Website: www.TurbulenceTraining.com
Author: Craig Ballantyne
Price: $39.95
Guarantee: 60 day money back
Extras: free membership to forums and lifetime support, range of e-books
Discount Available: $4.95 21 day trial available

Turbulence Training is one of the more popular abs development programs going around at the moment. Its well prices, gets great reviews and is headed by one of the nicest guys you will ever meet in the business. So why didn’t it get my top score? Well, read on friends and find out for yourselves.

A Bit About Craig Ballantyne

If you haven’t heard of Craig Ballantyne by now then you are probably just the kind of person who would benefit greatly from Turbulence Training. You see, craig has become one of the best known fitness figures in the business and has recently written magazine articles for such esteemed publications as Mens Health and Oxygen magazine. His products have even been featured on national television following an appearance on the popular series Biggest Loser.

So What Is Turbulence Training?

Realizing that many people were simply too busy to spend a lot of time at the gym, fitness expert Craig Ballantyne, came up with the idea of short but super intense workout sessions to enable busy people to get the most out of the time they had available for exercise. The result is the super intensive fitness course called Turbulence Training

Turbulence Training, as the name suggests, focuses on short sharp sessions rather than spending hours on an exercise bike or rowing machine in the gym. In fact, just 3 Turbulence Training workouts per week are enough to lose tummy fat and get the six pack abs that you have dreamed about – and all for just 45 minutes a week!

Craig achieves this amazing feat by setting you up for 25 minutes of strength training followed by 20 minutes of Interval Training – Turbulence Style! The reason it’s so successful is that Craig has discovered the secret to boosting your metabolism to unheard of highs – something that causes accelerated weight loss and muscle production.

Craig has obviously spent a great deal of time and effort researching and developing these techniques and the testimonials on his site lead me to believe that the results are quite extraordinary. Of course, even he admits that one of the barriers to success in Turbulence Training is that most people simply won’t believe that so little exercise can bring about such great results. However, after watching some of my gym buddies (Ross & Mike – Thanks guys) go through the routines I can say that the feedback they gave me was more than encouraging – they were really stoked about the whole program.

The real secret to Turbulence Training’s success is the concept of the exercise supersets. What Craig has done here is to combine sets of related exercises into one larger exercise regime. The 2 sets are performed one after the other and are formulated so that your metabolic rate is raised to crazy levels and you continue to burn fat for almost 2 days after you stop! Wow – talk about exercising on autopilot. Confused? Well, don’t worry, so was I to begin with but a couple of e-mails from Craig later (yes he really does support his product well) and I can now explain the theory such, with apologies to Craig if I’m off the mark!

Here’s an example of a superset

1a. Bench Press (3×8)
1b. DB Squat (3×8)

Simple really, but that particular set, Craig assures me, is powerful enough to get your metabolism firing for the rest of the day – amazing!

Craig also believes in mixing the exercise sets up for maximum effectiveness – something he calls the variation theory. The reason behind this is that your body learns to adapt to your routines and therefore they become less efficient. By changing them every 3-4 weeks you maintain their optimum effectiveness. I have to say that Ross (my gym buddy guinea pig) said he could really feel the effects of this when the exercises were changed – it was like being given an immediate boost!

Diet According To  Turbulence Training

Again, Turbulence Training, like the other guides I reviewed places a strong emphasis on the role of an effective diet for raising your metabolism. Here it differs from many other programs is that its not an exercise in counting calories! Instead, one of the bonuses in the pack gives you some guides to help you calculate your daily requirements and ways to monitor what you are eating. It also lists a load of common foods and gives you information about their calorific values and nutritional values. Obviously it can’t cover every type of food, but as a planning tool it’s a great help. I really liked this because it removes the tiresome task of counting the calories and sticking to a rigid diet – something I’m particularly bad at, while still enabling you to get great results.

One place where Turbulence training scores well above average is in the support it offers to its members. You get access to the TTmembers.com forums where you can communicate and get advice from a whole spectrum of fellow users, as well as Craig himself. As I mentioned earlier, he also actively supports his customers wand responds within 24 hours of getting an enquiry. My experience bears this out and I can recommend the support aspect of the program very highly indeed.

Of course, it’s not all a bed of roses. For one thing, it’s a bit of a harsh regime – a little too much for me, but I have to say that if you want results and you are prepared to work for them, then turbulence training really delivers the goods. Craig also advises you how to do many of the exercises in the safety and comfort of your own home, but tends to overlook the fact that many of us don’t have access to all of the equipment that he mentions. I didn’t expect you would be too happy having to go out and buy dumbbells, exercise balls, jump ropes and the likes just to follow this course.

Whats The Verdict Then?

Well, I personally liked the product, it was well rounded and offered a good deal of information. Speaking to many people who have tried the program, it certainly seems that it is very effective, but I have to say that I just found it a bit too hard going. I don’t believe that Craigs approach is anything unique nowadays, and while he was no doubt one of the pioneers of the turbulence approach, other products have appeared that are a bit more polished and offer even better results. Its still a good buy, but I would recommend it only to people who have tried to work with other programs and failed.

Getting rid of tummy fat and building a set of flat and toned abs is dependent on 2 crucial factors – nutrition and exercise. No matter what these fitness ‘gurus’ proclaim, when you strip away all of the fluff and filler, every guide on the market focuses on these crucial elements.
In fact, the author of ‘How to get Ripped Abs’ Mr. John Alvino even goes as far as to proclaim that without the correct nutritional information and exercise regimes then you could literally spend your entire life going to the gym and still not see the kind of results that his guide can produce!!

Down the years, there have been many guides that concentrated on losing tummy fat with Turbulence Training and The Truth About Six Pack Abs being particularly good examples of the genre. While these guides are still excellent, How to get Ripped Abs really takes the science to another level.

So, how does the ‘How To Get Ripped Abs’ guide measure up to its hype and marketing spin? Well, I grabbed a copy and handed it straight to my gym buddy – hey why should I do all of the work – and here’s what we found out.

First Up – Who Is John Alvino?

Well, he’s only one of the world’s most respected nutrition and exercise experts. Over the past 16 years he has made a global name for himself thanks to his unique and revolutionary fat loss and extreme exercise regimes. He owns his own training centre in New Jersey and his client list reads like a veritable who’s who of sporting celebrities with NFL superstars and PGA golfers among the many clients who regularly attend. One of the unique things about John is that he practices what he preaches – that’s right he tries every single piece of advice and routine on himself to verify its effectiveness before he tells anyone else. So, in my book at least, his credentials are mighty impressive.

What’s In The How to Get Ripped Abs Program?

The program itself is a comprehensive guide to help you gain accelerated fat loss over your entire body, but as you might guess from the title, special emphasis is given to the stomach and abs area.
I particularly liked the fact that John leaves nothing open to interpretation, for the guide really does cover an entire A-Z of how to get Ripped abs. There’s no fluff or filler, just great, straightforward and easy to follow advice. In fact, the course is so detailed that it actually comprises of several separate manuals. So, without further ado, let me explain what this amazing course contains.

Guide 1: The Main How to Get Ripped Abs Manual

This manual really concentrates on the many specialized exercise regimes that John has developed as part of the program. As I said in the intro though, there are 2 parts to your ultimate success and he hasn’t forgotten nutrition either. His unique approach to the problem involves a 2 phase approach to getting ripped abs..
Phase 1 covers the first couple of weeks of the course and is aimed at fixing your metabolism. Most people need this because we are accustomed to eating 2 or 3 set meals a day. John explains why this is generally a bad thing for us and gives us the tools to get around the problem. I liked this part, but both Tim and myself had problems sticking to the advice in this phase – willpower is not supplied I’m afraid! Phase 2 then kicks in once your body is ready for it. This involves a series of Fat Loss Meltdown techniques as john refers to them as, that are guaranteed to give you twice the results in half the time.
The guide handily outlines a load of tasty meals to get your through this phase, all with detailed calorific and nutritional information so all you really have to worry about is getting on with the exercise regime and sticking to the plan. At the end of this phase I could see definite improvement although, by my own admission I was not the best pupil. Still, if I can see a change then you definitely can.

Guide 2: Fat Loss Meltdown

This manual is worth the price of the product on its own, at least that’s what Tim, my gym buddy who trialed the product for me says. In the Fat Loss Meltdown manual John lays out 24 weeks of workout routines that vary every 3 weeks. These routines are designed to keep your metabolic rate at its peak during the entire 6 month period, and are a great way to stay motivated and on-track. One of the best things about this guide is that it details for you how to achieve amazing results without the need for expensive gym equipment. Ok, if you have a gym membership that’s maybe not a great advantage, but even the certified fitness fanatics among us can gain a lot of ideas from his techniques and training routines for all kind of equipment including jump ropes, bikes and even sandbags.
The meltdown Course is really intensive stuff, in fact it’s the kind of training used by Special Forces around the world, so you shouldn’t be upset if it’s a bit too much for you. Of course, if you relish a challenge…

Guide 3 : The Nutrition Guide

This is actually my favorite part of the guide because it deals with my favorite subject – food. I am personally using this guide every single day because I am trying to achieve my target body fat percentage, but the idea is that, once this goal is reached then its back to Phase 1 and those 6 small meals a day.

So Whats My Verdict Then?

If you are serious about losing tummy fat and don’t mind some hard work then you simply cannot get a better program than How to Get Ripped Abs . But beware – this is a very strict regime and requires dedication. On the plus side, however,  it will  definitely give you results twice as fast as any other fat loss or abs enhancing program available today. The only reason I couldn’t give this product a 5 star review is because of the price. Its quite a bit higher than most of the other programs, but then again, you get what you pay for. Remember, if you don’t get the promised results (and I honestly don’t believe that would be a fault of the guide) then you are still able to get a full 60 day money back guarantee.

So, to summarise, How To Get Ripped Abs covers

1. Metabolism boosting tips to really turbo-charge your weight loss efforts.
2. John Alvino’s Unique workout regime that’s specially designed to ditch the tummy fat and get your abs defined like you never thought possible.
3. Nutritional guidelines which are made to prevent fat loss sabotage and increase your calorie burn rate. Sometimes by as much as 50%. Now, some of these guidelines may surprise you. I know they surprised me and I’m mighty glad that I don’t need to make these kind of mistakes anymore.
4. Special stomach toning exercises, both for the lower abs and upper abs which will help you get that firm look that you desire.
5. General motivational information.
6. A dedicated support system for you to help you with any fitness goal.