5 Must Do Exercises For A Flat Belly

Looking to rid that excess fat around your belly?  If so, you not only need to focus on your nutrition, but also make sure that you have a good workout in place.

Now, when it comes to exercises for a flat belly, you might immediately start thinking about crunch variations. After all, it would only make sense to do exercises that specifically target this muscle group – right?

Not quite.

While there’s no question that direct ab exercises can help to increase your core strength, an even better choice is performing exercises that recruit the ab muscles for balance and stabilization while also working other major muscle groups in the body.

Why is this more ideal?  Simply because if you want a flat belly, you not only need to strengthen your core, but you also need to ensure that you lose the layer of fat covering your current ab muscles.  It won’t matter how strong those abs are, if you have a thick blanket of body fat covering them up, you won’t ever attain the defined, flat look you’re after.

And, the larger the muscles you work in a given movement, the more calories – and hence fat you burn.

So let’s get to your top 5 ab moves to try.  Do these and you’ll not only see firming and toning benefits in your core, but also in other areas of your body as well.

Single Leg Stiff – Leg Deadlifts

The first core-integrated exercise to try is the single leg deadlifts. Deadlifts on their own are a fantastic exercise but moving this to just one leg brings the abs into play to a larger degree.

Stand with one leg elevated behind you on a bench or chair and then perform the stiff leg deadlift from there. Be sure to think of pulling up from the glutes and hamstrings, not the lower back to target the proper muscles.

Walking Lunges With A Twist

Next we come to walking lunges. To up the challenge on this exercise, you’re going to want to hold a medicine ball with both hands and as you lunge forward, twisting to the side of the body, and crossing the medicine ball as you go.  Untwist yourself on the way up and next step, twist to the other side.

Now you’re not only working the main abs for stabilization purposes, but also calling into play the obliques. This will help rid those love handles you may want to target.

Push-Up On An Exercise Ball

Ready for a challenge? This exercise is going to provide it.  The regular push-up exercise is excellent for upper body strength as it’s going to work the chest, shoulders, triceps, and biceps all in one move.

To get more core activation now, all you need to do is place the hands up on an exercise ball.  They’ll be contracting with each rep you do, working hard to keep the body balanced on top of the ball.

Take note that this move is very difficult, so if you can only do a few reps to begin with, don’t get frustrated. Keep working at it and soon you’ll do more.

Prone Ball Roll In

One move that is a little more ab focused in itself but that will also help to work the hip flexors as well as shoulder and tricep muscles is the prone ball roll in.  You’ll direct the movement using the core muscles however, so note that those will be the main moves.

Place the feet up on an exercise ball, body facing downward, balancing the upper body on your hands placed directly beneath the shoulders.  You should be in a flat table-top like position here.

Once balanced, slowly begin to bend the knees and contract the abs as you move the ball into the body.  Once you are as far as you can go, pause briefly and then extend the feet back out until you are in the starting position once again.

Continue repeating this movement until all reps are complete.

Squats

The classic.  Squats are a can’t-miss exercise for just about any goal.  This move is the ‘king’ of fat burners because it’ll hit every single muscle in the lower body all while recruiting all the muscles in the core and spinal column as you lift the weight.

Plus, if you’ve ever done a set of 8-10 heavy squats before, you know just how out of breath you’ll be by the end.  In terms of calorie burn, they just can’t be beat.

So next time you’re in the gym looking to work your abs, don’t be so fast to rush off and hit the ab mats. Sometimes the best core exercises are not specific abdominal moves, but others that utilize the abs while working your main muscle groups.

Give these a try and watch how fast your abs shape up and you achieve the flat-stomach look.