of the movement to make it more challenging or add a weight between your feet or you can do both.

Another easy exercise to set up that’s very effective is the long arm crunch.

You can do this exercise with a weight, but you can also do it with one hand stacked on top of the other.

The important thing to remember is to keep both hands pointed straight up towards the ceiling as you crunch up with your knees bent.

If you start reaching forward as you situp instead of straight up it’ll make the exercise a lot less effective. Now for the last two,

I want to go over two great exercises for the obliques which are oblique v situps and windshield wipers.

With oblique v ups, you would lay on one side with your hips tilted more towards your butt rather than straight on your hip bone.

Then you would put the arm closest to the floor straight out in front of you and place your opposite hand behind your head.

Lift your upper and lower body up off the ground and aim to bring your elbow and knees together.

Then lower back down slowly and repeat for reps.

And with windshield wipers, you’re going to lie flat on your back spread your arms wide to your sides, and raise your legs straight up at a 90-degree angle.

then you’re going to turn your hips and your legs side to side while squeezing your core.

So that gives you 10 exercises you can start doing at home with no equipment, and then as you get better at the exercises you can start adding increasingly heavier dumbbells for resistance.

You’re probably not going to want to do all 10 exercises at once. Even though you can, doing 3 sets of each will leave you with 30 sets.

Instead, start by selecting 5 exercises and perform 3 sets of each for 10 to 20 reps. If you don’t have dumbbells and you’re only using your body weight remember that you’ll have to slow down your rep tempo or gradually increase your rep range.

Guys, if you follow a solid diet plan and consistently get stronger at the key ab exercises like what I went over in this video, it may take time but you will develop better abs.

I hope this video has helped you out. If you enjoyed it make sure you subscribe to my channel.

Also if you feel like you need any extra help with developing an effective workout or diet plan based on your goals visit my website by clicking the link in the description below.

We have everything from workout plans designed to build muscle, to recipe books that’ll help you burn fat,

and one on one coaching for those of you that need more help with your specific problems. Again thanks for tuning in and I’ll see you guys next time.