Achieve a Flat Stomach with the following Tummy Exercises

For many people the weather warming up means that the bulge that began to take up the midsection area during the holidays has to be worked out. Get a flatter stomach and remove the excess weight in time to go to the beach. Before starting any workout regimen perform a proper warm up to prevent injury and talk to your trainer.

Plank
The floor or another flat surface is required to perform this exercise. You might want to cushion your knees with a towel or mat since you're going to be on your stomach. Use your forearms to prop up the upper body until your elbows are at a ninety degree angle right beneath the shoulders. Use the elbows as support for the upper body as you lift your body off the floor until your toes are supporting the lower part of the body while you rise from the floor. There shouldn't be any drooping or arching in the back instead the body should form a straight line. Lower yourself back to the floor once you have held the pose for twenty seconds. It is sufficient to do only one repetition.

Side Plank
This tummy exercise begins with the same starting position as the first one and is just a variation of it. When you are in the correct position roll onto your side and support your torso with your right forearm. Raise your hips and roll your feet until the right foot is below the left foot. Your body is in a straight line just like in the plank only you are now on one side. Your left hand is placed on the hip and you will keep this position for five seconds. Return to the first position and do the same thing on the opposite side.

Ball Roll
You might have gone to get a ball before reading further if you only glanced at the title. You are the ball for this stomach exercise so you don't need the one you found! In a sitting position on the floor hug your knees against your chest. Balance on your tail bone with your feet on the floor by rolling back slightly keeping the toes pointing downward. As you roll into the upper part of your butt and lower back pull the abdominals inward. Pull yourself to the first position as you contract the muscles of the abdominal wall. If this exercise is too hard at first try loosening your arms up and see if that helps.

Standing Crossover
This exercise for the stomach requires standing just as the name says. The feet should be positioned a few inches apart. With arms to the side bend your elbows ninety degrees until the fingertips are toward the ceiling with palms facing the front. Lift the right knee to the left elbow as you contract the abdominals while taking the left elbow down to the right knee. The joints should touch, hold and return to first position. Repeat for a complete set alternating sides.

Surprising source of omega-3 healthy fats

This is a post by Mike Geary from truthaboutabs.com

Everybody already knows that salmon (wild salmon, not farm raised) is a great source of omega-3 fatty acids...so that's no surprise.

And we also know the issues that come with eating fish higher on the food chain such as tuna and swordfish -- the high mercury levels!

But there is a great alternative that is much higher in omega-3 fatty acids and doesn't have the issues with mercury that tuna, swordfish, and other larger fish do... and that alternative is:

Sardines!

Now before you give the usual response I see from people -- "Ewww, sardines are nasty"... you might want to give them an honest try first and maybe try the type of sardine sandwich melt that I make, which is delicious.

Sardines are a great choice for a quick healthy meal -- tons of muscle-building appetite-satisfying protein, super high in healthy omega-3 healthy fats, and much lower in mercury and other pollutants than most fish. And they're delicious too in my "grilled sardine melt" recipe below.

Here's the healthy grilled-sardine-melt that I make sometimes:

1 container of sardines
1 whole egg cooked over-easy (cage-free organic)
2 slices of sprouted-grain Ezekial raisin bread
a little mustard
1 slice of grass-fed organic cheddar cheese
a little virgin coconut oil to brush the bread with

I just stack the cheese, sardines, and the grilled egg on the bread (with outsides brushed with coconut oil) and then grill this sandwich up just like a grilled cheese. If you have some fresh basil leaves, that goes great inside this sandwich also. Mmm, gotta love basil!

I know this sandwich probably sounds a little weird, but I've yet to find somebody that didn't think this was absolutely delicious when they tried it.

The sprouted grain raisin bread makes a nice sweet contrast to the sardines, egg, and cheese... it's really good!

This is actually quite a filling sandwich with the egg, sardines, and the cheese on it... it'll satisfy your appetite for hours. I like to have this healthy sandwich with a side salad of fresh greens and 1/4 or 1/2 of an avocado... and of course, some my unsweetened iced green/white/oolong tea mixture.

One of the benefits of sardines is also the long chain omega-3 fats, such as EPA and DHA... this is different than eating plant-based omega-3 fats for example, from flaxseeds or walnuts, where your body still needs to try to convert the shorter chain omega-3s to longer chain omega-3s. This is an inefficient conversion, so one of the best ways to provide your body with the important EPA and DHA are through fatty fish sources, fish oil, or krill oil.

That's one of the reasons I'm such a fan of taking daily Krill Oil... especially considering that Krill Oil has been measured as having 47x the antioxidant power of fish oil, plus with the benefit of the phospholipids in Krill Oil.