Now, in the spirit of full disclosure – I am good friends with the authors Alwyn Cosgrove and Lou Schuler. Alwyn and I created Warp Speed Fat Loss together and Lou and I are also working on a project together.
So as you can imagine I’m probably not going to say bad things about the book. However, I’m not the only one that thinks the book is awesome. As I write this, it is the #1 selling Abs book and #1 Weight Training book at Amazon.com (and it has only been for sale for 10 hours).
If you have read the previous books you may have the same questions that I did when I first heard about this project. Last February I had lunch with Lou and he was telling me about this book. My first questions was – “How many more new rules are there?” While I was being sarcastic, Lou answered extremely seriously
“Many.”
He then went on to talk all about the areas that the previous two books never touched on. I was surprised at the differences between the books and as Lou pointed out the first New Rules of Lifting book was written in the early part of the last decade (as there is a large lag between writing a book and getting it published).
Instead of recounting my conversation with Lou about the differences between the books and what this new one brings to the table I have a video for you. In this promo video Lou does a really good job of explaining what the New Rules of Lifting for Abs is all about. Lou is not a salesman and has pretty much told me that he hates selling and marketing and wishes that he could just write books. Despite his self professed great disdain for selling – he really sell’s the heck out of the book in this video by showing the different types of movements and movement progressions that it includes.
The video doesn’t even come close to doing the exercise selection in this book justice. This book contains some of the craziest abs exercises I’ve ever seen like the Suspended Push-Up Hold with Feet Elevated + Leg Raise (page 51). Another favorite is the Front Plank & Row (page 71). One thing that I really like about the book is that while technically it is a ‘how to get abs’ book, at the same time it isn’t. Fitness training has evolved so much over the past several years and this book is the culmination of a lot of that evolution. Full body training is ab training. In the video above Lou shows why the crunch isn’t a good ab exercise and how the plank is a better alternative. But training your abs isn’t limited to ‘ab specific movements. Another great example of how strength training movements are used as ab movements in the book is one of my favorites, two-point dumbbell row. You can see in the pictures below the difference between a two point row (two points refers to two point of contact – two feet) and a traditional dumbbell row with your leg on the bench. The two point row requires much greater stabilization and total body involvement compared to its traditional counterpart.
Two Point Dumbell Row Traditional Dumbbell Row
The New Rules of Lifting for Abs is full of these types of movement upgrades. The exercises and programs in this book outline how you should be training if you want to get the most out of your time spent exercising.
One final note. As you read The New Rules of Lifting for Abs you’ll definitely notice how well it is written. Lou has been writing books for a long time and it shows. The book is so polished and easily accessible to the reader (Side Note: with my conversations with Lou I am continually impress with how much Lou cares about the readers experience with his books – something the book industry is increasing lacking). While reading the nutrition sections, I stopped and thought to myself – ‘Lou explains this better than I do!”
It is just an awesome book. I know you will get so much out of it beyond just using the programs but changing how you look at your training. It is by far my favorite in the New Rules Series and it is waaay better than The Matrix Revolutions so pick up a copy and start training.
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