Why do we train abs everyday???

[Idorus]

I don't understand why it's OK to train abs every single day while people advise me to train other muscle groups once or twice a week max.

If I do a proper ab workout, I feel my abs are killing me for 2-3 days while rebuilding so I don't see the point in just destroying them everyday without letting them rest.

So would I get better results training them 4 or more times a week or should I do like for other muscle groups and work on them once or twice a week?

[MiloMan]

It's overtraining. Abs and calves are just like any other muscles, so train them the same.

[Idorus]

OK

And with this in mind does it mean I should train them once a week or twice?

[MiloMan]

How many times per week do you train legs, chest, back, etc?

[Scar]

Do 'we'?

[devl]

I might be in the minority, but I've never really trained abs. Many other exercises have always worked them well enough for me.

[Idorus]

Miloman: Once a week, but I have a thread runnign about whether I should train them once or twice too

[Arniefan]

i train my abbs three times a week, i train each body part 3 times a week with 2 excersises each day.

[turboman]

Never work my abs. I don't work my triceps and biceps either. I figure all these muscle get enough of a workout when I do other exercises.

[Chuwawa]

Originally posted by turboman
Never work my abs. I don't work my triceps and biceps either. I figure all these muscle get enough of a workout when I do other exercises.

You figure wrong. They do to an extent but you'll have to work them separately if you want them to grow beyond a certain level.

[Retardo-pex]

whats this we business I've never met anyone who trained abs everyday

[The Iron Lord]

Originally posted by Chuwawa
You figure wrong. They do to an extent but you'll have to work them separately if you want them to grow beyond a certain level.

Bull****. Your arms will become massive when you can do sets of 8-10 chins with 100 lbs hanging from your waist, and you can do dips with 200 lbs. around your waist. Direct arm work defintely isn't necessary, and can be counter productive. Most trainees that have the balls to give up *direct* bicep work experience a surge in the size of their biceps.

[Machine]

Where are the pictures of these people who don't train arms yet have these growth surges? I've seen plenty of people who train arms and they grow, I have yet to see anyone who NEVER directly trains their bis and tris and experience growth better than someone who does.

But as far as the ab thing goes, you should definately not train abs daily, I do mine twice a week, and sometimes once a week.

[The Iron Lord]

Originally posted by Machine
Where are the pictures of these people who don't train arms yet have these growth surges? I've seen plenty of people who train arms and they grow, I have yet to see anyone who NEVER directly trains their bis and tris and experience growth better than someone who does.

But as far as the ab thing goes, you should definately not train abs daily, I do mine twice a week, and sometimes once a week.

I have 18" arms at 6.5% body fat. I do at the very most 2 sets of curls per week. I do no direct tricep work. BUT, I chin and dip my arse off. Here is a pic. It's a bad one, but I think it shows that I have something better than spaghetti noodles hanging out of my shirt sleeves.


http://forum.bodybuilding.com/showth...threadid=60570

[-Bagel Muffin-]

Why the hell wouldn't you want to take 5-10 minutes to do direct arm work? I don't understand....

[Machine]

Originally posted by The Iron Lord
I have 18" arms at 6.5% body fat. I do at the very most 2 sets of curls per week. I do no direct tricep work. BUT, I chin and dip my arse off. Here is a pic. It's a bad one, but I think it shows that I have something better than spaghetti noodles hanging out of my shirt sleeves.


http://forum.bodybuilding.com/showth...threadid=60570

True, impressive, but you think a direct arm workout would hinder your results?

[The Iron Lord]

Originally posted by Machine
True, impressive, but you think a direct arm workout would hinder your results?

I know for a fact it would. I used to train 4 or 5 days a week, and would often dedicate a whole day to just arms. Doing that, I reached 17.5" arms at a body weight of almost 250 lbs. Once I educated myself, I abbreviated, and attained 18" arms at a body weight of 215 lbs. All the curl variations in the world won't do for your biceps what palms facing chins with ungodly weight hanging from your waist will......

[Machine]

So what does your workout scheduel look like now? I'm curious. How many sets of weight chins, dips? I love dips, not so much chins cause I really suck ass at them...

[Scar]

Originally posted by The Iron Lord
I know for a fact it would. I used to train 4 or 5 days a week, and would often dedicate a whole day to just arms. Doing that, I reached 17.5" arms at a body weight of almost 250 lbs.

Yet you persistently tell inexperienced lifters not to train this way...if it got you 17.5 inch arms ...IT DAMN WELL WORKS!

Of course your arms responded to a different stimulus once they had reached such huge proportions. The guys you tell not train this way DO NOT have 17.5 arms and probably NEED to train them this way to get them up to a level where they need to cut back.

[The Iron Lord]

Originally posted by Scar
Yet you persistently tell inexperienced lifters not to train this way...if it got you 17.5 inch arms ...IT DAMN WELL WORKS!

Of course your arms responded to a different stimulus once they had reached such huge proportions. The guys you tell not train this way DO NOT have 17.5 arms and probably NEED to train them this way to get them up to a level where they need to cut back.

Read the post, asstard. I had 17.5" arms at a body weight of 250 lbs. Anyone can get big arms if they're a fat ass like I was. I leaned up and my arm size grew. Why? Abbreviation.

[Scar]

Rubbish ...you are trying to back out of what you have implicated yourself in... What is clear is that your ARMS GREW using this routine...doesn't matter if 1 or even 2 inches on your arms were fat.

All you have proved is the time old adage:

'overtrain your arms to get them big...then undertrain them when they do'


this is how everyone gains in bb'ing....it is a necessary process ,at first,for new recruits to overtrain to some extent-particularly their arms and THEN cut back ...this is probably the closest to a universal truth bb'ing has....no newbie should be doing an extreme HIT/whatever term routine...unless they are a severe hardgainer.

Instead of insulting me you should thank me...I highlighted a patently obvious fact regarding your progression and why HIT now works so well for you....sorry if showing the flaws in your thinking upset you but as the old saying goes....

'Everything works..but nothing works forever'.

[The Iron Lord]

Originally posted by Scar
Rubbish ...you are trying to back out of what you have implicated yourself in... What is clear is that your ARMS GREW using this routine...doesn't matter if 1 or even 2 inches on your arms were fat.

All you have proved is the time old adage:

'overtrain your arms to get them big...then undertrain them when they do'


this is how everyone gains in bb'ing....it is a necessary process ,at first,for new recruits to overtrain to some extent-particularly their arms and THEN cut back ...this is probably the closest to a universal truth bb'ing has....no newbie should be doing an extreme HIT/whatever term routine...unless they are a severe hardgainer.

Instead of insulting me you should thank me...I highlighted a patently obvious fact regarding your progression and why HIT now works so well for you....sorry if showing the flaws in your thinking upset you but as the old saying goes....

'Everything works..but nothing works forever'.

Keep patting yourself on the back, buddy. Most obese women have at least 17" arms. But, they flap in a gentle breeze. No, I got 18" vascular, striated arms when I learned how to train.

[Machine]

Originally posted by The Iron Lord
Keep patting yourself on the back, buddy. Most obese women have at least 17" arms. But, they flap in a gentle breeze. No, I got 18" vascular, striated arms when I learned how to train.

So you HIT? How many sets of dips and chins do you do? And when do you do them?

[Scar]

Originally posted by The Iron Lord
Keep patting yourself on the back, buddy. Most obese women have at least 17" arms. But, they flap in a gentle breeze. No, I got 18" vascular, striated arms when I learned how to train.

You weren't obese were you though...nowhere near it.

And as you know...vascularity and striations are a bodyfat issue...not a training one.

[The Iron Lord]

Originally posted by Machine
So you HIT? How many sets of dips and chins do you do? And when do you do them?

No, I'm not a HITer, I'm an abbreviator. I very rarely train to failure, usually opting to stay about 1 rep shy. Right now, I do dips and chins twice a week each. On dips, I'm doing a 5x5 routine....2 progressively heavier warm up sets of 5 followed by three heavy work sets with a constant poundage. When I get all 5 sets of 5, I up the weight and start again. For chins, I do two warm up sets, followed by two work sets each session.

[The Iron Lord]

Originally posted by Scar
You weren't obese were you though...nowhere near it.

And as you know...vascularity and striations are a bodyfat issue...not a training one.

I was probably in the 25%+ body fat range...maybe more.

Of course, the striations are a body fat issue. My point exactly....I got larger arms when I was leaner and abbreviating than when I was volume training and unconcerned with how much of their size was fat tissue.

[Zuhaltern]

Originally posted by The Iron Lord
Read the post, asstard. I had 17.5" arms at a body weight of 250 lbs. Anyone can get big arms if they're a fat ass like I was. I leaned up and my arm size grew. Why? Abbreviation.

Your 215 bro and only have 18 in arms damn doesn't sound to impresive to me I am 165 and have 17 3/4 inch arms so whats the big deal I train bi's and tri's once a weak and I am smaller than you and we basically have the same size arms so wouldn't you say training your bis and tris with direct arm work works pretty damn good it does for me.

[firstmark]

It is true that if you progress in weight on compound exercizes that the muscles involved will all grow.
When you can barbell row 500 pounds you should have good biceps of course. But if you train biceps specifically you can have good biceps sooner without having to build them by having them be the weak link on some compound exercize which requires them to grow in order to increase weight on the compound exercize.

[firstmark]

And only cardio junkies would consider training abs every day. Its cardio junkies that have lead some to believe that lots of people train abs more often than other bodyparts when in reality abs are a very neglected muscle as far as weightraining as no one really cares if you can move a lot of weight with your abs or not.
Most people who work abs everyday are not really working them to increase strength but rather to be part of the "toning" and exercize for fitness crowd that does exercizes until they no longer make them feel good.

[The Iron Lord]

Originally posted by Zuhaltern
Your 215 bro and only have 18 in arms damn doesn't sound to impresive to me I am 165 and have 17 3/4 inch arms so whats the big deal I train bi's and tri's once a weak and I am smaller than you and we basically have the same size arms so wouldn't you say training your bis and tris with direct arm work works pretty damn good it does for me.

17-3/4" arms at a body weight of 165 lbs. Hmmm...you can't be any taller than 5'4" or so. Tell the truth. Anyone pushing 18" arms at a body weight of less than 180 lbs. can't possibly be any taller.

How tall are you? I'm 6'3". At 6'3", 215 lbs, 18" arms look monsterous. If you don't believe me, you're simply exhibiting your inexperience in the game.


What's your body fat percentage, buddy? I have 18" arms in contest condition at 6.5% body fat - measured by 7 point skin fold method.

So, don't come on here bragging about your 17-3/4" arms when you've been training less than 2 years. My guess is that you're pushing the 20% body fat envelope. Show me your arms when they've got a nasty vein running down the bicep, and cross - striations in the tricep. I suspect they won't be so monsterous then.