Geschatte leestijd: 6 minutenTraining the abdominal muscles? The most frequently asked fitness question in the world is: “How do I get my abs tight and show my six-pack?” The answer is deceptively simple: make sure you lose the fat on your stomach and train your abs heavily enough to build them.
Training the Abdominals for a Six-Pack
Unfortunately, it’s not as easy as it seems, as many people realize. You can train your abs until you can’t walk from the cramp, but as long as you have a layer of fat over your abs, the outside world will never see your six-pack.
You’ll need to train and watch your diet to achieve a low body fat percentage, and you need to train your abs correctly to give them a tight and muscular appearance.
So how can you best train your abs to eventually reveal a six-pack?
How Are the Abdominal Muscles Structured?
Your abs consist of several internal and external muscles. I’ll focus on the muscles you can see, the outer or external abdominal muscles.
Your six-pack consists of only one muscle: the rectus abdominis or straight abdominal muscle. The lines on that muscle, dividing your abs into the familiar “rolls,” are made by tendons running over the rectus abdominis muscle. If you want your abs to be well defined in different sections, it’s important to thicken the rectus abdominis muscle so the tendons are pulled further into the muscle. Here are all your abdominal muscles.
By the way, not everyone has a six-pack. Some people have fewer tendons running over their rectus abdominis muscle, resulting in a four-pack. Others have more tendons and have an eight-pack. You’re stuck with the number of tendons you have, and you can never turn a six-pack into an eight-pack, for example.
On the sides are the obliques or oblique abdominal muscles. The obliques provide a nice frame for your six-pack. They need to be well trained, but you should be careful not to make them too large. If they’re too large, your waist will appear much thicker than it actually is.
The intercostals or intercostal muscles don’t really belong to the abs, but they are trained along with certain abdominal exercises. When you’re really lean, the intercostals look like shark teeth, forming a nice separation between your abs and your back.
What Movements Can Your Abs Make?
Your abs have several functions that enable a few movements. When choosing exercises for your ab workout, it’s important that all of these functions are trained in the selected exercises.
Your abs:
- Stabilize and tilt your pelvis
- Allow you to lift your legs forward
- Rotate – together with your lower back – your spine
Your abs also assist in moving your ribcage upward so you can inhale.
To fully and effectively train your abs, all of these movements need to be incorporated into your training.
How to Train Your Abs Best?
All abdominal exercises are based on the three movements I described above: they tilt your pelvis, help lift your legs forward, and rotate your spine.
Some exercises focus on just one movement of the abs (for example, crunches, which train the tilting of your pelvis), while others use all movements simultaneously (for example, hanging twisting leg raises).
It’s not possible to train a part of your abs in isolation (separately), while another part is not engaged at all. All abs are trained to some extent with each abdominal exercise.
However, different exercises help emphasize a certain part of the abs, such as the bottom of the rectus abdominis muscle when doing leg raises.
You can never fully isolate your abs. An exercise like the crunch, for example, is focused on training the rectus abdominis muscle at the front, but the obliques – the abs on the sides of your torso – are definitely engaged.
Exercises for the Upper Abs
Most abdominal exercises target the upper abs, probably because this is the part that is most visible. Let me go over the most effective and least dangerous exercises with you.
Least dangerous? Are there dangerous ab exercises?
Unfortunately, yes. There are exercises that can do more harm to your body than good. The most well-known ab exercise, the sit-up, is one such dangerous exercise because it can seriously damage the lower back muscles when performed incorrectly.
Additionally, the sit-up is not as effective as an ab exercise because much of the movement comes from your hips rather than your abs.
No, there are many better, less dangerous, and more effective exercises for your abs.
A highly effective exercise for the upper abs is the crunch.
Crunches
The crunch is a simple exercise with a very short movement, but if done correctly, your abs will burn from it.
Crunches primarily train your rectus abdominis and to a lesser extent, the obliques (the front and sides).
The correct execution of the crunch is as follows:
- Lie on your back (mat, bench) with your knees up. You can keep your feet up or place them on the floor.
- Place your hands on your chest and keep them there. Do not use your hands to swing your upper body forward. You can do this for the last few repetitions to further fatigue your abs.
- Slowly lift your head up by only lifting your shoulder blades off the ground. The rest of your back remains in contact with the ground. This is a very short movement, but enough to train your rectus abdominis muscle.
- Squeeze your abs hard to increase intensity and tighten your muscles.
- Lower your head and shoulder blades again, but do not let your shoulder blades touch the ground. This keeps your muscles engaged.
If you want to make the exercise harder and thicken your abs, you can place a weight plate on your chest.
There are many variations of the crunch. A very good variation is the twisting crunch, where you move your elbows alternately towards the opposite knee (so right elbow towards left knee, and left elbow towards right knee
– see the video).
In addition to the rectus abdominis, twisting crunches also train the obliques and intercostals to the maximum.
These two exercises are all you need to fully train the upper abs. There are many more exercises and variations, but as a base, this is a perfect choice.
Exercises for the Lower Abs
There are also many different exercises for the lower part of the rectus abdominis muscle. These exercises all have one thing in common: they involve raising your legs.
Hanging Leg Raises
The best and at the same time the toughest exercise for the lower abs is the hanging leg raise. The execution is as follows:
- Hang from a pull-up bar or other bar with both hands – palms facing forward, like on the bar you do pull-ups on. You can also use a special leg raise machine.
- Keep your feet slightly forward to avoid extra tension on your lower back.
- Now slowly raise your legs without tilting your upper body further.
- Lower your legs until they are just slightly forward to protect your lower back.
Hanging leg raises are very difficult. Therefore, it’s best to start with bent knees, so you bring your knees up.
You can also do hanging leg raises with a twist – hanging twisting leg raises – to train your obliques and intercostals effectively.
Reverse Crunches
If hanging leg raises are too difficult, or you don’t have the ability to do them, reverse crunches are a good alternative.
As the name suggests, reverse crunches involve lifting your knees upward.
With reverse crunches, it’s important to always keep your buttocks off the ground so your abs remain engaged.
If reverse crunches become too easy this way, you can move your buttocks upward to put even more tension on the lower part of your abs.
Exercises for the Side of Your Abs
The side of your abs – your obliques – are trained in almost all ab exercises. You don’t really need to do separate exercises for your obliques to get a tighter waist.
If you still want to train the sides separately but have a tendency for a wide waist, don’t do side bends. This is an exercise where you stand with a weight in one hand and move your upper body back and forth.
Side bends train your obliques, making them larger. Normally, that’s good in fitness, but when your waist is too wide, you appear narrower in your shoulders and legs. It’s important to stay as slim as possible in your waist.
Side Crunches
If you want to train the obliques effectively, then the side crunch (yes, another crunch) is the perfect exercise:
- Lie on your side on the ground and place your hands next to your head, and cross your upper leg over your other leg.
- Now slowly move your head towards your legs, squeeze your obliques hard, and return.
- Try to keep your shoulder blades as far away from the ground as possible.
Side crunches are a tough exercise, and it takes some training to perform them correctly, but it works the obliques optimally. Make sure you don’t “swing” with your hands to make the repetitions easier.
A Complete Ab Workout
As I said, with ab training, everything revolves around the three areas within your abs. A good workout should be tailored to that.
A good example of a complete ab workout for beginner athletes is:
Bench Crunches: 2 x 12 repetitions
Hanging Leg Raises: 2 x 12 repetitions
Side Crunches: 2 x 12 repetitions
It may seem very little, but if you contract your abs well with each repetition, this is more than enough.
