We have seen all of those infomercials and magazine ads that promote their best abdominal exercise routines and then promise you that you will have sexy abs in just a few short workouts. Then they further insult our intellegence by trying to convince us by showing us their "before and after" photos.

These ads should make you shake your head in disgust! There really are no magical ab workouts, spot reducing (you can't pick areas that you would like to trim down), or crazy machines that will give you those washboard abs. The amazing fact I believe about all of these ads is - they never talk about dieting! Hard work and dieting is the only real way to lose that thick layer of fat and reveal some spectactular abs!

The best abdominal exercise is really a pretty simple and successful one - crunches and reverse crunches, that's it! Work your abs 2-3 times per week. The abdominals are no different than working out any other part of your body. Training them more than two or three times a week will not give the muscles proper time to repair themselves.

What you really need to do when performing these two exercises is, concentrate on contracting your abdominal muscles as tight as you can. I like contracting for a count of three. This will causes your abs to fatigue faster. Don't worry about how many reps you do, concentrate on contracting your abdominal muscles. I believe crunches and reverse crunches are the best abdomial exercise routines you can perform. If you do not like getting on the floor to do these exercises I can recommend the ab lounge. This chair will give you the range of motion needed allowing you to contract and expand those pesky ab muscles. Oh yeah - don't forget to reduce those calories if you want all of that hard work to pay off!