How to Get Great Abs and Whittle Your Winter Waistline

The stats don't lie. While it was once thought that the average person gained 7 to 10 pounds during the winter, then lost it during the warmer season, recent studies have provided good and bad news: the average person gains less weight than originally thought, but that weight is never completely lost...it tends to stick around forever.

Don't let your hard-earned abs disappear. Stay ahead of the game by training just as hard during the winter as you would any other time. That way, when the sun escapes the cold weather clouds, you'll be a step ahead of everyone else. When strutting time rolls around again, you'll be the one most eager to lose your shirt. Here's how to keep your physique fit by whittling your winter waistline.

GAIN WEIGHT
To keep added weight from hiding your set of chiseled abs, you've got to add weight to your routine, and forget all the failing fads out there. Ab training has long been a marrow of misinformation. Just turn on the TV and you'll find countless gadgets, diets, and magic pills that claim the abs of your dreams are only three easy payments away. The truth is your abs are a muscle like any other. And like any other, they're built only with intensity, progressive overload, and rest. You could do a thousand sit-ups a day for the next ten years but only get so far. Why? Because a thousand sit-ups satisfies only the intensity requirement.

To get the brick-hard belly you want, you have to constantly challenge your abs by progressively overloading them - by forcing them to guess what's coming next. The best way to do this is weighted incline sit-ups.

HERE'S HOW: Lie on an angled bench with a weight held securely across your upper chest. Squeeze your abs by curling your chin into your chest, then lifting your shoulders off the bench, then drawing your torso all the way up to a full contraction. Slowly return to the start and repeat.

AB ADVICE: Select weight that forces you to failure around 15 reps. Any heavier weight - or any lower reps - and your abs will grow...this means you waist will get bigger. By aiming for 15 reps, you can train your abs for definition, keep them overloaded with weight, and not worry about actually widening your waistline.

TWISTED TRAINING
No abs are complete without a set of ripped obliques to accompany them, and the obliques respond to weight in the same way the abs do. Like the abs, progressive overload, intensity, and higher reps are the key. The ideal movement to achieve all three is the twisting crunch.

HERE'S HOW: This movement is similar to the crunches above, but should be performed on a flat bench to maximize effort throughout the lower obliques. With a weight in your hands, and your arms extended in front of your chest, crunch forward. Instead of curling your torso directly toward your knees, twist to one side, then slowly curl back down. Repeat the movement twisting to the other side.

AB ADVICE: As with weighted crunches, if these twists are improperly performed, you run the risk of actually making your waist thicker. To avoid this, twist the weight to the outside of your knees only as far as you can without bringing your glutes off the bench. This will focus the work on the diagonal fibers higher in your obliques, and keep your actual waist from growing.

GET BUFF WITH BENDS
Dumbbell side bends are another great way to define the obliques. By concentrating on squeezing your sides instead of merely see-sawing on your hips, you can develop great obliques without adding any mass to your waist.

HERE'S HOW: Hold a dumbbell in your right hand heavy enough to allow for no less than 15 reps. Stand upright with your free arm at your side or bent behind your head. Slowly bend to the right as far as you can go. As you bend, imagine that a rod is running through your torso about three inches above your belly-button; this is the axis on which you want to bend. Now slowly straighten, squeezing your obliques on the same axis to raise the weight, and bring yourself to the upright starting position. Repeat the same procedure on your left side.

"JACK" IT UP
Now you know how to use added weight to challenge and train your midsection, but like all muscles, you need a movement that really finishes the abs off... a movement that annihilates the lower and upper abs, as well as the obliques. That movement is the jackknife sit-up.

HERE'S HOW: Lie flat on your back with your arms extended straight behind your head. Maintaining this arms-extended position, curl your torso up and pull your knees in toward your chest until your elbows are in line with, and just outside, your right knee. Return to the starting position and repeat, bringing your arms to the other knee, and continue in an alternating fashion.

AB ADVICE: Do this movement at the end of your ab routine. Rest only 15 seconds between sets and work to the point that you can only complete a few reps. This will guarantee your abs have been completely fatigued, and with the quick reps, it'll help you achieve that definition you want.