THE OG: Abdominals

"Sharp, well-built abdominal muscles are worth a king's ransom. To my mind, there is no more treasured possession"

The Vince Gironda “frog sit-up”

Welcome back to THE OG, my series on all things Vince Gironda. We’re now well into considering Vince’s approaches to training individual body parts. We’ve had the chest and shoulders, and now it’s time for the abdominals, which Vince described as “the most misunderstood area of all.”

All quotations, once again, are taken from Vince’s 1984 book The Wild Physique, unless otherwise stated.

Oh—and before we go any further, let me just remind you that I’m running a special offer for the rest of the month. Get 15% off a full year’s subscription by clicking the button below. Time is running out!

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The best abdominals I ever saw belonged to French-Canadian gym owner Leo Robert. Not only did Leo have chunky abdominal muscles from the bottom of his rib cage to well below the navel, but they were also perfectly aligned in three straight rows. He was the envy of every bodybuilder in his day. (WP, p.105)

In his discussion of abdominal training in The Wild Physique, Vince Gironda’s main concern is to clear up misconceptions and misunderstandings about the highly coveted tight, chiselled midsection.

First misunderstanding: spot reduction. Sorry, but no amount of sit-ups will burn the fat off your stomach. Fat loss doesn’t work like that: it isn’t specific to the region that is being worked. Vince knew this way back when, and it’s been wholly substantiated by scientific studies as well.

Contrary to popular opinion, you cannot produce localized spot reduction by performing a few sets of sit-ups every day. Only nutritional dieting and high-activity training with minimum rest periods will cause weight loss. Heart and lung action are very important to emulsify fat. (WP, p.105)

The Gironda prescription for losing weight is dieting and high-intensity exercise which stimulates the cardiovascular system. That means 8x8 workouts with short rest periods.

Second misunderstanding: abs are difficult to develop. I think people are generally confused in this regard because they think you can spot-reduce your way to a chiselled six pack, when, as we’ve just seen, you can’t. So they think it’s “impossible” to get abdominals. Really, their focus is wrong. If they want to have visible abs, they need to reduce their body fat overall, and that means dieting and the above.

Vince tells a nice little anecdote.