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Confidence First

2 weeks until you need to put on a bikini and you're wondering what to do to look and feel good? Let's start with how you feel. Confidence from the inside out will make you feel good and translate into looking good. Eating well, getting plenty of rest, being kind and helping others — these all add to the secret ingredient to looking great. If you feel good on the inside, you will look good on the outside, regardless of your body shape, hair style or nail color.

From a physiological perspective, to get those tight bikini abs — it's going to take some commitment to eating a balanced diet and some hard (but rewarding) workouts. Chances are, like healthy humans do, you have abs under a layer of healthy normal fat. By burning away at that layer, overall fat loss will help you define those sexy abs. Cardio is an excellent way to burn the fat and calories that are holding you back from your bikini abs. The more intense the workout, the more fat you will burn.

Burn Fat

Cardio

Cardio is an excellent calorie and fat burner. When combined with strength exercises, you can expect to get toned and in shape fast. For a full body workout you can do from home, check out my Exercise Program that is easy to follow and will help you stay in fantastic shape.

Cardio helps you lose belly fat, strengthens the heart muscle, reduces the risk of disease and improves lung capacity. It naturally boosts energy, is great for mental health, improves sleep and keeps the immune system strong and healthy. When done on a regular basis, cardio can improve resting blood pressure and contribute to longevity.

I suggest mixing up your routine and doing intervals instead of slow steady cardio — your body burns more calories from the change in pace, so you can achieve more results in a shorter period of time. Go hard, ease off, then hard again for at least 20–60 minutes. You will see a leaner stomach faster this way.

Nutrition

Diet

A diet clean with water-rich foods, green veggies and clean protein will help dramatically with seeing your abs. You can work out all you want, but if your diet isn't on point you won't see results. Focus on overall fat loss rather than spot reduction and pair your diet with regular physical activity.

Cut back on sugar, simple carbs (bread and pasta), fried foods and alcohol. Replace them with vegetables, lean proteins, foods rich in healthy fats (oily fish, avocado, nuts), wholegrains and pulses.

Build your diet around your protein intake. Chicken breast, low-fat milk and protein shakes will keep you full longer — your body actually burns more calories breaking down protein than it does other foods. It also fuels your muscles, raises your metabolism and helps you burn fat more efficiently.

Train Smart

Working Out

Many women don't start training abs because they think they'll have to do extremely hard exercises or use difficult machines. That's just not the case. You can do easy and effective exercises at home to get those tight and sexy bikini abs. Forget about special ab machines — planks, crunches, sit-ups and leg raises are all you need.

Core strength is crucial for your overall fitness and helps to improve balance and stability. Once you start to see your abs, the more you'll see them and the more inspired you'll be to keep going. The sooner you get started, the sooner you'll see those abs!

For beach-ready abs, I recommend full-body workouts starting with the static moves below. They're perfect for beginners and will build up the strength in your abdominals before moving on to more advanced exercises.