8 Worst Ab Exercises Ever (STOP DOING THESE!)

No matter what ab exercises you are doing in your ab workouts, these 8 are the worst and need to be stopped right now. In this video, I’m going to show you eight exercises for abs that are popular and unfortunately not really helping you to get that six pack you have been looking for. That said, I w

There’s no way in hell we’re getting this  video done man, she’s ridiculous.

What’s up guys, Jeff Cavaliere, Athleanx. com. Today I’m going to show you the eight worst AB exercises ever, as in I don’t want  to do these anymore. But don’t worry, I’m not going to leave you hanging, I’m going  to give you the alternatives I want you to do instead. But because we’re going to  cover those mistakes—welcome, Jesse.

Oh, I got to do the dumb stuff again? Of course. And you haven’t really concentrated on either what I’ve said, or Jesse said to  this point, because we’ve been staring here. This is Daisy, my new Labrador retriever puppy. And guess what?

Even she knows these AB exercises suck. That being said, I want to make sure you  don’t make the same mistakes that Jessie is, so let’s start breaking down one by one. And we start right off with one of the most popular ab exercises out there that I’ve been  a very vocal supporter of and that’s the basic plank. And my reasoning is just that it’s too  damn basic. If you can hold the plank for more than one minute, then you need to move on to  something a lot more challenging because there’s no benefit to be had here, because it is too easy.

There’s a lot of things we can do that take this position to the next level where it is capable of  actually doing something beneficial for you. Try an RKC Plank for example. What you do here is  you involve more muscles in the plant to make it more difficult and rewarding. You initiate with  the glute and quad co-contraction tightening your legs as hard as you possibly can, making the  core become engaged to a level you’ve never felt before. And to increase the difficulty even more,  you keep those elbows out of your body to increase the impact it has on your core.

But you want to  go even further than that and you want to involve some weights, you’ve got some options here, too. And the first is something called the Three Point Plank Row by placing just one arm on the bench  and the other one in the air with a dumbbell, you’ve decreased the overall base of support. You don’t have four limbs on the ground anymore, you’ve just got that three. Notice that my hips  never change, they stay locked in position without losing the stability that I’m looking for. Then finally we have the Twisting Barbell Plank, which takes this to another dimension.

In other words, not just challenging you into anti-extension, but your ability to  control and prevent rotation. Remember, guys, it’s not always about the motion that  you create when you’re challenging your abs, it’s about the motion that you could prevent  when we take it to that next level. Nothing says I’m stuck in the 80s  more with my ab exercise routine, then this exercise number two, and it’s the  Dumbbell Side Bend. It’s just not a good option if you’re trying to train your obliques. And let’s  not even talk about the fact that people will do these either with two dumbbells at one time, in  which they turn themselves into a human seesaw or they’re actually doing them for spot reduction  of their love handles.

In neither case will that actually happen. Because my problem here  is you’re asking for something that your body doesn’t want to give you, and that is an  excessive amount of lateral trunk flexion. Your lumbar spine is not meant or designed to  do this, especially when you combine it with the fact that you’ve got a heavy weight or at  least a moderately heavy dumbbell in your hands. The fact is there’s a better alternative and it  doesn’t require any equipment at all. And it’s a simple Side Plank Lift.

You can see that when I  lift myself up the side that I’m actually training is the underside, the bottom side there that’s  looking for that lateral pillar strength. And when I lower myself back down,  what does it look like I’m doing? If you turn your head sideways, it actually  looks like a side bend right down on the ground. But because we’re doing this in this way, guys, I  have much more control of that frontal plane as it was originally intended. The fact is, guys, it’s  not always the motion that’s the problem it’s how you’re performing it and more importantly,  how you’re performing it, that turns this emotion into something that’s not productive.

For exercise number three, I’m not trying to pick a fight with CrossFit, but they’re the ones who  have been credited with the invention of this exercise. And they managed to take one of the best  machines in the gym, the Glute Ham Raise and make, one of the worst AB exercise you can ever do the  GHD sit up. Now, if you look at this exercise here, guys, you can see right off the bat this  is a one-way trip to the chiropractor. Your back is not going to like you if you do this exercise. You were never intended to do this hyperextension, especially against the full weight of gravity,  because this is a very heavily weighted exercise, half of your body weight being lifted  up on every single repetition.

And again, depending upon the pivot  point and where you place yourself on this, because a lot of people don’t  understand where to place themself on this, you get a real shearing force placed on your  lumbar spine, it’s not something you want. So how could you achieve the same degree of  anti-extension challenge without having to do this? Well, you can just stay on the floor  and get the same benefit. And we have a simple Roll-Up. And even if you have no weight in your  hand at all by extending your arms up overhead, you’re increasing the moment arm on the Abs and  you’re making the exercise more difficult.

And all you’re trying to do is simply allow yourself to  come up, but more importantly, protect that spine on the way down. You’re not hyperextending, you’re  trying to flex it one segment at a time. And if you have the ability to you add a dumbbell  to the exercise to add additional weight. Again, we can start to mimic some of that challenge of  the weight of your upper torso of the GHD set up by doing it with a dumbbell in our hands  on the Roll-Up. And if you have even greater desire to increase the challenge, hold that  dumbbell on one side, which is now going to not only challenge the anti-extension strength, but  also the anti-rotational strength that you need to develop as well.

Any of these exercises are  going to be way better than this one right here and get back to using this for what it was meant  for in the first place, a Glute Ham Raise. Now exercise number four may come as a surprise  to a lot of people that watch my channel, but this one right here. Straight Leg Raises. Now  look, I have a lot of variations of exercises that utilize Straight Leg Raising because it gives me  the opportunity to weight the exercise, the weight of your legs is a good overload. That being said,  if you can’t handle the weight of your own legs, then any variation of a leg race is  going to become problematic for you because of what it does to your low back.

You  see, lifting strictly with your hip flexors and not being able to control the descent of  the legs back down to the ground because you don’t have ab strength is going to  pull your back into hyperextension as those hip flexors yank on your lower vertebrae  every time you lower them down to the ground. If you have to use your hands to get yourself up  there, you should be doing this exercise in the first place because you don’t have adequate ab  strength to do it. Don’t use your hands to push into the ground, use them instead to check  to make sure you’re doing exercise right. Place them to the side of you, right alongside  your lower back, and try to drag them inward