1. Crunch Away Those Flabby Abs
Learn to do a basic abdominal crunch, which you can then build on to customize your own ab workout. Lie on the floor with your feet up in the air. Place your hands behind your head to help support your neck. Pull your abs in toward your spine as you lift from your waist, raising your shoulder blades several inches off the floor. Slowly lower back down, keeping your abs flexed the entire time, until your shoulder blades just touch the ground again. Repeat without resting. If you feel your lower back tiring out, there's a good chance that your abs aren't contracted as well as they need to be.
2. Leaner Diet Equals Leaner Abdominal Muscles
Exercise isn't the only activity that lends you defined abdominal muscles. A layer of fat over your abs, no matter how toned they are, won't allow you to develop any definition. Eat a diet full of lean protein, complex carbohydrates and plenty of fruits and vegetables to maintain a healthy body fat level. If you want to lose weight, try cutting about 500 calories out of your daily intake to encourage the fat to melt away.
3. Sweat to Shrink the Fat Away
Aerobic exercises, or cardio, help burn calories and shrink excess body fat. These include cycling, running and stair climbing. Work out for 20 to 30 minutes at a time, building up to 45 minutes of interval training. The point of interval training is to get your heart pumping with short recovery periods throughout the workout to burn calories and shrink body fat.
4. Add Variation to Your Ab Workout
Several different movements help define your abs. Whatever exercises you choose, always focus on squeezing and contracting your abdominal muscles throughout the movement. If you need to modify the basic crunch when you're beginning, bend your knees and bring you feet down flat on the ground. Make the crunch a little more difficult by adding a plated weight to your chest. Do bicycle crunches to work your obliques by lifting one shoulder towards the opposite knee, lower back toward the ground and then lift the other shoulder towards the opposite knee.
5. Balance and Core Strength
Working out on a fitness ball improves your overall core strength, which in turn helps to define the abdominal muscles. The balance required to remain steady on the ball adds a new dimension to your ab workout. To do crunches on a fitness ball, sit on the ball with your feet planted on the ground. Lean back to about a 45-degree angle and sit back up using your abs to pull you back in.
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