Jame Scott

What is the biggest gym ‘urban legend’ you have ever heard?

That’s an easy answer: doing hundreds of crunches will get you a six-pack.

This is probably my favourite fitness myth ever. If you ask 10 people in the gym how to get a six-pack, you are likely to get 10 different answers. Everybody has the secret to getting those desirable abdominal muscles. Whether it’s some crazy new form of an abdominal crunch or just a good old-fashioned sit up, everybody likes to put their own personal touch on it.

Some say faster is better, others say slower, some say more is better, others less is better, legs up, legs down, with weight, without weight, on the floor, on a stability ball, hanging upside down, before working out, after working out, once a day, every other day, eight minute abs, six second abs, abs of steel, ab-roller, ab-chair, ab-doer and last but not least, my favourite silly/useless workout piece of equipment ever invented, the ab-shocker – the electronic exercise belt you wear that claims to literally shock your abdominal muscles throughout the day to give you a six-pack in days. 

The sad thing is that the exercise industry has taken this craze and exploited it beyond belief. Any fitness magazine that you pick up usually has the words ‘six-pack’ or ‘abdominal’ on the cover somewhere. Simply Google ‘six-pack’ and see how many pieces of equipment, videos and fad diets pop up. There are more abdominal machines in a typical gym than there are for any other parts of the body.

What we consider the six-pack is actually one muscle called the rectus abdominus. However the human body has over 600 muscles, so it begs the question: when did this one muscle become such an obsession for both men and women? The truth is everybody has a rectus abdominus so everybody already has a six-pack. What separates most of us from the guy or girl on the magazine cover is theirs is visible and yours isn’t. It’s as simple as you having more body fat covering that particular muscle than they do. This initially might sound a little depressing, but think of it like this – all you have to do is lose some body fat and you can look like that person on the magazine cover. 

Here is what most people do not want to hear. It is going to take a lot of work, dedication and time to get to this level. You absolutely cannot buy one piece of abdominal equipment or do an hour of sit-ups a day and get a six-pack without proper diet and exercise. There is no such thing as spot reduction – meaning you can’t lose weight in one part of the body by doing targeted exercises on that body part.

So how to you get a six-pack? Diet, exercise and patience. Eat clean and watch your calories. Exercise four to five days a week – total body strength training and cardio. And have patience, Rome wasn’t built in a day.

James Scott is the Strength and Conditioning Coach for the Shanghai Sharks. If you have a fitness question you’d like him to answer in a future column, please email him at [email protected].