The best exercises for the abs - the results of scientific research. A set of abdominal exercises - home workout for beginners What exercises for the abdominal press

Currently, there are a huge number of workouts focused on training the abs. abdominals. This article will tell you everything you need to know about building a beautiful, sculpted body.

You can be strong... you can be big... but all the really tough guys have incredibly awesome abs. If you want to get abs like Arnold Schwarzenegger, that's great.

If creating a sculpted figure is so easy, why doesn’t everyone have a toned and sculpted stomach? This means there is some kind of problem.

You know what happens when millions of people want something so badly that it forces them to scan Google for what they want late into the night, with their wallets at the ready.

Of course... it's a siren call for the savvy marketers hiding in the shadows. Perhaps it is better to call them eagles, soaring overhead, searching for weakened prey.

Okay, okay, this is going to sound a little dramatic, but my point is this:

Someone will tell you that you only need to do a few exercises a day to get relief press... but this is a mistake.
Some will say that you must do squats and deadlifts, otherwise you will not be able to form a beautiful torso... but this is a mistake.
Someone will say that you need to eat only certain foods, and everything else is absolutely forbidden... but this is a mistake.
Some will say that you just need to lose weight... but this is a mistake.
And some will say that it’s all about food additives... but they are also wrong.

There are really only two things you need to do well:

How to get ripped six-pack abs in 2 easy steps

Getting six pack abs is easier said than done. Although it is quite simple if you follow certain instructions.

1. Lose weight

I think this is obvious.

The first reason why six packs are not visible is the presence of a large layer of fat covering the muscle layer.

By losing fat, you will be closer to your goal, if you are not already there. However, this leads to the next question: how to lose weight?

First, you can't get rid of belly fat directly. Losing weight in limited areas of the body is a myth.

Targeted fat loss or "limited reduction" has long been a hot button for selling fitness books, magazines, DVDs, food additives and much more.

One workout is for “slimming” your thighs and the other is for “sculpting” your midsection. This food is supposed to reduce belly fat and this food can somehow make your thighs look slimmer.

I wish it were that simple.

Research showed that muscle training does lead to increased levels of blood flow and lipolysis (the breakdown of fat cells into usable energy) in the area of the trained muscles, but the effect is so small as to be of no significance.

Training muscles burns calories and thus promotes muscle growth and fat burning, but does not directly reduce the amount of fat formed on those muscles.

Thus, fat loss is a process that involves the entire body.

For effective weight loss necessary maintain a calorie deficit, which causes the body to reduce the overall volume of its fat reserves. Contractions occur everywhere, however, some areas dry out faster than others.

The point is, you can work out as much as you want until your abs explode, but you will never see the result until you send body fat percentage to the required ratio.

This ratio should be: 15% or less body fat for men and 25% or less for women.

Here is a visual image that shows what abs looks like with different content quantities subcutaneous fat:

As you can see, the abdominal muscles become visible at 15% and 25% in men and women respectively, and especially stand out at 10% in men and 20% in women.

It was mentioned earlier that some areas of the body lose fat faster than others.

Unfortunately, the layer of fat that covers the core muscles, especially the lower parts, is terribly resilient. And it's not about individual characteristics organism, but in physiology.

There are scientific reasons why fat cells in this area of the body are more difficult to burn than others. And fortunately, there are various strategies to improve this situation.

2. Develop all your abdominal muscles

In other words, you need to pump all the core muscles. There is a common belief that people who do a lot of weight-bearing exercises (squats, deadlift, exercises with added weight, etc.) do not need to train the abdominal muscles.

One may not agree with this. Let's take a quick look at the muscles that make up the abdominals.

Firstly, this rectus abdominis (rectus abdominal muscle). This is the name for a group of muscles that look like six “packs”:

Then there are several other abdominal muscles that complete the appearance of the torso, these include the obliques and abdominals (or transversus as it is commonly called), as well as the serratus:

Don't discount the need to develop these muscles other than the "pretty" rectus muscle.

Here is an example of abs, with poorly developed lower layers of core muscles:

Yes, it doesn’t look bad, but there is no relief of the oblique abdominal muscles, the serratus muscle is underdeveloped and there is no line of the transverse muscle.

Some people have a different problem: their rectus muscle is weakly expressed or unevenly expressed, while the rest of the abdominal muscles are pumped:

If the obliques are too extended, the rectus muscle is deficient, and the transversus and serratus muscles may be absent.

Now let's take a look at what a good, proper abdominal press should look like:

Of course the model (Greg Plitt) has much better genetics than those two guys, but he's no thinner than the second guy. He just has the perfect balance of development of all the core muscles.

The goal is not just to get beautiful abs, but to have great abs.

I don't look like Plitt, but I have personal experience working on building my abdominal muscle groups. This is me a few years ago:

I was about 7% body fat and, as you can see, pretty good core muscle building. It is worth noting that I did squats, deadlifts, and some abdominal exercises, but this is not what I would like to write about in this article.

(If you're wondering why I only have four abs instead of six, it's purely genetic. Some people develop better rectus abdominis muscles than others.)

This rather dramatic improvement was the result of not only training the rectus muscles, but also other major abdominal muscles.

The Real Shortcut to Six-Pack Abs

It doesn't matter whether you are a man or a woman, a thin person must have developed muscles abdominal press.

You can lose weight with proper nutrition and diets, and for the development of the core muscles of the core, training of both isolated muscle groups and all muscles as a whole is necessary.

Use this workout and flexible diet program to lose up to 5 kg of fat and build beautiful muscles in just 30 days... without exhausting fasting or constant training in the gym.

The best exercises to train your abdominal muscles

I've seen and talked to many people who regularly make incredible amounts of various exercises who can stand in the plank for an impressive amount of time, but all this does not lead to results - their abs remain underdeveloped.

It is necessary to leave the “comfort zone”, i.e. must be given increased load on the muscles For their growth. It is worth paying attention to this, and, in the case of weight-bearing strength training, increase the weight from time to time.

One of the biggest mistakes is not doing strength training with weights when working on your core muscles.

Before we talk about training routines, let's look at what individual exercises are.

There are an almost endless number of different abdominal exercises to choose from, and almost as many opinions as to which exercises are best. Luckily, we're only interested in a few exercises that will help build your core.

All exercises listed in this article were selected based on certain research, as well as my personal experience, which was gained while working with hundreds of people.

I also described several exercises that you can perform, but if you carefully follow the basic plan, then most likely they are not needed.

Basic exercises

Squats, deadlift, bench press, classical military press While they are not abdominal exercises in themselves, they are effective in building and strengthening your core muscles.

They are also the most important exercises for general building and strengthening of body muscles. If you don't do them and don't intend to do them, then you lose the lion's share of progress.

Twisting on the upper block

Crunches on upper block– one of my favorite exercises, which helps well in the formation of the rectus abdominis muscle.

A variant of “twisting” twists is possible, in which, in addition to the rectus muscle, there is a large load on the oblique abdominal muscles. In this case, the sequence of actions is as follows: you need to touch the left knee with your right elbow, then the usual straight twist, and the left elbow touches the right knee, back to the center and so on.

Raising the legs while resting on the elbows

This exercise is considered one of the best, which involves the rectus and oblique abdominal muscles (including their lower parts).

You can start with knee raises, but you should aim to do the exercise with with outstretched legs. After this load becomes small, you can add weight, for example, holding a medicine ball between your legs.

Hanging leg raises on the bar

This exercise is similar to the previous one, but requires much more effort.

Similar to the previous one, at first it can also be performed with with bent knees, but strive to perform with extended legs. Over time you can add weight.

Bike

Don't let it light exercise fool yourself - it is an excellent addition to your workouts. When performing a bicycle, the oblique and transverse abdominal muscles are involved.

Ab roller

I'm not a fan of various gadgets and other gizmos for training, but the ab roller is a really effective and cheap tool.

If you want to include this exercise in your regular training program, then you need to purchase a high-quality video, for example, this one:

Although you can use any :)

You can add weight to this exercise using a weighted vest.

How to create an effective training program and pump up your abs

The rules for creating a workout focused on shaping the abs are very simple:

1. Combine weight-bearing and body-weight exercises into one workout.

Abs capable of deep, separate contractions of individual muscles require much more preparation than many might think. IN in this case an approach " periodic» exercise is the most effective way to achieve this goal.

2. Exercise regularly

Optimal training frequency is a subject of endless debate. However, the main rule can be identified: The smaller the muscle group, the faster it recovers.

So after general exercises exercises such as deadlifts or squats take longer to recover than isolated exercises, for example, on the biceps.

So I noticed that, just like the calf muscles, the abdominal muscles can do more contractions than larger muscle groups.

I noticed that 2-3 ab workouts per week, and at the same time the overall power training– “golden mean” to obtain maximum results and preventing overtraining .

If we consider the question required quantity abdominal workouts per week, then you should leave 1 to 2 days of rest between workouts. If I plan three workouts a week, I prefer to train on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, or Tuesday and Thursday if I plan to do two workouts.

3. Make sure progress is not stagnant

As with any other workout, the main goal of the workout is to become stronger, with beautiful, toned muscles.

The weight used during training should gradually increase as the number of times you can do the same exercise with the weight equals the number of times you can do the same exercise without the weight.

Now that we know the “rules,” let’s take a closer look at how to plan your workouts.

The training scheme is elementary. It is necessary to do the exercises cyclically. One cycle contains 3 exercises that must be performed continuously one after another. We rest only between cycles; we do not rest between exercises within a cycle.

Abdominal training program

How to build a loop:

It’s worth including in the first set strength exercise, such as crunches in the upper block, lifting legs while resting on the elbows or lifting legs while hanging on the bar - only 10-15 repetitions.

If you cannot do the exercise at least 10 times, then you need to reduce the weight. If you do it 15 times, it’s time to add a couple of kilograms.

We immediately move on to one set of exercises without weight and do it maximum amount once.
We move on to another set of exercises without weight and do it as many times as possible.
Rest 2-3 minutes before a new cycle.

For example, here's one of my favorite loops:

1 set of crunches in the upper block, 10-12 times
1 set of leg raises resting on the elbows as many times as possible
1 bicycle set maximum number of times

Rest 2-3 minutes

I usually insert ab circuits between sets of common muscle groups to save time. For example:

1 set of deadlifts
1 cycle per press
Rest 60-90 seconds
1 set of deadlifts
1 cycle per press
Rest 60-90 seconds

It’s better to set yourself a goal of 3 abdominal cycles during one workout (and 2-3 workouts per week). It's actually not as easy as it seems!

Can sports nutrition supplements help you get bigger abs faster?

No natural substances can “burn fat,” no matter how complicated or pseudo-scientific the explanation may be.

Supplement companies most often talk about increasing fat oxidation levels (while maintaining muscle mass) while supporting the thyroid, inducing thermogenesis, blocking enzymes related to fat storage, inducing enzymes that cause fat loss, managing hormone and neurotransmitter levels , reducing water retention, improving nutrient absorption and more.

Okay, while these aspects do have an impact on weight loss, this type of marketing is nothing more than an attempt to blind us with terminology and scientific half-truths in hopes that we will believe it.

If you look at the science of fat loss, you'll find that the right supplements can help, but they won't compensate for poor nutrition and exercise. If you follow the advice in this article, and don't torture yourself with exhausting diets and workouts, you can reap benefits from supplements that will truly accelerate fat loss.

Let's summarize the ab training

Almost every fitness guru and workout program promises to give you a six-pack for a very short time, but few can actually deliver on that promise because it's not really that fast of a process.

There is no panacea for creating a beautiful torso. If you want a lean, sexy belly, then you need to be patient, eat right and exercise. If you are willing to wait months rather than days, you will get the results you want.

Now you know everything you need to eventually get a six pack, get out of your comfort zone and get to work!

Beautiful and sculpted abdominal muscles are the dream of almost every athlete, so the question of how to train the abdominal muscles at home is relevant for many. In today's article we will look at the most effective exercises for the press, which can be performed at home, without any additional equipment.

If you have limited time, it is not necessary to spend it on a trip to Gym, in a section or on a sports field, there are a lot of effective exercises for the press that can be performed at home; the entire workout can be done in 20-30 minutes. These exercises are performed with own weight athlete's body, they are equally suitable for men and women, beginners and more experienced athletes. Let's figure out how to quickly and correctly pump up your abs at home.

Today we will cover the following topics:

Abdominal exercises you can do at home;
Recommendations for abdominal training for men;
Recommendations for abdominal training for women.

Effective abdominal exercises at home

Below will be listed exercises for the press at home, which I recommend paying attention to as part of your training process. Some of them are a little simpler, others are a little more complicated; by trial and error, choose for yourself those in which you are most comfortable following correct technique performing the exercise, and in which you feel the contraction of the target muscle group well.

I recommend performing 4 to 6 exercises in three approaches, with a rest interval of 30-60 seconds, this way you will get maximum benefit and efficiency, work out all parts of the abdominal muscles and with each workout you will become one step closer to your cherished goal.

Combine static (plank, vacuum, corner) and dynamic (various types of twisting, leg lifts, “clip”) exercises within one workout to increase training volume and intensity.

A selection of the simplest abdominal exercises

Raising the body - classic exercise on the press, known to everyone from school physical education lessons.

Raising the body is a simplified version, for those who still have difficulties with the usual version of the exercise.

Another simple option is lifting the body.

Raising the body to the corner is a more complicated version of the exercise. It combines static and dynamic loads on the abdominal muscles - suitable for those who have worked on their abs for at least 1-2 weeks.

Raising your legs to your chin is a great alternative to the first two options.

Alternately raising your legs is also good for pumping and lateral muscles belly.

Elbow plank

is a powerful static exercise in which the athlete focuses on the forearms and toes while maintaining natural lordosis in the lower back. Works the rectus abdominis muscle perfectly; the plank should be done for the maximum amount of time, until you are able to maintain correct position housings. As soon as you lose stability and start to shake a little, the effectiveness of the exercise drops, the load shifts to the calf and deltoid muscles.

More experienced athletes can try a plank variation with more high pose legs, placing them on a hill or leaning against a wall.

Straight arm plank

A more complicated version of the plank, in which you stand in a plank with your arms outstretched. We keep our back straight - not hunched over, and our legs are slightly narrower than our shoulders.

Side plank

An exercise similar to the classic plank, the difference lies in the position of the torso - we lie on our side, leaning on the floor with our elbow and the outer side of our foot. Performed alternately for each side. Unlike the classic plank, the load is focused on the oblique abdominal muscles.

Vacuum

- a unique static exercise, due to which you will not only work the entire target muscle group, but also reduce the volume of your abdomen and waist. It represents the maximum retraction of the abdomen and holding it in this position for maximum time while maintaining calm and measured breathing. Can be performed standing, sitting, lying down or on all fours, all of these options are equally effective, but slightly involve different stabilizer muscles.

This is perhaps the only exercise with which you can give sufficient training stress to the transverse abdominal muscle, which is responsible for the volume of your abdominal cavity.

Crunches

is a classic abdominal exercise with which you can start your workout, as it engages all the fibers of the rectus abdominis muscle along its entire length. When performing crunches lying on the floor, press your buttocks and feet firmly to the floor, keep your hands at your temples or behind your head, without creating a load on your shoulders. cervical region spine, gaze should be directed straight. Flex your torso by contracting your abdominal muscles, while bending slightly at the thoracic spine.

Choose the optimal range of motion for yourself; you should not try to reach your knees with your elbows, as they do in physical education classes at school; it is important to keep your muscles under constant tension and work without stopping at the lower or upper point of the amplitude.

Bike

An effective and fairly common abdominal exercise in which the athlete lies on his back with his legs raised, simulating the movement of riding a bicycle. You can complicate the task - join your hands at the back of your head, lift your body, tearing off top part your back off the floor, and during the movement, lean with your right elbow towards your left knee and your left elbow towards your right knee - this way you additionally use the oblique abdominal muscles and emphasize the load on the upper abs.

Scissors

An exercise similar to a bicycle, but here we make cross movements with our legs, moving one over the other, and raise our legs a little lower, trying to include the lower abs as much as possible. Do not raise your legs too high; experiment and select the optimal angle for your anatomical features, at which you will feel the contraction of the abdominal muscles well.

A type of twist in which the athlete raises his legs bent at the knees almost at a right angle to the body. It is necessary to bend, as if trying to reach your knees with your forehead, you can put your hands behind your head or keep them straight in front of you - this will have practically no effect on the biomechanics of movement. It is important to keep your legs in the same position throughout the entire approach, without lifting your lower back from the floor.

Oblique crunches lying on the floor

A type of crunch in which the largest share of the load is focused on the oblique abdominal muscles. When you lie down on the floor, bend your legs at almost a right angle, resting your feet on the floor. Now we place the ankle of one leg on the knee of the other, cross our arms at the back of our heads, press our lower back tightly to the floor and begin to lift our body using the force of our abdominal muscles. Our task is to try to reach the knee of the right leg with the elbow of the left hand and vice versa, the movement itself is carried out with a slightly rounded back.

More explosive and speed exercise, in which the athlete’s task is to simultaneously raise his legs and body up, trying to reach his feet with his fingers. The movement should be synchronous, the legs and body should rise at the same speed and “meet” in the middle of the amplitude. It is important to keep your lower back firmly pressed to the floor and not bend your legs at the knee joints when lifting - this way you will not only increase the productivity of the exercise, but also reduce the risk of injury from the movement to zero.

Lying leg raise

An excellent exercise for the lower abs, you need to lift your legs from a lying position on your back and bring the movement to a right angle relative to the body. Lying leg raises can be performed with either bent or straight legs, but the first option is much easier and is more suitable for beginner athletes. Throughout the entire approach, it is important to keep your lower back firmly pressed to the floor. If you have a crossbar or wall bars at home, try doing hanging leg raises; this makes the task much more difficult, since a large number of stabilizer muscles are involved, which are responsible for the position of our body.

Alternate leg raises while lying down

This variation differs in that we first raise one leg at a right angle, and then put the second one to it. Alternating leg raises are more difficult than the classic version, since here the abdominal muscles are under tension twice as long, so don’t be alarmed if you manage to perform fewer repetitions than with both legs raised.

To comfortably perform this exercise, we will need a chair, bed, sofa or any other elevated position. You need to sit on the edge of the apparatus on which you will do the leg pull-ups, press your buttocks tightly against it, leaning back a little and stretching your legs straight in front of you. Hold the edges of the projectile with your hands. Now you need to pull your legs towards your stomach, while at the same time bending your knees and tilting your body forward. If you feel the movement correctly, your upper abs will get a great workout.

Boat pose (boat pose)

Common in yoga and Pilates, but extremely effective for people interested in fitness. Lying on your back, we gradually begin to simultaneously raise our legs and torso, bringing the movement to a right angle between the legs and torso, while the buttocks are pressed tightly to the floor, and the back and legs are straight. We stay in this position for the maximum amount of time.

Due to inexperience, your muscles will simply tear from the monstrous static load. It is important to maintain a smooth movement throughout the entire approach; here we do 6-10 repetitions with the longest possible delay in a bent state; you should not suddenly lower your legs or body down, as you can easily injure your lower back.

"Six Inches"

An exercise that the legendary basketball player Michael Jordan actively used in his training. It consists of statically holding straight, raised legs while lying on your back. Unlike the corner, the angle of elevation is much smaller and is approximately 15 cm (six inches), hence the name of the exercise.

Running while lying down

- a unique exercise that perfectly develops the endurance of the abdominal muscles. It is necessary to rest your hands on a reliable support (table, sofa, bed, etc.), while resting your toes on the floor. We take alternate steps with each foot towards our support, keeping our back straight. When stepping, the knee of the front leg should be positioned at chest level, the exercise is done in a fairly fast and explosive manner - we try to move the front leg back and pull the back leg under the chest at the same time.

Corner lying on the floor

A static exercise for the press, in which we raise our bent legs towards the chest, resting our buttocks and palms on the floor. It is important to catch the right angle at which you will feel the maximum burning sensation in the abdominal muscles, so you should not raise your legs too high - this will reduce the load on the lower section and create unwanted compression of the lumbar vertebrae. If you have a wall bars or horizontal bar at home, try doing a hanging corner; here we don’t need to be distracted by the position of our torso and arms, and we can completely mentally concentrate on contracting our abs.

Birch

A universal abdominal exercise that evenly engages all parts of the abdominal muscles. Take a position lying on your back, then raise your legs up at right angles to the body - this will be our starting position, while keeping our arms straight, stretching them along the body, or moving them up, you can grab some support for greater control over the movement .

We need to lift our pelvis from the floor using the force of our abs and try to stretch our feet up as much as possible, as if trying to reach the ceiling with our toes, lock in this position for a second or two and lower our pelvis down. The exercise should be performed smoothly; we do not make any sudden movements either when we lift the pelvis or when we return to starting position.

We have already figured out how to properly pump up the abs at home, but are there any specific training features for men? Let's imagine the following situation: You are an adult man in good physical shape, you have been training your abs regularly for several months, but still have not achieved desired result. What needs to be done in such a situation?

There can be quite a lot of factors due to which abs are still not showing off on your stomach. Let's look at the most common of them.

Frequency and intensity of training

There can be two possible scenarios here: either you train your abs too rarely, and this load is not enough to create the stress necessary for hypertrophy of the abdominal muscles, or you train your abs too often, “killing” them with each workout, and your muscles simply do not manage to recover.

It's no secret that the male hormonal background is more suitable for gaining muscle mass, so we need less time and resources to develop the muscle group that interests us. But this does not mean that we should do dozens of abdominal exercises every day, working to failure in each approach, without giving them proper rest and recovery. Therefore, it is necessary to select the intensity frequency at which the muscles will best respond to the load. In my coaching and personal experience, the optimal frequency of abdominal training is no more than twice a week, and in most cases, once a week will be more than enough.

The main thing is to approach this issue wisely. Select 3-5 exercises in which you will best feel the contraction of the abdominal muscles, and try to progress in them, increasing the number of repetitions and decreasing the rest time between approaches.

If the exercise no longer “works” or the neuromuscular connection has worsened, replace the exercise with a similar one. It is important to evenly work all sections of the abdominal muscles, not forgetting the transverse and oblique abdominal muscles.

Nutrition

You will never see abs if your percentage of subcutaneous fat is high enough. Therefore, it is necessary to correctly create a diet and stick to it for quite a long time, then you will certainly see the results of your labors. The basis of your diet should be protein foods, the consumption of carbohydrates and fats must be reduced, and it is better to completely abandon the consumption of simple carbohydrates and trans fats, since by consuming them you not only receive a large number of “empty” calories, but also harm your liver and stomach and pancreas.

Every girl dreams of having a flat and attractive tummy that attracts the attention of others. It’s much more pleasant to have positive attention when everyone looks at you and admires you than to realize that the eyes of others are attracted by your saggy sides and less-than-perfect abs.

Remember that there is no magic exercise, doing which every day for 5 minutes, you will get a perfect stomach and a toned figure. Our body is a complex complex in which everything is interconnected and, if you want to achieve results, you cannot focus on one thing.

Once you realize this, it will be much easier to work on yourself and the desired effect from the exercises will not be long in coming.

Here is the maximum list useful exercises for the abdominal muscles, which will help you get yourself in order efficiently and quickly.

1. Plank

An effective exercise that many people don’t even know exists. But by doing it, you strengthen your abs, thighs, shoulder girdle and buttocks.

Your back should be perfectly straight when performing; if tension increases, stop the exercise immediately so as not to injure yourself.

Tighten your buttocks, this will make the exercise much easier.

Do not bend your legs at the knees, this will create excess stress.

The picture shows a classic plank with emphasis on the elbows. Never bet elbow joints wider than the shoulders. Thanks to this rule, you will not cause harm to your joints.

Completion time – until the first unpleasant sensations arise, but no more than two minutes. It is advisable to do this no more than once a day. Here the principle - the greater the number of repetitions, the better - does not apply.

2. "Crunch and bicycle"

Lie on the floor, clasp your hands at the back of your head. Remember, never interlock your fingers, this can injure your cervical spine! Try to touch your elbow to the opposite knee, while the leg that is not involved in the process is straightened.

Number of repetitions – 3 sets of 10-15 times.

3. “Elbow to Knee Twist”

Lie on the floor, clasp your hands at the back of your head. Don't clasp your fingers. Then cross your legs as shown in the picture. Touch your right elbow to your left knee. Next, switch your legs and stretch, respectively, with your left elbow to your right knee.

The number of repetitions is 15 times on one leg and 15 times on the other.

4. "Twisting"

Lie on the floor with your legs bent at the knees. Place your hands on the back of your head, do not clasp your fingers. The lower back should not lift off the floor. Straining only your abdominal muscles, pull your head, neck and shoulder blades forward, but not with your arms! You should feel your abs tense. Smoothly lower yourself back down.

Number of repetitions – 2-3 sets of 20-25 times.

5. “Double Twist”

Lie on the floor, arms along your body. Then, tensing your abdominal muscles, simultaneously pull up both legs, while lifting your torso towards you. The hands should touch the legs, as in the picture. Return to initial position.

Number of repetitions – 1-2 sets of 10-15 times.

6. "Scissors"

One of the most famous and simple exercises. Lying on the floor, extend your arms along your body. Do not raise your head, otherwise there will be excessive stress on the cervical spine, and no one needs this. Raise your legs completely straight above the floor and, imagining that they are scissors, cut the air from left to right and vice versa.

Number of repetitions – 2 sets of 15-20 times.

7. "Reverse twist"

Lying on the floor, raise your legs so that they are perpendicular to your torso. Stretch your arms along your body, do not raise your head. After this, trying to tense your abdominal muscles, stretch your legs towards your chest. If this is too difficult, you can bend your knees at first.

Number of repetitions – 2 sets of 10-15 times.

8. "Climber"

A good thing not only for training your abdominal muscles, but also for cardio training. Get into a position as if you were doing a push-up. Do not arch your back and lower back; there should be one straight line from your head to your feet. Raise one leg as shown in the picture and pull it towards your chest. The abdominal muscles should be tense. After lowering your leg, pause and raise the other one.

Number of repetitions – 2-3 sets of 15-20 times.

9. Toe Touch Crunch

An exercise that looks very simple, but is difficult to perform. Lying on the floor, raise your legs vertically. Then, reach for them with your hands to form a kind of letter V. Touching your toes, lower yourself to the starting position.

Number of repetitions – 1-2 sets of 8-10 times.

10. "Vacuum"

An extremely useful thing that, unfortunately, few people use. This exercise will allow you to tone the transverse muscle, which is responsible for making your stomach look flat.

The starting position is the same as in the figure, the body is relaxed. Draw air into your stomach and then exhale completely. Try to exhale even after the air has completely escaped. As you do this, tighten your abdominal muscles.

Execution time and number of repetitions – 3-5 times for 20-30 seconds.

Is it possible to pump up your abs at home so that cubes appear on them? Determination is one of the traits of a real man; nothing is impossible for him. Even if you have to work hard to achieve your goal.

In the article you will find a description of effective exercises for losing weight and strengthening abdominal muscles, which are suitable for both beginners and experienced athletes.

About the training program

For perfect abs you need to train all abdominal muscle groups

The abdominal muscles are divided into three groups - upper, lower press, oblique muscles. Each group has its own exercises:

upper press - twisting;
lower abs - exercises with raising legs;
oblique muscles - twisting with torso rotation, lateral twisting.

How to quickly pump up your abs at home (video training):

How to do crunches?

There are many abdominal exercises, but the most effective are crunches.

Direct

I.P.: lying on the floor, legs bent at the knees (90°), palms under the back of the head.
Smoothly, without making jerks, using force, the shoulders are raised and moved forward to the pelvis, returning to I.P.

With a twist

The same, with the body turning to the sides at the top point.

Reverse

I.P. - Same.
As you inhale, lift your hips off the floor and try to pull your legs toward your chest without changing the bend angle. To make the exercise more difficult, place a ball between your knees.

Side crunches

Exercise narrows your waist.

I.P.: lying on your side, resting on your elbow.

The pelvis is raised and lowered, bending at the waist.

Complex for beginners

if there is no horizontal bar, then you can raise your legs on the floor

Press crunches.
Vertical and horizontal “scissors”. Lying on the floor, perform horizontal and vertical movements with legs raised 30 cm from the floor.
"Bike". Lying on the floor and raising your shoulders, as in straight crunches, try to reach the knee on the opposite side with your elbow, while simultaneously pulling your leg bent at the knee towards the elbow.
Climber exercise. Starting position - as with. As you inhale, pull your knee toward your chest, and as you exhale, straighten your leg. Then repeat the same with the other leg. Perform at a fast pace for 30 seconds or longer.
Leg raises on the bar, (if there is no stadium or wall bars nearby at home, then you can lie on the floor).

How to remove belly fat?

The plank exercise will help you get rid of your belly fat

Is it possible to lose belly fat by pumping up your abs? To answer this question, you need to know one nuance. It is in the internal abdominal muscles, which are practically not worked out during training, are relaxed and bulge. Therefore, even a belly can be skinny people. There are other exercises for this part of the muscular skeleton.

I.P.: as when performing horizontal push-ups, the abdominal muscles are tense. Stay in this position for 10 seconds. Then they lower themselves to the floor, inhale deeply, return to the starting position and perform the exercise again. Over time, the duration increases. Despite its apparent ease, this exercise is not easy for a beginner to perform.

They do the same thing, but rely on right hand, bent at the elbow, and the right leg. The plane of the body is perpendicular to the floor, left hand raise the top. Repeat the same for the other side.

Burning belly fat and sides

Exercises must be performed slowly, without rushing

To burn fat on the stomach and sides, do crunches, but without weights, “to the last strength.”

You won't be able to lose weight in one part of your body. Additionally needed aerobic exercise or . These include active games - basketball, tennis, etc. They not only help burn fat, but also increase endurance, strengthen the heart and blood vessels.

Ab pumping table for 14 days

Day	Replays	Approaches
1	20	4–5
3	15
5	25
7	20
9	15
11	30
13	20

Start with 1-2 sets, their number is gradually increased. On even days - rest.

Intensive video training for advanced:

Errors

Here are the mistakes that beginners most often make when trying to improve their abdominal shape.

Ignoring complex exercises. Complex workouts help to work all the muscles of the body. Therefore, the program includes traction, etc.
Working out the abdominal muscles requires a lot of effort and energy, so they are performed last.
For cubes, the press is pumped every day, doing it several times. This is true, but the same effect is achieved if you train 3-4 times a week, performing 3-4 sets. There is no point in wasting extra energy.
Incorrect execution. Often beginners perform movements in a way that is easier for them to do. Such connivance does not bring results and often ends in injury.
Can't be neglected - they create beautiful posture. This is what the exercise does.
When performing crunches, do not extend much, otherwise the muscles will stretch and the tone of the abdominal wall will decrease.
Long-term classes according to the old program, without complications and new exercises. Muscles get used to the load, and at some point the training stops bringing results. As soon as the exercise has become easy to perform, it is complicated, the number of repetitions is increased or replaced with a new one.
Relying on devices from TV stores. The products are created for lazy people who still train anyway.

Extras - food, water

replace fast food with vegetables

To prevent a layer of fat from hiding spectacular cubes, Proper nutrition is a prerequisite. People forget about fatty, fried, fast food, cream pies, smoked foods, and sweet carbonated drinks. Simple carbohydrates, which are found in chips, most desserts, potatoes, and baked goods, only complicate the task.

To remove fat on the stomach and sides, the ratio of fats, proteins, carbohydrates in percentage terms should be 20/50/30.

The menu is based on:

porridge (buckwheat, pearl barley, unpolished rice);
lean meats (chicken, turkey, beef);
Fish and seafood;
raw vegetables and fruits (especially apples, cucumbers, avocados, carrots);
legumes (peas, lentils, soybeans).

Seasonings speed up metabolism:

hot (cayenne) pepper;
cinnamon;
ginger;
mustard.

Testosterone is a male hormone that helps build muscle mass and burn extra calories.

Increase testosterone levels with the right foods. Carrot sticks with avocado puree sauce contain beta-carotene, which is involved in the synthesis of the hormone.

Water balance is important. In total, drink up to 2 liters of clean water per day.

Metabolism will accelerate by 30% if you drink a glass of cold water with a temperature of up to 5 o C.

It is important to remember that for an athletic physique you need A complex approach. The first results appear no earlier than a month later. The task becomes more difficult if the person is very heavy. Start with the minimum physical activity- walking, swimming, then start intense training.

It is often considered that the best exercise for the abs is this. Peter Francis, professor San Diego State University, set out to answer this question using scientific methods and determine the most effective abdominal exercise.

His study (1) assessed the effects of 13 of the most popular ab exercises on direct abdominal muscle recruitment. Using electromyography equipment, the load in the upper, lower and lateral abdominal muscle groups was measured. In addition, the load in the thigh muscles was measured for all three dozen participants in this scientific experiment to determine whether the movement was performed due to the leg muscles.

Fitseven has already written about that - let us remind you that often abdominal exercises are performed fundamentally incorrectly, and the load from the abdominal muscles is transferred to secondary muscle groups (for example, to the legs or lower back).

Effective abdominal exercises

Each subject in the above-mentioned study performed 10-12 repetitions of a specific abdominal exercise, strictly following a rhythm of two seconds to rise and two seconds to lower the body - recall that an excessively fast pace of exercise definitely reduces the level of involvement of the abdominal muscles. The effect of each exercise on both the rectus abdominis muscles and the lateral and oblique abdominal muscles was determined.

The effect of each exercise on the abdominal muscles was compared with classic crunches. If the exercise score was determined to be, for example, 200 units, this means that the exercise engaged the abdominal muscles twice as effectively as crunches (100 units). If the result was 50 units, then the exercise is twice as bad.

Exercise “Vacuum belly”

Let us make a separate reservation about what was not included in the structure of the study, since it involves muscles, the work of which is quite difficult to measure using the electromyography method. Let us recall that when correct execution“abdominal vacuum” work includes not only internal muscles abs and core, but also the muscles of the diaphragm.

In other words, while this exercise definitely develops your abs and makes your belly much more toned, the effectiveness of the ab vacuum is due more to the development of neuromuscular connections and overall strengthening of muscle tone than to direct muscle fiber hypertrophy.

Press: rating of the best exercises

Below are the results of a comparative study of popular abdominal exercises. It should be noted that although the primary goal was to determine the best exercises for both the rectus abdominis muscles and side press, in the end it turned out that only extremely well-trained people can isolate a certain area - but this is almost inaccessible to beginners. That is why it has its own characteristics.

The best exercises for the rectus abdominis muscles

Exercises for the lateral abdominal muscles

7 Best Ab Exercises

1. Exercise “Bicycle”

Starting position: lying on your back, lower back pressed to the floor. Raise your upper torso, then your legs; begin to alternately pull your knees towards your head, as if. The right knee should touch the left elbow, then vice versa. Read more about the technique and its advantages.

2. Leg raises

The exercise is performed both with and without fixing the back in the simulator (see photo). During execution, the body remains motionless, only the legs bent at the knees move. It is important to feel the work of the abdominal muscles and constantly monitor the movement.

3. Roller crunches

The exercise can be performed not only with a special roller, but also with dumbbells or a barbell rolling on the floor (see photo). Get on your knees, transfer your body weight to your hands, “roll” forward, then, using the strength of your abdominal muscles, return to the starting position.

Sit on a fit ball, place your hands behind your head, then lean back. Using a controlled movement using your abdominal muscles, lift your body, hold for a second and lower yourself down again. Your thighs should remain parallel to the floor when performing.

.

Lying on your back, your lower back pressed tightly to the floor, your arms along your body. Raise your legs up, knees slightly bent, ankles touching each other. Using the strength of your abdominal muscles, slowly lift your pelvis, as if twisting towards your head.

6. Exercise "Plank"

This exercise is considered the best static exercise for the abdominal muscles. It is necessary to take a stable position on your elbows, fix your body, tense your abdominal muscles - and maintain this position for 30-40 seconds. Then repeat several times. Read more about.

7.

The exercise is in many ways similar to classic crunches, however, when performing it, the arms are not placed behind the head, but extended back. Actually, this is what makes the exercise more difficult, increasing the level of muscle involvement in the work.

Abdominal exercises for men and women

Despite the fact that the structure of the abdominal muscles in men and women is absolutely the same, the strategy for training it is still different, since performing multi-joint basic exercises with serious working weight indirectly develops the abs - as a result classic crunches seem overly light to most male athletes.

On the other hand, most girls will be completely unable to perform hanging leg raises or even the aforementioned roller crunches. That is why we remind you once again that there is simply no universal “best abdominal exercise”, since each trainee has his own level of physical fitness.

The best abdominal exercises for men

Hanging Leg Raises
Roller crunches
Exercise “Bicycle”

The best abdominal exercises for women

Lying crunches
Plank and abdominal vacuum

Are the upper and lower abs separated?

As Fitseven mentioned above, the scientific study also showed that the majority of subjects were unable to separate the involvement of the upper and lower abdominal muscles during exercise. The movements, in fact, were performed due to the participation of all parts of the abdominal muscles and core muscles at the same time.

However, this does not mean that it is impossible to specifically load the lower abdomen. This just goes to show that an average exerciser is not able to concentrate on engaging certain areas of the abs - no matter what exercises they do. This requires special training techniques and high level sensation of the abdominal muscles being involved in work.

Another myth indirectly refuted by this study is the super-effectiveness of the ab roller. Despite the fact that roller exercises show slightly greater engagement of the abdominal muscles than regular crunches, it is easy to see that there are more effective exercises for the abdominal muscles.

Among other things, it is important to mention that performing abdominal crunches with a roller requires a fairly serious level of development of the abdominal muscles - if the muscles are too weak, then the main load will go to the arms and lower back. The result, in the end, will only be pain in the back and neck, and not at all pumped up six-pack abs.

Abdominal Exercises: Summary

No abdominal machine or roller will be as effective as a regular hanging leg raise or bicycle exercise performed at a slow pace and with perfect technique.
For most intermediate-level trainees, it is quite difficult to separate the work of the upper and lower abdominal muscles - especially without the ability to consciously tense certain parts of the abdominal muscles.
The “abdominal vacuum” exercise, although it makes the abs stronger, is not due to hypertrophy processes.

Scientific sources

Peter Francis, Ph.D, Biomechanics Lab at San Diego State University,

Seal

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