| Now, I'll be the first person to tell you that it's VERY rare to find a piece of abdominal training equipment that REALLY WORKS. Most of the entries into the abdominal training market are specifically designed to maximize their profit, NOT your midsection. To really hit a home run with me, an abdominal training machine must satisfy four basic requirements: 1. It must be able to effectively work not only the rectus abdominus (the six-pack muscles) but also the obliques (the side ab muscles) and the transverse abdominus (the deep ab muscles that wrap around your core to stabilize it). 2. It must work the abdominal muscles in a functional manner, i.e. not just assisted muscle contraction, like an ab roller or ab folding chair. 3. It must be convenient enough to use that a person will actually use it regularly. 4. It must hold some advantage over doing bodyweight ab exercises alone. ∗∗ BONUS - It would be ideal if you can also use it to effectively work OTHER bodyparts as well! --- Recently, I've had the privelege of testing a new piece of abdominal equipment called the "Lean Abs Machine." Truth be told, I'd been searching for quite a long time for an abdominal machine that met all the requirements that I listed above. Most abdominal equipment (especially the infomerical type of stuff) can barely be classified as training equipment, in my opinion, and none of it ever close to meeting all those requirements I listed above. But the "Lean Abs Machine" turned out to be a big step above the rest! It is the ONLY piece of ab equipment I've used that met all four requirements AND the bonus requirement. The mechanism by which the "Lean Abs Machine" works is actually quite simple. The easiest way to explain it would be that it is a lever with resistance bands attached near the base. You push or pull against the lever using the bands for resistance. It's a simple concept but the elegant design results in great versatility compared to other abdominal training equipment. Here's how it stacks up to the four requirements I laid out above:
1. Working all parts of the core effectively
The "Lean Abs Machine" is simply one of THE most versatile pieces of ab equipment available. Instead of just focusing on one single function of the abdominal area (as most ab training products do - generally it's a crunch type of movement) and then telling you to add a bit of shoulder rotation to work the side abs, the "Lean Abs Machine" actually allows for very specific, separate exercises for all functions of the abdominals. With this machine, I was able to perform exercises that worked a crunchin... | 
