Q: Hi Mike,

I had a question with abdomnal training. I currently do ab exercises 4-5 times a week. My ab muscles have gotten a lot stronger and I can do 100 crunches everytime I workout. My question is even though I know I'm getting stronger there why do I still have fat in that area?

--Sara, Carlsbad

Answer:

Hello Sara,

What you are trying to do is called spot reducing. Unfortunately this is not how your body will burn fat. You can concentrate as hard as you want with exercises that target certain areas of your body, but that does not mean you will lose fat in that area. By concentrating on those areas you are getting that area stronger. You body will take fat from where ever it wants to. By doing these ab workouts you may be losing fat from your arms, face, legs, .... everyone is different. Another comment I wanted to make about your question is the number of reps you are performing. You want to keep your rep range around 15-20 for your specific goal. Your abdominal muscles are made of the same tissue as other skeletal muscle in your body (such as your arms). You would not want to perform 100 bicep curls or 100 squats because you can risk injury and overtraining. If 15-20 is too easy then you need to change the exercise to make it harder. If you or others have any questions about this please let me know.

Thanks,

Mike