Lee Suckling: Everything you know about getting a flat stomach is a lie

The area at either side of your belly button is the single most stubborn part of your body. Photo / Getty Images

I've been chasing the illusion of the flat stomach for 14 years now, writes Lee Suckling.

Every magazine article you've read or link you've ever clicked that told you how to get a flat stomach was lying to you.

You see these stories every day: "Six weeks to a six pack!" Men's health mags will tell you. "Drop a dress size before spring!" you'll see in an Instagram ad. And so the same tired advice will begin. Eat more fruit and veggies. Curb your sugar intake. Follow a routine of crunches that haven't really changed since 1958.

I'm repentant to tell you that these things don't work. They never have, and never can. They will help you lose weight, maybe. Any diet and exercise regimen will. The illusive flat stomach, however, is nigh-on-impossible to achieve. No matter how fit you are, how low your body fat percentage, the area at either side of your belly button is the single most stubborn part of your body. Regular people like you and me will never be able to shift this final bit of fat.

There, I've said it. A truly flat stomach is pretty much out of the question. Can we all breathe a collective sigh of relief now?

I have been going to the gym five days a week since 2005, which means I've been chasing the illusion of the flat stomach for 14 years now. I've never weighed more than 75 kilograms (I'm 183cm tall) so I've never had much fat to lose. Yet I've spend over a decade dreaming of that kind of abdomen so flat, when your t-shirt clings to it in the wind you don't think twice. A stomach that causes you zero self-consciousness about rolls when you're sitting down. The kind you can only try to pinch and it will resist your fingers.

Did you know it's possible to have a six-pack of abs and still not have a flat stomach? That's me. All those fitness articles about doing it in six weeks can take a hike: a year ago, after thirteen years in the gym, four years without refined sugar, and months on a strict high-protein, low-carb diet, I "sort-of" achieved the ultimate goal.

I got the six-pack, the kind you can count. One, two, three, four, five, six. Chiselled like marble. This was the result of a renewed workout programme of 90 minutes in the gym (one hour of weights in the morning, back again for 30 minutes of intense cardio at night). Five, sometimes six days a week. When I'd go on holiday, I'd still work out every single day. I would go running on Christmas day when the gym was closed and then double up on Boxing Day with two workouts. I never, ever ate what I truly desired.

Then I'd take off my shirt and look down. What was sitting there, below that grill of six abs? A tiny, convex belly bump. The kind that was preventing me from having the even-more-mythical eight-pack like Jason Momoa had in Aquaman and Chris Evans had at the height of his Avengers fitness.

I found out what it actually took these movie superheroes to get their completely flat stomachs. Chris Evans was in the gym with his celebrity trainer for over two hours a day, six days a week, (https://www.bodybuilding.com/content/chris-evans-captain-america-training-plan.html) and ate nothing but porridge, chicken, and salad. Jason Momoa had his trainer observe, count, and interview him every day about everything he put in his mouth, then have his chef adjust his total calories and macros (protein, carbs, fats) based on what Momoa was actually eating, not just what he was told to eat.

In short, in addition to all the training, the sweat, the years – yes, years, not weeks or months – of discipline, to get a truly flat stomach you need to be observed, coached, and watched over. You figuratively need to put your belly in someone else's hands because you can't be trusted to succeed on your own.

A flat stomach is more commitment than any of us can fathom. Let's also not forget that once you get it, you have to keep it – the militaristic regime never stops. You can never relax. If that's worth it to you, go for gold on the flat-stomach goal. From personal experience, however, I can tell you you'll save yourself a lot of (literal) stomach aches if you simply accept it's only possible to get a flat stomach that's 90 per cent there.