What do you guys do for abs?

[Jiraiya]

For a long time, I never worked abs because I read in so many mags and been informed by so many people with freaking nice abs that it was all diet, or that by doing pull-ups, bench, and squats that my abs would grow. Well 14 years later at 172lbs, benching 335, squatting 385, and doing 23 bodyweight pull-ups my abs still sucked. Sure you could tell they were there, but compared to the rest of my body, they looked like crap. For one, I know my body tends to put every ounce of fat in my mid-section, but that really was not the problem. At one time I thought it was, until I got re-connected with my younger brother who is a bigger guy than me and usually sports 18% to 25% body fat. I am much leaner than him but his abs look freaking freaky despite the fat. He showed me his ab routine where he was doing decline crunches with 45 lb plates and normally goes 130 or so on the ab machines. He trains them like someone would train pecs or legs, meaning serious and heavy and he also does it daily. So after this discovery I started to work heavy on abs daily. After just 4 weeks, there was a drastic improvement. Now I believe that since abs recover alot quicker than most muscles trained, its pretty hard to overtrain them. I also believe that alot of people with nice abs are born with them. The rest of us, will have to work for it. I am sure we have all seen that super nerd in high school who had no fat or muscle and absolutel NO ABS, now explain that you diet guys. I am also sure you all have seen the roid beast bodybuilders in the offseason who have a huge gut, but there abs are still showing solidly. I think abs, like any muscle need to be worked on and built up if they are not already delivered to you by the gods.

[FallenWyvern]

For a long time, I never worked abs because I read in so many mags and been informed by so many people with freaking nice abs that it was all diet, or that by doing pull-ups, bench, and squats that my abs would grow. Well 14 years later at 172lbs, benching 335, squatting 385, and doing 23 bodyweight pull-ups my abs still sucked. Sure you could tell they were there, but compared to the rest of my body, they looked like crap. For one, I know my body tends to put every ounce of fat in my mid-section, but that really was not the problem. At one time I thought it was, until I got re-connected with my younger brother who is a bigger guy than me and usually sports 18% to 25% body fat. I am much leaner than him but his abs look freaking freaky despite the fat. He showed me his ab routine where he was doing decline crunches with 45 lb plates and normally goes 130 or so on the ab machines. He trains them like someone would train pecs or legs, meaning serious and heavy and he also does it daily. So after this discovery I started to work heavy on abs daily. After just 4 weeks, there was a drastic improvement. Now I believe that since abs recover alot quicker than most muscles trained, its pretty hard to overtrain them. I also believe that alot of people with nice abs are born with them. The rest of us, will have to work for it. I am sure we have all seen that super nerd in high school who had no fat or muscle and absolutel NO ABS, now explain that you diet guys. I am also sure you all have seen the roid beast bodybuilders in the offseason who have a huge gut, but there abs are still showing solidly. I think abs, like any muscle need to be worked on and built up if they are not already delivered to you by the gods.

This is quite contrary to what I have experienced my self.

I would like to see pictures.

[Jiraiya]

As you can see from the first sentence of my post, what I am doing is contrary to the norm. What I am pointing out is that if something is working for 90% of the people but not working for you, it may be a good idea to try something different. I have tried the route that worked for most people for over a decade and did not see results. I only wish I changed it up sooner. By no means am I saying my way is the way to ABsolute salvation. When I have time to take pics I will put one up as my avitar.