Ab Ripper X

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4 Comments

Comment by Chris Kolba's Fit to Live on September 6, 2008 at 6:39pm

An awesome reference is Stuart McGills book Ultimate Back Fitness and Performance.
You ask a hard question because without examining you and seeing your strengths and weakness and looking at some of your movement patterns I couldnt give you exercises that may be appropriate for you. I think the book would give you some great backround to help you determine what types of things you should or shouldnt do.
In general though we prefer verticle abdominal training (see blog for some pictures chriskolba.wordpress.com), bridges, bridge march, planks and lateral planks to just name a few.
Chris

Comment by Diana Young, RD, LD/N, CDE on September 5, 2008 at 10:57am

@Chris Kolba - yikes, I have problems with my spine now. Actually I have degenerative joint disease in my spine. Can you recommend ab exercises that would be more appropriate?

Comment by Chris Kolba's Fit to Live on September 5, 2008 at 10:01am

While this routine looks cool and grueling the question to ask is do the exercises train you for show or for go? (the answer is show) which is fine if you just want to look good but training the core for performance or function the approach is quite different.
Also, not to be a downer, many of the exercises shown and done with abdominal training are actually harmful to your spine. The compressive and shear forces to the joints and disc are very high.
Just want to provide another side to think about.
Chris

Comment by tzuzan on August 31, 2008 at 5:21pm

Wow! What a fantastic core workout. This would be perfect for my dragon boat training as we engage our core quite a bit when we are on the water. Thanks for this!