In the last newsletter I covered everything you need to know about abs and core training.
This week I thought I would share my top 9 abdominal exercises with you.
But before I get into my top 9 I wanted to share with you my worst abdominal exercises
- Crunches
- Abdominal crunch machines
- Decline sit ups
- Crunches and twists
- Anything you buy on the shopping channel that guarantees a six pack
All of these exercises use spinal flexion and as I mentioned in my post last week. Not only will this leave you with poor posture but it will also irritate or even herniate a disk in your spine.
If you are doing any of the exercises above stop!!
There is a better way …
Here are 9 of my favourite abdominal exercises.
1. HARDSTYLE PLANK
The hardstyle plank is a plank but on steroids. The goal isn’t to go for as long as you can, it’s to generate as much tension as you can. You want to make sure your shoulders are stacked and packed over your elbows, buttocks are squeezed and tight as possible, abs are braced and quads are zipped. Essentially it should be as if you’re trying to pull down from your upper body and pull up from your lower body.
2. PALLOFF PRESS
Stand parallel to a cable machine and clasp the handle. Make sure your torso is front on and bring your hands to the centre of your chest and slowly press out. Complete all your reps on one side then the other.
3. SHOULDER TAPS
Start in the top of a push up position (feet approximately 3-4 feet apart from each other) Keeping your hips still alternately touch the opposite shoulder. As you get better with this exercise, bring your feet closer together
4 – SLOW MOUNTAIN CLIMBERS
In the top of the push up position, slowly bring your knee towards your elbow, then repeat on the other side.
5 – STABILITY BALL JACKKNIFE
In a push up position with your feet elevated on a stability (swiss) ball, bring your knees up to your chest
6 – ROLL OUTS
Remember those ab wheels from the 80s. Yep they were and still are a great exercise for your core. Roll outs can also be performed on a swiss ball or even a foam roller for a seriously challenging version
7 – STIR THE POT
In a plank position with your elbows elevated on a stability (swiss) ball, gently move your shoulders in a clockwise and anti clockwise direction. Your body should be stable and it’s only the shoulders that move
8 – DEADBUGS
Lie flat on your back with arms extended towards the sky. Lift and bend your legs to 90 degrees. Engage your core and slowly lower your right arm behind your head and extend the left leg at the same time. Return to the start position and repeat with the opposite limbs
9 – CRAWLING
Get into the all-fours position with your shoulders stacked over hands, hips stacked over knees and ankles and toes extended. Raise your knees 1-2 inches off the ground. While maintaining good alignment, move your right hand and left knee forward. Continue moving forward while alternating sides
Functional exercises and the core
It’s also important to recognise that all functional exercises will use your core and ab muscles. Exercises such as squats, deadlifts, push ups and chin ups all have been shown to recruit large amounts of abdominal fibres. Interestingly in an EMG study a chin up was shown to be far greater at recruiting the rectus abdominis (six pack muscle) compared to many other traditional ab exercises. The chin up scored a mean activation of 249 and peak activation of 461 compared to the ever popular hanging leg raise which was a distant second with 124 and 300 peak. An abdominal crunch holding a 45kg weight only recruited 55.3 mean and 83.2 peak activation
Here is an added bonus…
How you position your weight will either increase or decrease core activation. For example a heavy goblet squat where a kettlebell or dumbbell is out in front of you will recruit more core and abs compared to a back squat. As a general rule of thumb anything that is held in a goblet position or is a single sided exercise will have the most core recruitment
Some final thoughts
When it comes to training the abdominals, how you perform the exercises always trumps how many reps or sets you do. 100 reps of any exercises done badly will ultimately lead to a broken body. Invest into a good trainer/coach https://www.personal-trainers.co.nz/ in order to perfect your form.
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