Developing the Abs

The abdominal muscles are the most talked about muscles by far. Everyone wants the perfect washboard abdomen; theories abound about how you can get it. The only problem is that there are so many myths, misunderstandings, and mysteries about abs that few people actually attain the elusive six-pack.

Common gym folklore would have you train your abs every day, doing at least 100 crunches. Some have said that abdominals and low back muscles are endurance muscles, so they can withstand that treatment and even benefit from it. However, the abdominal muscles are made up of the same muscle tissue as any other muscle; like any other muscle they should only be weight trained concentrically and eccentrically once every 48 hours at the maximum. You wouldn't dream of lifting with your legs every day, would you? Your abs need some rest to grow too. The abdominal muscles do have some endurance qualities, since they have to isometrically contract all day long to help you maintain your posture and prevent low back injury, but that work doesn't mechanically stress the muscle fibers as strength training does. When you strength train your abdominals, they hypertrophy and get stronger. When that happens, you just may start to see the six-pack.

The real reason that you don't see ripped abs on everybody, however, isn't related to the number of sit-ups they do or even the amount of weight they lift. It is all about fat. Well-defined abs are not so much a product of exercise as they are of diet. You must peel away all of the layers of body fat for the abdominal muscles to peek through. They can increase in size (hypertrophy) with exercise, but you must decrease your body fat for all of that exercise to show itself as defined abs.

What about the latest rage of doing ab work using stability balls? This is another old practice that has turned into a new training method. Physical therapists have used stability balls in therapy for years to help people with injuries or disabilities to exercise, but now such balls are popular in the gym scene. These accessories add more to your workout than variety. Performing crunch exercises on a ball increases abdominal muscular activity and places a higher demand on the motor control system than doing crunches on a stable surface. Ball use also appears to specifically strengthen the external oblique muscles significantly, even when you perform straight crunches, because of all the muscles needed to stabilize the body during the movement. Crunches on balls change both the level of muscular activity and the way that the muscles coactivate to stabilize the spine and the entire body. Definitely not a rip-off, inexpensive stability balls can help you through a low back rehabilitation program and advance you to a challenging exercise routine.

Can you really concentrate your abdominal training on just upper abs, lower abs, or obliques? There is no validity to the argument that you can train only your upper abs by doing a certain movement and only your lower abs by doing a different movement. The rectus abdominis muscle is one continuous muscle that spans the length of the abdominal area, and when it is called on to perform its job of forward trunk flexion, all of the fibers work as a unit. Indeed, even the obliques assist with trunk flexion. Certain exercises, however, emphasize more of the upper abdomen, like the partial crunch or ab-roller crunch. These exercises work on the upper abdomen because you only complete the movement partially and don't work a full range of motion. The typical exercises people do to target their lower abs, like hanging leg raises and reverse crunches, actually do not totally isolate that area. Reverse crunches may emphasize the lower part of the rectus abdominis as opposed to the upper because that is where the movement is starting, but the hip flexors play a significant role too. During hanging leg raises the abdominals work only as stabilizers, isometrically contracting to allow the hip flexors to curl the lower body. It certainly feels challenging, because it is difficult to stabilize the spine while the body is hanging without support. Rotating movements emphasize the obliques, but the rectus abdominis works during these movements also.

Pilates is a popular discipline that is based on trunk control. Instructors teach you to curl the trunk up and down, vertebra by vertebra, during abdominal exercises, while you do straight-leg sit-ups. By contrast, someone probably taught you to bend your knees to protect your low back during sit-ups, and maybe even to anchor your feet under a table or bench. However, when the feet or legs are restrained during abdominal exercises, the iliopsoas muscle group (hip flexors) is primarily working, not the abdominals. Essentially, you are bending at the hips to raise your trunk. In addition, anchoring the feet leads to an arched back and possible shearing stress on the lumbar spine; some studies have found that performing sit-ups with bent knees doesn't significantly reduce lumbar spine compression. Your feet are never glued to the ground when your trunk moves during everyday life or during sports. To prevent injury and increase performance, your trunk needs to know how to coordinate movements in real-life situations, not just in the gym.

If you are healthy and free from back problems, you need to get off the floor and experiment with some new ab exercises like those discussed in this chapter. If you are lying flat on the floor and only doing crunches, you are missing out on some important ranges of motion for strengthening and function. Maximal muscular tension is developed with a prestretch on the muscle, so try initiating the ab crunch from beyond neutral, or from about 15 degrees of hyperextension. Try using resistive tubing, weighted cables, stability balls, or a curved Roman chair. Also experiment with different functional patterns like diagonals. Such moves will not only increase the use of all of your abdominal musculature, but will also train your ab strength for use in daily activities and sports.

What is the best ab exercise you can do if you have a low back problem or are just a beginner? There is no single best exercise that recruits all of the abdominal muscles simultaneously. Your conditioning level, medical history, and progression are important to keep in mind. With that said, the straight-leg sit-up and bent-leg sit-up create the greatest muscle challenge-but they also involve the greatest lumbar compression. In other words, they may work your abdominals well but could possibly harm your spine. Perform these exercises only if you have previous training experience and don't have a low back problem. The partial crunch produces less spinal compression, but also creates less of a muscle challenge. It is a good exercise for beginners or for those with a previous back injury. One exercise that really challenges the obliques without lumbar compressive loading is one you hardly ever see people doing. The trunk side raise is performed by lying on your side and raising the torso up off a decline sit-up bench or a hyperextension bench. This exercise also strengthens the quadratus lumborum muscle of the low back, a spinal stabilizer.

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