I had a great ab workout yesterday without doing any crunches or situps, which are mostly a waste of time.  So what exercises did I do for my abs?

Simple, I did complex movements like front/Zercher grip sandbag squats and handstand pushups with my feet against the wall.  These exercises require intense stability work for your abs, and are pretty good for your back too.

When you do squats with a fairly heavy sandbag in front of you, it requires your abs and low back to work hard to stabilize your spine and maintain good posture.  It also works your mid back muscles along your thoracic spine, again, great for your posture.

For the handstand pushups I place my back to a wall and put my hands on the floor about two feet or so, in front of me on the ground.  Then I walk my feet up the wall until my body is fairly straight and then do some pushups.

Not just a great upper body exercise (if strong enough), I also really feel it in my lower abs and internal obliques.  Those muscles are working hard to provide stability.  This is how these muscles work in real life settings.

These exercises provide a lot more intensity than lying on the ground and doing crunches, which are pretty much a waist of time in my opinion – because they lack proper intensity and require too much time (inefficient).

Doing squats or stepups with a sandbag on one shoulder is also a great ab workout.  They force your obliques (sides) to provide plenty of stability for your spine since all the weight is positioned on one side.

Do you see a theme happening here?  Training your abs with exercises that involve other muscles not only saves you time but gives your abs a more intense workout.  It also builds total body coordination which is important for playing sports but also for avoiding injury in everyday life.

Think of a fireman carrying someone from a burning building.  He either carries that person in front of him or on his shoulder.  Doing crunches won’t help him accomplish this…..

but training with sandbags will!

If short on time, work your entire body in one session – building strength and cardio at the same time.

Get moving!

Brian

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