Archive for the ‘Lower Abdominal Exercise’ Category
A lower abdominal exercise that I sometimes forget about is the reverse crunch. We did these today in my Body Sculpt class and they are quite effective as a lower abdominal exercise.
Since we had finish our chest presses and flys on a step bench, I thought it a good opportunity to throw in a lower abdominal exercise to give the rest of the body a break. We stayed supine on our step benches and grabbed the bench behind the head and held on. Extend the legs up toward the ceiling. As you exhale, lift and push the hips and legs up toward the ceiling (reverse curl) while holding onto the bench behind you. Do about 12-15 reps.
Then extend the legs in front of you, and lift and lower the legs. Keep the belly button pulled into
your spine which helps keep the lower back into the bench and exhale as you lift the legs. Combine this lower abdominal exercise with your reverse curl while on the step bench and you have a pretty comprehensive lower abdominal workout.
Lower Abdominal Exercise
The following lower abdominal exercise could be considered advanced, however can always be modified. The exercise I’m talking about is hanging leg raises. That is hanging from a bar and bringing your knees to your chest. Some gyms have straps that hang on a bar, that you can put your arms into for more upper body support. The strap goes underneath each arm pit.
Fully extend your body without touching the floor. As you exhale bring your knees to your chest and inhale extend the legs down and repeat. A couple of things to watch out for, which can lead to cheating…the swing. This is a good reason to have
a spotter. When you are lowering your legs, there’s a tendency for the whole body to swing. When you start swinging, you are not isolating the lower abdominal region. A spotter will stop you from swinging.
Start out with as many as you can. Try to increase by 1 each time you do the lower abdominal exercise. If you find that the bent knees exercise is getting easy, extend the legs forward, and make it more like a pike. You’ll keep the legs straight and lift up, using the lower abs. Or you can start training the obliques by lifting your legs to one side, alternating sides.