About Workouts for Women – Part 2

In Ab Workouts for Women – Part 1 I gave you some great tips and rules to follow when it comes to working your ab muscles.

So now that you have a good idea about HOW to properly do your ab workouts lets focus on 3 of my favorite ab exercises.

 

Ab exercise #1

Bicycles – Often considered a one of the best ab exercises developed the “bicycle” is easy to do but is a tough exercise for those of you just starting out.

Starting Position: Lay flat on your back with you feet off the floor and your kness bent. Place your hands on the side of your head an make sure to keep your elbows pointed out (as wide as possible).

 

Next: Extend your left leg out straight. Now bring your left elbow to your right knee. You dont need to touch them together but you need to come close.

 

Then, in one fluid motion, extend your right leg out straight while brining your right elbow and left knee together.

Once you have it down try to do a set on 10 reps where 1 rep is complete when you do both sides.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Ab exercise #2

Power Crunches – The “Power Crunch” is a little more advanced than a basic crunch. Remember to exhale as you contract your abs to get to full effect of this ab exercise.

Starting Position: Laying flat on your back bend your knees and let your feet hover 6 inches off the floor. Place your hands on your forehead and point your elbows in.

 

 

Next: As you exhale lift your knees toward the center of your body and at the same time bring your elbows down to meet your knees just over your stomach by doing a downward “crunch” type motion.

Again you don’t need to actually touch your elbows and knees together but try to come as close as possible.

Then return to the starting position and repeat. Start with a set of 10 PERFECT reps. If you do these correctly you should definitely feel it!

 

 

 

 

Ab exercise #3

Toe Touchers – The third ab exercise is called the “Toe Toucher”. This is another easy but very effective ab exercise for women if done correctly.

Starting Position: Lay flat on your back with your feet straight up in the air. With your back flat and chin slightly tucked into your chest extend your arms and point your fingers at your toes.

Next: Begin this ab exercise by exhaling as your lift your upper body off the floor in an attempt to touch your toes. You should contract your abs as you lift. Keep your legs as straight as possible during the entire range of motion.

The key to this exercise is to let your abs lift your body. If will take some work to master but once you get it you will know it!

 

Once you touch your toes (or come close) lower your upper body back down to the floor but keep your fingers pointed at your toes. If you let your arms sway back over your head before you do the next rep you will be using too much momentum. Don’t do it!

Focus on doing 10 PERFECT reps of these as well.

To get great abs your Diet is always first but when it comes to Ab Workouts for Women these 3 ab exercises are my tried and tested favorite exercises for getting great results!

 

I am often asked “What are the best ab workouts for women?”

My answer is always the same.

It really depends on the type of workout you are doing. By that I mean are you doing a traditional weight training workout? Are you using the TRX Suspension trainer? Do you use kettlebells?

Once they tell me what kind of workout routine they are using I try to guide them along using the same type of routine.

Regardless of the workout that you are using we first need to know how to work actually get our abs to work!

So before we jump into specific ab exercises let’s start with the basics.

Here is the problem…

Most people simply do not know the correct way to do any type of ab exercise. They are mostly going through the motions without fully engaging their ab muscles. Doing a crunch or any other ab exercise will not be effective if you do the exercise incorrectly.

That being said we first need to understand how to do a basic ab movement before we get into all kind of fancy pants ab exercises.

Rule #1- Use your abs to do the movement! This sounds simple enough but after years of training people I can tell you that most people still use everything but their abs when they are doing an ab exercise.

In order to use your abs you need to focus on your ab muscles and let them pull your head and shoulders through the movement. 

Try this: The next time you do a basic crunch try to exhale all the air from your lungs just prior to doing the crunch. As you go to lift your head and neck to do the crunch try to contract your abs as you are doing it. Try to feel the ab muscles engaging a pulling your body through the movement.

Rule #2- Avoid momentum! Faster is not better so slow down and do the exercise correctly! Doing 1000 crunches as fast as you can is not only ineffective is probably means you are doing them wrong!

Squeeze and contract on every single rep that you do! Focus on quality not quantity!

Rule #3– Don’t use your arms to pull! If you place your heads on or behind your head when you do ab exercises make sure that you aren’t pulling you neck and shoulders through the movement.

You can rest your head in or on your hands but do this only for support. If your abs are doing the work then you should feel them working and you can’t do that if your arms are pulling you up on every rep!

Learning HOW to use your abs in extremely important if you want to get the most out of your ab workout.

This will not come easy for some of you but with a little practice you will get it!

-Amber

Coming next in the Ab workouts for Women series we will get into some specific ab movements that you can do to help you get that nice tight stomach you are striving for!

CLICK HERE FOR PART 2!