Hey, it’s getting warmer again and your clothes are getting thinner.

In a few weeks the outdoor pools will open and you want to show off your abdominal muscles, but don’t have any?

Then you are in the right place. I’ll get you and your abs with my six-pack challenge until the beginning of summer!

After the Burpee Challenge, I chose my stomach as the challenge focus.

Because now is the right time to train your abs. Because now you probably already have – unlike in winter – the greater incentive due to the warmer weather to do something for yourself and your body. Before we get to the challenge plan, one more important piece of information for you: the hyped six-pack is difficult or even impossible to achieve with training alone, because it also depends on your body composition, more precisely on your body fat percentage. As a man, you should move below 12% to be able to call a real six-pack your own. In my opinion, women are very well defined under 15% body fat, but of course they can go even further if they actually want to have a six-pack. You can find out more about this in my article “Abs workout – the right way”.

Sixpack Challenge – the exercises to get your abs into shape

I designed the Sixpack Challenge in three levels of difficulty so that everyone can take part. I will now list the necessary exercises for you and would like to briefly explain them to you. The best thing to do is to watch the video instructions so that you can imagine what it means.

Sixpack Challenge (Rookie)

• Crunches
  A classic abdominal muscle exercise in which you lie on your back With your legs upright, lift your upper body until your hands touch your knees. In order to train your oblique abdominal muscles, you should do a straight crunch followed by a left (both hands touch the left knee or the outside of the lower leg) and a right.
• Mountain Climbers
  You jump out of the support alternately with one leg forward to your hands.
• Knee support rotation – Your knees and forearms touch the floor, your upper body and thighs are in one line. Then you turn to the side and stretch your arm up, then switch to the other side – each side counts as a repetition.
• HH Leg Lever – Lift your straight legs up from the supine position. The hands are under the buttocks and serve as support. If not possible with straight legs, try something bent.

Sixpack Challenge (Advanced)

• Sit-Up
  Also classic, but you have to be different Sit fully down on the crunches so that your hands are touching the floor between your feet. So that the oblique abdominal muscles are not neglected here: As with the crunches, put your hands in the middle, once on the left and once on the right.
• Climbers
  Same as the Mountain Climbers, only you have to put your foot further forward, at the same height as your hand.
• Support rotation
  Same as above, only you are now standing in full support (plank) and turn alternately to the left and right.
• Straight Leg Lever
  As above, only the palms of the hands are next to the buttocks and not underneath, and the legs must remain straight.

Sixpack Challenge (Pro)

• Jackknives
  Also known as “jackknives”. Arms and legs are lifted off the ground at the same time and touch each other in the air. Also straight once, then the arms only go on the left outside of the legs, then only on the right.
• Froggers
  From the support, you jump forward with both legs at the same time at hand level and make sure that your buttocks are below knee level.
• Push-up rotation
  Stand in the push-up position and turn your body from this position as described above. When you’ve turned on each side, do a push-up.
• Dragon Flag
  This exercise will require you to have something to hold on to. For example a stable table that you can lie on on your back. You not only have to lift your stretched legs, but also your upper body off the floor up to the shoulder blades. Alternatively, you can do toes to bar if you have a pull-up bar handy. If you don’t have any equipment at all, it’s okay if you “only” do straight leg levers and also lift your buttocks, as I do in the video.

The exercises for the back days

So much for the exercises. However, anyone who says abdominal muscles must also say back muscles. Therefore, I will also sprinkle days in the challenge plan when your stomach has a break and you can train your back to compensate. The following exercises are provided for this, which I have already presented as Freeletics compensation:

• Hyperextensions (Rookie)
  Lie on your stomach, place your arms next to your body so that your palms are on the floor, and then lift your shoulders and chest off the floor.
• Hyperextensions (Advanced)
  As above, only this time you have your hands bent at head height and your shoulder blades contract when you bend up.
• Hyperextensions (Pro)
  The arms are now stretched forward and with each repetition, a different leg is bent in the knee joint, but you still lie on your stomach and activate your back extensors.

The challenge plan

Did I actually write quickly and easily in the heading? Well, you have to do a little something if you want to have defined abdominal muscles.

It’s quick and easy because the whole thing is over in 40 days and I give you the complete set of exercises – so you have to choose a level of difficulty and just do it!

To explain: On April 28th For example, if you have chosen the Rookie-level of difficulty, 15 crunches, 15 mountain climbers, 15 knee support rotations and 15 HH leg levers are available.

04/22/2015 – day 1 – 5/5/5/5
04/23/2015 – day 2 – 10/10/10/10
04/24/2015 – day 3 – back day (2 x 5)
April 25, 2015 – day 4 – 10/10/10/10
April 26, 2015 – day 5 – day off
April 27, 2015 – day 6 – 10/10/10/10 to April 28. 2015 – day 7 – 15/15/15/15
29.04.2015 – day 8 – 20/20/20/20
30.04.2015 – day 9 – back day (2 x 10)
01.05. 2015 – day 10 – 25/25/25/25
02.05.2015 – day 11 – 25/25/25/25
03.05.2015 – day 12 – rest day
05/04/2015 – day 13 – 25/25/25/25
05/05/2015 – day 14 – 30/30/30/30
05/06/2015 – day 15 – 35/35/35 / 35
07.05.2015 – day 16 – back day (2x 20)
08.05.2015 – day 17 – 40/40/40/40
09.05.2015 – day 18 – 45/45/45/45
05/10/2015 – day 19 – day off
05/11/2015 – day 20 – 50/50/50/50
05/12/2015 – day 21 – 50/50/50/50
05/13 2015 – day 22 – 50/50/50/50
14.05.2015 – day 23 – back day (2 x 25)
15.05.2015 – day 24 – 55/55/55/55
16.05. 2015 – day 25 – 60/60/60/60
17.05.2015 – day 26 – day off
18.05.2015 – day 27 – 65/65/65/65
19.05.2015 – day 28 – 70/70/70/70
May 20, 2015 – day 29 – 75/75/75/75
May 21, 2015 – day 30 – back day (2 x 35)
May 22, 2015 – day 31 – 75/75/75/75
23.05.2015 – day 32 – 75/75/75/75
24.05.2015 – day 33 – day off
25.05.2015 – day 34 – 80/80/80 / 80
May 26, 2015 – day 35 – 85/85/85/85
May 27, 2015 – day 36 – 90/90/90/90
May 28, 2015 – day 37 – back day (2 x 50) – 05/29/2015 – day 38 – 95/95/95/95
05/30/2015 – day 39 – Day off
May 31, 2015 – Day 40 – 100/100/100/100

Important notes and tips

If you stick with it until the last day, you’ve already achieved a lot. Congratulations!

If you then also take care to have a negative calorie balance, the results will be impressive. When participating, please also note my exercise instructions. Please pause if you feel sick or unwell. Choose your level of difficulty at the beginning – of course you can also change during the challenge. You can of course also use the Freeletics app to count the exercises (most of the exercises come from the program). I also created a Google Calendar for the challenge so you don’t forget to do your workout. You are welcome to use or subscribe to the calendar. If you want to add it to your Google Calendar, do the following:

• Open your own Google calendar in your browser
• In the menu bar on the left, right under “Additional calendars”, click into the “Add additional calendars” field.
• Enter [email protected] there and press the Enter key
• Possibly Change the color of the newly added calendar by clicking on the little arrow next to the calendar name (4yourfitness Challenge Calendar) and choosing a color.
• Done

If you want to show your friends that you are taking part, you are welcome to forward the link to Challenge or take part in or share the associated Sixpack Challenge Facebook event. Thank you for being there!

Have fun. Keep moving! Just do it!