Abdominal exercises are integral for building your body’s core strength. These are an essential part of your workout routine if you want to stay in shape and feel good. Though, as important as routines that target your abdominal muscles are, very few people actually do them correctly. So, to help you get the most in terms of positive results from your ab workouts, here are a few tips to ensure that you are doing them properly.
Don’t start with abdominal exercises
Your abdominal muscles form part of your core, which is necessary for stabilising your movements. This is especially true when you put your body under strain. By starting your workout with ab exercises, you are essentially lessening the effectiveness of the rest of your workout routine. So, while you should certainly include ab exercises in your training programme, opt to keep them for the last bit of your session.
You need to work with your diet
Belly fat is not easily defeated. While extensive abdominal exercises might build your core muscles, they alone won’t lead you towards that epic six-pack you’ve always dreamed of. Belly fat atop your abdominal muscles needs to be shaved with healthy eating. When combining a strict diet with a stringent abdominal workout routine, you will see the best results.
Don’t train them every day
Like any other muscle in your body, your abs need time to recover and repair after a training session. This means you should be giving them at least one day off after a workout. If you wake up the next morning after an abdominal workout and you still feel like you could do sit-ups all day, then quite frankly you need a more difficult routine and not just more of it.
Always focus on form
With any strenuous exercise, the temptation is there to rush through it without much regard for form and finesse. By doing this, you are counteracting the effectiveness of your ab workouts. Rather take your time and do shorter sets. Take care to do each movement slowly and purposefully. By doing this you will not only see better results but will drastically limit the chance of injuring yourself.
Vary your abdominal exercises
There are scores of exercises that you can do for your abs, each one of them targeting a different area of this muscle group. If you stick to just sit-ups or crunches, you are not fully working each and every part of your core. Be sure to vary your routines as much as possible. Use different angles and exercises to target the various areas of your abdominals equally.
For example, the plank with single leg raise is a great exercise to target your abdominals:
- Start this exercise in a prone push up position. Your body weight must be supported on your toes and forearms.
- Bend your arms at 90 degrees. Please them directly under the shoulders.
- Keep your body straight for the duration of the exercise.
- Contract your abdominals and relax your upper back.
- In this position, raise one leg at a time by contracting the glutes.
- Keep the abdominals contracted throughout the movement.
- Relax the upper back and drop into the plank.
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