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hey folks Dr Mike iSell here for
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Renaissance periodization I have a
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question for you should you train your
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abs I'll wait go
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ahead do you have your answer yet oh
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Well let's see if you're right here we
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go should you be training your abs what
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a strange question but I promise it's a
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real question it's a decades old
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controversy what gets you abs and by ABS
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I mean visible ABS that moment when you
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pull your T-shirt off at the beach and
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that girl you've always liked but never
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really said much to you she's
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like and you're like hey Karen she'll
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cancel you later and she's like oh my
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God your
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abs Scott H Scott the video guy what do
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you like you're in this fantasy now
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enjoy we all want this eventuality for
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ourselves so how the fuck do we get abs
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well is it diet a lot of people say it
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is is it cardio doesn't cardio help to
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get abs all the runners have abs is it
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supplements for sure all abs are made by
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Tren and VAR and what other Reddit
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supplements do we know Clen yes that's
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just R and Varon Clan bro I don't know
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why but every time I read ignorant
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Reddit comments about steroids from
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people have clearly never use them I
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give them an Eastern European accent and
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I don't know I'm also Eastern European
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so I guess I can't possibly really
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offend anyone in that sort of way but I
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find Eastern Europeans uh to be
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generally awesome people but every now
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and again just really curse
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look up that word really brutal they
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just say stuff and it sounds mean and
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they're just being honest but it comes
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off all wrong so in any case is it
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training should be right I mean they
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train every other muscle how do you get
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abs you train your abs everyone knows
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that or do they now if we say it's
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training we can ask the next question of
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how does the training actually impact
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your apps for example does the training
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make them bigger and make them pop out
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more does the training make them more
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defined like can you do a bunch of
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crunches and get more striations and
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separations in your abs maybe does it
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reduce the size of your midsection a lot
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of people are like oh man I got a big
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old belly I need to train
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ABS I wonder how that would work you
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could be asking yourself quite rightly
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and if you're going to train ABS in
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order to get any of those above things
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how would you do it because there's
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whole lot of different type of ab
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training and well probably if we're
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interested in any philosophy not all of
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it can be equally effective and we
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should be prepared for the eventuality
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that some of it could be very
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ineffective altogether lots to unpack
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here let's get started so first of all
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how to get abs let's answer that first
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first first of all you already won
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everyone literally everyone has abs
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already the thing is they are just
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covered by a small to medium to
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extremely large layer of body fat that's
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the real problem so if you reduce the
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fat that covers your abs you you will
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have abs which means that the ultimate
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way to get abs and the by far most
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straightforward is to impose a calorie
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deficit that results from a combination
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of decreasing your dietary intake and
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potentially increasing your physical
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activity that's ABS that's how come
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marathon runners have abs most of them
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don't train ABS at all they're really
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not even sure why the fuck they have abs
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but they do a crazy amount of physical
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activity and they can't possibly eat
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enough food to make up for it so they
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stay at 6% body failure around and they
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all have six-packs they're not doing
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planks or all this other bullshit
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they're not in the gym training their
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abs they're sure as hell not taking
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steroids to make their abs bigger they
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have abs because they're so lean and
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that's it so fundamentally getting abs
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can requires zero AB training in almost
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every case however sometimes once you
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remove most of the fat from your
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midsection and your abs become visible
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you realize that your abs are so small
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they are just tiny tiny little abs and
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that means not the muscles themselves
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are necessarily tiny but they're just
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not very thick so you could have this
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like more feminine looking midsection
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where someone's like yeah I guess you
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have abs but they don't really pop
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they're not
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gnarly and that's a thing but it's
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totally fixable with AB growth training
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so at this point we realize it's not a
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body fat issue we're very lean we can
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see little veins and we can see our ABS
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but they don't pop out as much that is
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fixable with hypertrophy training for
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your ab musculature which we'll talk
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about later how to do it exactly all
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right now so that's how to get abs is
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primarily through well creating a
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calorie deficit getting lean training
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only modifies how your abs look everyone
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has them already here's what AB training
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will not do for you get the myth sling
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sword out myth dragons flying up cutting
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their heads off you ever think like when
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a knight kills a dragon that the the
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dragon has maybe like a family back home
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and to pop a dragon and you killed Mama
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dragon and she's flying around and
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you're a night and everyone you know the
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princess gives you a blowjob whatever
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else happens after you kill a dragon and
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and you're sitting all comfortable and
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pretty in the castle I did a good thing
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and then you know it's getting pretty
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late and papa dragon back at the house
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is like geez Janice the mama dragon's
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been gone for a long time he starts to
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worry the kids are like Papa Papa where
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is M and they have the old 1930s little
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hat on and one of them has a peg leg Peg
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Leg dragon and you're you're sitting in
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the Castle Post blow job from the queen
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and a princess at the same time that's
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right that's an adult video it's fucked
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up you never think about that shit mhm
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in any case here's what AB training will
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not do for you will not it will not spot
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reduce your fat right now hold on just
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connect it to all other humans on Earth
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it's like cerebro but people always ask
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me why the hell does your head look like
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that no it's not growth hormone abuse I
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actually don't abuse hormone I take it
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intelligently and I had a big head
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before I ever took it but it is actually
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because I have a cerebro from X-Man
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installed in my skull and clearly it's
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bigger so they had to make my head look
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funny so I can actually connect with all
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people at the same time right now and
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find out what all of you're doing hey
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hey Jim stop jacking off I see you doing
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that shit all right back to everyone
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else right now thousands of people as I
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connect to the ultraverse are doing
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millions of fucking crunches to try to
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burn the fat off of their abs it doesn't
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work the research on what's called spot
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reduction is does local activity of the
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muscle does that activity burn the fat
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close to that muscle shows us two things
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one it's very difficult to measure at
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that fine level of precision so we're
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not really sure but that already tells
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us how little of that is going on that
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we can barely measure the ship some of
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the studies do show that there is a spot
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reduction effect but it is so fucking
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teeny tiny you would have to do kind of
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an Infinity number of crunches in order
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to get your abs to show if you just
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didn't reduce your overall level of body
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fat and because your overall level of
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body fat matters so much more you can
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make it so much easier on yourself and
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just not do the fucking crunches at all
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and just do a calorie deficit so if
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you're looking for spot reduction if you
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are looking to get abs by just doing a
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million crunches you are doing something
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that is some combination of or some uh
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the truth of it is either just doesn't
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do anything at all to burn the local fat
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or it does so little you'll never
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fucking notice that sucks just don't do
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that so if people say oh man I got to
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burn the fat off my abs how do I do it
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what's your answer to tell them in the
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break room at work you go just lose fat
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all over lose 10 pounds and you'll see
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your abs better they're like but what
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about the ABS themselves fat will come
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off mostly of where you put the fat on
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and if you have a lot of Android obesity
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you put a lot of fat on your abs and
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upper body when you do a calorie deficit
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that's where it's going to come off of
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it's amazing how that works second thing
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training will not change the shape or
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symmetry of your abs some of us when you
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get abs myself included that they're
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slightly misaligned in my case insanely
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misaligned you say Fuck how could how do
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I get them to align again so I have a
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cool little model six P that ship has
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fucking sailed for you and unless we
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have intense genomic medicine in the
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next 10 to 15 years or insane
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reconstructive surgery your abs are just
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going to look like they look except
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leaner or not leaner bigger or not
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bigger lastly this is a really big one
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tied into the first one of spot
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reduction training your abs does not
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make your waist any smaller and as a
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matter of fact if you make your abs
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really muscular it makes your waist
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bigger a lot of powerlifters have big
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waste because they're putting a shitload
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of strain on their abs and a lot of
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figure girls for example who come from
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gymnastics backgrounds have been doing
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tons of ab and oblique training you that
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they had to for gymnastics and a lot of
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gymnastics mov require that anyway when
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they reduce their gymnastics move
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involvement or stop training their
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obliques entirely their waist actually
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shrink because the muscles on the side
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of your waist got smaller there's no
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amount of training to those muscles to
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make them bigger that can make them
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smaller thus if you want a smaller
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shapelier tinier little waist training
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your abs has diddly dick to do with that
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am I pissed at you training ABS no train
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away just understand what you're getting
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and I'll tell you this this is kind of a
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little mini tragedy first world tragedy
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right now again connecting to the
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ultraverse seeing what everyone's
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thinking and feeling Jim really you're
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jacking off
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again back to everyone else folks tons
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of people right now are training their
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abs for either spot reducing fat or for
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making their waist
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smaller and sometimes even to change the
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shape and symmetry of their abs all the
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same time and those three things just
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don't fucking work so stop doing them
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because you're probably not into doing
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shit that doesn't work or works really
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poorly so just imposing a calorie
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deficit and not training your abs as
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much or hardly at all is probably a much
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better way to go for almost everyone
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that's just the that's just the reality
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of the matter now if we do want to train
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ABS what will AB training actually do
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for us first thing is if you train your
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abs for endurance like with planks and a
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bunch of other stuff it will make your
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abs more endurant you will have better
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AB endurance why I don't know why you
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would want more AB endurance maybe you
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cramp during sex or some shit like that
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but anytime people are doing planks and
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stuff like that in the gym they're just
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working on isometric AB
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endurance um most people do planks in
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the gym because they just nominally
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understand that that trains their abs
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somehow they probably think it spot
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reduces fat and it's something the
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personal trainer group fitness
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instructor told them to do and they
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suffer through it and they get a little
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endorphin high and they feel like
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they've accomplished something that's as
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deep as that thinking ever goes people
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do not get ripped Abs from doing fucking
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planks planks are cool for their own
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shit and for getting you General
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isometric AB endurance but not much
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other than that second thing training
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your abs especially in a hypertrophic
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way which we'll talk about lastly in
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just a bit can make your abs physically
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bigger that means they pop out more at
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higher body fats and really cool one
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they pop through clothes so if you're
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into the following look you could train
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your abs for a long time to get them
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bigger when you put on your uh Under
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Armour right some shit like that in the
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gym or in a locker room or whatever the
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fuck you wear that shit out on the
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street maybe not you guys know that like
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NFL like running back look where they
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have the under arm on the combine and
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they're just relaxed but you can see
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their abs popping through their fucking
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clothes that looks sweet and that
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exactly what everyone's into I don't
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know how many girls are like oh my God
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his abs are popping out maybe some like
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it maybe some don't but at the end of
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the day if you want that look yeah
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training your abs for growth will get
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you that look cool look it's not the
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same as like a men's physique competitor
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uh where in a shirt or in Under Armour
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you wouldn't be able to tell that they
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have abs but when they take them off
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you're like holy fuck and their waist is
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really tiny it's different because
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remember NFL folks they don't have super
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tiny waste they have big popping ABS
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it's a trade-off which one you want more
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right so that's definitely a thing that
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you can get from Ab training and lastly
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you can make your abs a lot stronger if
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your abs are a limiting factor in your
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strength in some way like for Brazilian
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jiu-jitsu or MMA or something like
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sitting up from guard if you had
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stronger ABS you could do it faster and
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more more forcefully then training abs
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for strength is totally thing that works
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but remember having strong ABS is not
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the same thing as having a ripped
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midsection currently I don't have a
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ripped midsection it's fine I have abs
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and some veins in it it's not exactly
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the most ripped thing but it's a big
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fucking midsection and it's strong as
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fuck but nobody shaking my hand for that
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shit like if I had more of a physique
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competitor waste more people would pay
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attention to my abs but I don't and
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there's nothing I can do through
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training to get there that's all diet
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and at some point also fucking genetics
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so lastly if you're going to train your
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abs how do you do it properly well
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here's the thing if you want bigger more
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exotic ABS did you train them normally
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like you train any other muscle group
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and this must be one of the biggest
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myths and misconceptions in the fitness
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industry is people when they train ABS
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they do like crunches where your hold
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you I can't even do it my arms are
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getting too big uh this is hard to do
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literally biceps hitting forearms pretty
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sweet right the the fucking hand behind
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your ears crunches you do like three
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sets of 50 like can you imagine doing
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that in front of like Brad shonfeld top
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hypertrophy researcher be like hey is
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three sets of 50 good for growth he'd be
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like not really okay is it good for fat
00:13:04
burning he's like uhuh like okay why am
00:13:08
I doing this huh you should have thought
00:13:10
about that before he started doing the
00:13:11
shit but what I just described is like
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90% of the ab training that occurs in
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the entire world most people do their AB
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training unresisted if you wanted the
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biggest pecs of all time would you just
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do push-ups that's nonsense but people
00:13:23
who want their abs developed highly to
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just do body weight ab stuff that's
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fucking stupid how do you train ABS what
00:13:29
does that mean to train normally
00:13:30
normally means like any other muscle
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group so for example you choose
00:13:33
exercises that a high stimulus and a low
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level of fatigue they don't bother the
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hips of your spine you can get a good
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full range of motion out of them and it
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really burns the really F living fuck
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out of your abs it gets them sore all
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that other stuff so first second you
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know full range of motion for sets of
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five to 30 reps per set standard loading
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range which means that after a while you
00:13:52
won't be able to use your body anymore
00:13:53
so you have to load it which means you
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do reps in reserve three reps in reserve
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then two reps in reserve then one then
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zero then D Lo standard me cycle
00:14:02
progression don't go to failure every
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time like everyone seems to think is
00:14:05
important with abs and you do load and
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rep progressions so get on a really good
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full range of motion ab machine and
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start sets of 10 to 20 ad sets as you
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recover better add load and add reps
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over time and your abs will grow it's
00:14:19
like every other muscle again a lot of
00:14:22
people say oh I train my abs every day
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or every time I train why do you train
00:14:26
your biceps or quads every time you
00:14:27
train that's fucking stupid you train
00:14:28
them mus hard you rest for a while and
00:14:30
then you train it again you can
00:14:31
logically set up a program that trains
00:14:33
them every day that might not be the
00:14:34
answer on average generally we recommend
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that you train every muscle between two
00:14:38
and four times per week so ABS fall into
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two and four times per week that means
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they're going to have a minimum
00:14:44
effective volume a maximum recoverable
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volume all that stuff it's the same as
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every other muscle group the problem is
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almost nobody trains their abs the same
00:14:52
as every other muscle group because AB
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training is just full of so much myth
00:14:55
and bullshittery and dumbassery that
00:14:57
it's hard to get to the actual uh
00:14:59
logically to what it is that we're
00:15:01
trying to do if we're trying to elicit
00:15:03
hypertrophy why wouldn't we do that the
00:15:05
same way we do with every other muscle
00:15:06
right if you want a real good guidance
00:15:09
on what that other mean that stuff means
00:15:11
there's an AB hypertrophy guide just
00:15:14
type that in or type in central Hub
00:15:15
hypertrophy guide ABS RP into your
00:15:18
Google machine and then voila there's a
00:15:20
whole article about how to train ABS
00:15:21
periodization progression exercises rep
00:15:23
ranges all that stuff just like every
00:15:26
other muscle with its own little quirks
00:15:29
but fundamentally it's just growth
00:15:30
training it's something you're already
00:15:31
very familiar with doing so when someone
00:15:33
asked you how do you train ABS think
00:15:34
about how you train your side delts or
00:15:36
your biceps or your Cales and like
00:15:38
that's damn near the same shit just the
00:15:39
exercises are different number two if
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you want stronger ABS drum roll Scott
00:15:45
the video guy can you do a drum roll
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sound for me
00:15:50
here train them for sets of three to six
00:15:53
repetitions with heavy loading what but
00:15:56
the strength training your abs are
00:15:58
fucking muscle you train for strength
00:15:59
they can train everything else for
00:16:00
strength well gez isn't six three to six
00:16:02
reps like really low for the ABS uhhuh
00:16:05
did you said you wanted strength right
00:16:06
you didn't say you wanted to arbitrarily
00:16:08
do sets of 10 to 20 train it for
00:16:10
strength you training for strength
00:16:12
that's just how it works now all of a
00:16:13
sudden you might not be interested in
00:16:14
training your abs for strength that
00:16:16
looks really painful but that's just
00:16:18
that's what we're talking about third
00:16:20
sport endurance if you want your abs to
00:16:22
be more endurant for sport I would say
00:16:23
try sport specific stuff first okay so
00:16:28
after exercises that mimic your sport at
00:16:30
least to some extent are probably really
00:16:32
good for sport endurance stuff so for
00:16:35
example if you're training your abs for
00:16:36
endurance in Brazilian jiu-jitsu you can
00:16:38
do some planks and stuff like that but
00:16:40
what you can also do is you say okay
00:16:41
where is my ab endurance really giving
00:16:43
up well when I'm sort of crouched and
00:16:45
sitting in guard my shoulders not laying
00:16:47
back because I don't just want to get
00:16:48
past I'm up with my hands like this
00:16:50
you're basically sitting on your butt
00:16:52
your feet are either on the ground your
00:16:53
feet are up you're only sitting on your
00:16:55
butt your shoulders are off the ground
00:16:56
and you have to sit in this curled up
00:16:57
posture and at some point after two
00:16:59
minutes of trying to prevent guard
00:17:00
passes you're like H I can't do this my
00:17:02
abs are tired well guess what in your ab
00:17:04
training if you want to train for
00:17:06
endurance after all the rolling and
00:17:07
training has been done for the day or
00:17:09
some other day of the week take like
00:17:11
some kind of weight or put on a weight
00:17:13
vest or take a like some kind of
00:17:14
dumbbell put it right here curl up and
00:17:16
sit there for as long as you can for
00:17:18
like a typical roll amount and then
00:17:20
increase the weight on the with the
00:17:22
dumbbell or increase the amount of time
00:17:23
you can sit in that crunch position even
00:17:25
pretend to move a little bit every now
00:17:26
and again and your abent interance will
00:17:27
come up in a sports specific way in that
00:17:30
position that you want it yes training
00:17:31
in different positions like plages Etc
00:17:33
will raise your general AB endurance but
00:17:35
you probably want a little bit more
00:17:36
specific AB indurance because that
00:17:37
actually replicates what you're doing in
00:17:38
the sport you don't want to replicate it
00:17:40
exactly but something more like that
00:17:42
right and then lastly if you want to get
00:17:45
your abs crisp if you want to get them
00:17:47
to show if you want random women to come
00:17:50
up to you in the street and be like
00:17:50
excuse me sir I don't even mean to
00:17:52
bother you I know you're with your
00:17:53
friends right now and you're probably on
00:17:54
to do very important things but can I
00:17:56
just take the time to just squirt
00:17:58
chocolate on your abs and lick them off
00:18:00
like a fucking pathetic animal that I am
00:18:02
because when I see a man's abs like that
00:18:04
I get weak in the knees and I have to
00:18:05
lick if you want that sort of thing to
00:18:08
happen to you daily then calorie deficit
00:18:12
oh and calorie deficit calorie deficit
00:18:13
calorie deficit sign me out see you guys
00:18:15
next time
