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Are abs made in the kitchen?
theyoginurse
Posts: 82 Member
I’ve read countless articles that say diet is 80% and exercise is 20% of the weight loss factor. There are even articles that say exercise is only 10%. How true is this? Have you lost weight without exercise? Are abs really made in the kitchen?
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Mine were3
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Not for me. While the deficit is the important driving factor, I lost my weight without exercise and ended up with a high bodyfat % no abs or definition to be seen. Next time around I incorporated strength training with the deficit and it made a huge difference.11
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You can lose weight without exercise, but you're probably not going to get a six pack without it14
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You won't get muscular abs unless you work them. You will just have a flat stomach if you control your calories without doing any exercise. I had no fat on my stomach for years but did not have abs until I started doing exercises to train them.8
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If you just want to lose weight, you can do that 100% diet. But I think the body most people envision they will have when they lose weight requires some exercise.
I believe "Abs are made in the kitchen" refers to the fact that it's really difficult to out-exercise a bad diet. If you aren't monitoring your diet, you can easily subconsciously eat more and cancel out the deficit you created with exercise. So what they're saying is - Yes I know you are working out hard, but if your diet isn't on point, you're never going to get to a low enough body fat to get visible abs.30 -
I 100% agree with the above poster. Abs are a result of being lean, not really exercise, unless of course you have amazing genetics. No matter how much you exercise, your physique really depends on what your eating and how much.4
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That's not the saying. The saying is "abs are made in the gym and revealed in the kitchen". This makes sense, although I cannot personally vouch for how to get a 6 pack, lol.12
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They are made in the gym, revealed in the kitchen. You have to have sufficient muscle to show (the made in the gym part), AND low enough body fat to expose the muscle (the revealed in the kitchen part).8
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And some women will struggle to get abs, no matter how hard they work.
There are genetics at play with how "bulgy" the muscles can get, even with reasonable amounts of training.
I've hit a point where I have maybe 1 and a half slightly visible ab muscles, and to get more would require WAY more specific ab pumping than I'm willing to do, and even lower body fat which I'm also not willing to countenance. I was a bit below 16% earlier this year, and still no particularly visible abs.
I've revised my current goal from having visible abs to squeezing out my 4th pull up!
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And some women will struggle to get abs, no matter how hard they work.
There are genetics at play with how "bulgy" the muscles can get, even with reasonable amounts of training.
I've hit a point where I have maybe 1 and a half slightly visible ab muscles, and to get more would require WAY more specific ab pumping than I'm willing to do, and even lower body fat which I'm also not willing to countenance. I was a bit below 16% earlier this year, and still no particularly visible abs.
I've revised my current goal from having visible abs to squeezing out my 4th pull up!
If you have any muscle on your core they would show at 16% ( I'm assuming you are a woman). That has more to do with training than genetics.1 -
As everyone else has said, but it bears repeating. Losing weight will reveal your abs, but if you don't have them they won't show.
For evidence, look at the flat stomachs found on those rescued from concentration camps. No observable muscle tone/definition.
If you have a lot of muscle... or a lot of visceral fat, your abs will be visible at higher body fat percentages. Mine start peeking through when I get below 235.4 -
You can not even train abs directly and get a six-pack.
They are activated by many exercises.
If you want abs you have to reduce your gut which translates to losing bodyfat.0 -
Any effort to put a percentage on it is silly, but the fact is, of course, that you need to be very lean to have visible abs, and that you get more lean by having a calorie deficit. Some (many or most) may also need to also improve training to have visible abs. (Disclaimer: I do not have visible abs, I am not lean enough for that.)
For me, yes, I could lose without exercise, but even apart from the ab question I look much better when I include exercise, including strength building, at least for my personal aesthetic.3 -
theyoginurse wrote: »I’ve read countless articles that say diet is 80% and exercise is 20% of the weight loss factor. There are even articles that say exercise is only 10%. How true is this? Have you lost weight without exercise? Are abs really made in the kitchen?
You can lose weight without exercise
Abs are shown in the kitchen
you do not have to do any direct ab work
core is worked in many ways
sometimes it is all about genetics as well...some may never get a 6 pack.2 -
theyoginurse wrote: »I’ve read countless articles that say diet is 80% and exercise is 20% of the weight loss factor. There are even articles that say exercise is only 10%. How true is this? Have you lost weight without exercise? Are abs really made in the kitchen?
You lose weight when you take in fewer calories than you expend...IMO, it's a lot easier to lose with exercise because you increase your energy expenditure and thus can eat more and still achieve the same end result...but you don't have to workout to lose weight. I lost a good 20 Lbs before I really started doing any kind of deliberate exercise.
For visible abs, you need to have abs...and you need to be at a pretty low BF% and have good genetics...you get to a low BF% by eating less...thus "abs made in the kitchen" thing...
Without exercise, I would have to eat around 1800 calories per day to lose 1 Lb per week...with my exercise, I can lose about 1 Lb per week eating around 2300-2500 calories depending.1 -
My abs appeared from a calorie deficit and my workout five days a week. Note that my workout disnt have a specific abs routine in it - I sort of got them for free.
Now that I see them I incorporate an abs routine.
However, diet played the role as I was on a caloric deficit for about three months prior.1 -
I have a lot of days that go like this: get up, eat a light breakfast quickly (usually just a coffee), drive an hour, spend the day hiking or cycling or skiing, drive back. I burn a lot more calories than usual, and skip a meal or two. Exercise helps by keeping me away from the kitchen where the food is.1
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Abs are made in the kitchen.
Brownies are also made in the kitchen.
The struggle is real.
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@Ironandwine69 this was 16% day. I wasn't doing *huge* amounts of specific core training, although there's plenty of muscle there from 5 years of Pilates and a year of decent lifting.
Just for me, the extra work I'd have to put in to get ripped abs wasn't worth the sacrifices I'd need to make.
(And yes, there's always the possibility that the 7-site calliper measurement came out a bit wrong and I was a bit higher than 16%...)0 -
I believe you can't exercise your way out of a bad diet. I think it takes both nutrition and exercise.2
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Its a two pronged attack. You have to uncover the abs to see them (deficit) but you should also be building something to show (ab work)0
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I got to 7.5% body fat (measured by Bod Pod) before I included strength training in my routine, and only had the earliest beginnings of abs.
So yes, in my experience you have to build muscle and maintain low body fat.0 -
Nutrition/calorie deficit for weight loss, exercise for fitness/physique improvements. It's much easier to create a caloric deficit with nutrition than to try to do it with exercise. However, depending on one's goals and if you really want what most perceive to be a "fit" physique you'll need to do some exercise. Beyond that, the exercise needs to match the goal physique; training for and running marathons likely isn't going to produce the desired physique if the goal is to look like a gymnast or bodybuilder.0
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article in this week's Health magazine, study shows that doing ab exercises does not burn ab fat. Probably something most have already known, but interesting study validated it. Ab exercise can build ab muscle and calorie deficit eliminates fat (and muscle, arggg) evenly across your body.0
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Abs are made through progressive resistance training...they are revealed in the kitchen.1
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Genetics, diet, strength training... in that order.2
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NorthCascades wrote: »
The better question is how bad is bad.0 -
You can exercise your way out of a bad or mediocre diet, so long as you control calories or do sufficient exercise that even with a bad diet you don't overeat.
Of course, if by a bad diet one means "more calories than one is burning," then it's a tautology.0
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