Whilst many will be aware that in order to sport a six pack that is so visually impressive, it may result in friends wanting to ditch the beach holiday plans you had and instead hold out for the ski season, then you will need to follow an intelligent and regimented diet plan.

This is of course somewhat a no brainer and anyone serious about attaining great abs will need to put diet at the top of their priorities. What seems to be slightly ironic though, is often the distinct lack of thought and effort that really goes into developing the abdominal muscles. We’ve all structured those workouts before. Start the week off with a big chest and back workout to build that powerful and masculine upper body. Then be sure to hit the legs hard for fear of being ostracized by your fellow gym goers for skipping leg day (despite the fact it is probably the thing you care least about). Then of course an arm session so dense with volume, you have to rush out of the gym straight after just so everyone can witness a pump so mighty not even Popeye’s spinach can compete.

Once this is all taken care of then it’s time to construct that master plan to a mesmerising set of abs that will make you the talk of the gym. Ok, here goes…..3 sets of crunches at the the end of each workout, that’ll do it!

Whilst there maybe a slightly sarcastic undertone to the above, I have no doubt many of you will have fallen victim to this all to familiar training paradigm. Unless you want to live your six pack dreams vicariously through the latest front cover of Men’s Health, then you’d better start dedicating some real time to training the abs intensively.

Below is the abdominal routines used to build Charlie Burton’s phenomenal mid section. Of course 3.3% body fat certainly helps, but I can assure you the abs were still looking razor sharp at 7-8% due to the hypertrophy achieved from his ab training..

There are three workouts to follow which I suggest you do separately to ensure you dedicate the proper time, energy and focus to each routine.

Workout 1

Ab wheel or barbell roll outs: 10 reps – x3 sets (isometric hold for 2- 3 seconds)

Accentuated crunch on bench: 8-10 reps – 3 sets (slow eccentric)

Reverse crunch on swiss ball: 11-13 reps – x3 sets

Low cable pull in: 20 reps – x 3 sets

Hanging Garhammer raise: 25 reps – x 3 sets

Workout 2

Standing Barbell twists: 20 reps – x 3 sets

Russian twist: 40 reps – x 3 sets (fast)

Low to high cable wood chop; 11-13 reps – x3 sets

DB side bend: 13-15 reps – 3 sets