CLICK HERE TO THE THE YOGA BALL TO HELP DO YOUR ABDOMINAL EXERCISES

I’m glad you’ve come across my blog about Abdominal Exercises. After having a couple beautiful girls, I was having a hard time getting back into shape and having a flat tummy. I hope that I can help you find a few abdominal exercises that can help you like they’ve helped me.

I searched the internet for effective and relatively quick abdominal exercises because I don’t want to join a gym or buy any workout DVD’s. I don’t have very much time to myself on a daily basis and so I need a concise and effective abdominal workout.

What I found to be the most time-effective abdominal exercise is the “Bicycle” workout. It’s pretty straight forward:

1. Lie down on your back (preferably on a padded mat) and put your hands together behind your head to offer your head/neck support.

2. Now, raise both knees to your chest and lift your shoulder blades off the ground (without pulling on your neck). Do this motion 10-15 times, 1-3 sets.

3. To get the “Bicycle” effect, lift your right knee and your left elbow and touch them together over your chest. Relax back down.

4. Now bring your left knee and right elbow together over your chest. Relax back down.

5. Do this alternating or “Bicycle” motion 12-16 times, 1-3 sets.

6. This abdominal exercise will work the abdominals and obliques (which really help tighten up your entire mid-section).

CLICK HERE TO THE THE YOGA BALL TO HELP DO YOUR ABDOMINAL EXERCISES

Another abdominal exercise that I’ve found to be very effective is called the “Captain’s Chair Leg Raise.”

1. For this exercise you can modify how you raise your legs depending on what you have available to assist you.

2. The most effective way to accomplish this abdominal exercise is to use a real “Captain’s Chair” workout stand; but I’ve used my couch or a chair and have had pretty good results.

3. You want to be able to get your legs off the ground and raise them to your chest. The more vertical your body is the more effective the leg raises will be.

4. Once you’ve found a way to support your arms and upper body, lift both knees to your chest then lower them back down.

5. I recommend doing 3 legs lifts for each rep. I will lift my legs straight to my chest then rotate left and lift then rotate right and lift. This hits the rectus abdominis and the obliques.

6. Try to do 10-15 reps (of the 3-lift rep) for 1-3 sets with a 60 second rest in-between sets.

7. TIP: the resting allows blood to circulate and your muscles recover allowing you to do more repetitions. Just make sure you rest no longer than 5 minutes, resting 2 weeks isn’t very effective

One last abdominal exercise that I’ve found to be very effective is called a “V-up.”

1. You’ll want to lie down on your back, legs straight with arms resting at your side (again, I recommend a padded mat).

2. Now lift your legs and arms up as you “sit up” and touch your toes (this motion should make you look like a “V” as your legs and body come off the ground with only your buttocks on the ground when your hands touch your toes).

3. Lie all the way back down to the starting position.

4. Do this 10-15 times for 1-3 sets resting 1-5 minutes in-between sets.

5. This abdominal exercise doesn’t focus on the oblique muscles so I usually will do this exercise together with the “Bicycle” exercise so that I get all 3 areas of my abdominals.

I hope that these abdominal exercises work well for you. They’ve really helped me strengthen my core muscles. These exercises combined with a more holistic diet have really helped me look the way I want to look. I also have so much more energy and I feel better inside and out. Let me know if you’ve found any Abdominal Exercises or other secret workout tips that have worked well for you.

CLICK HERE TO THE THE YOGA BALL TO HELP DO YOUR ABDOMINAL EXERCISES

CLICK HERE TO THE THE YOGA BALL TO HELP DO YOUR ABDOMINAL EXERCISES

I’ve often wondered if there are Abdominal Exercises for Women that are “better” than your normal crunches. Turns out those abdominal exercises can be unisex or targeted to men or women.

Since all muscle can be built the same way (break it down with exercise and it grows back stronger) most abdominal exercises will work well for both men and women; but there are a few exercises that can be more helpful for men or women.

Doing abdominal exercises with ball (a medicine ball or yoga ball) can help a woman achieve a flatter tummy instead of getting huge ripped abs like those hot male models we see on TV commercials.

What I’ve found to be the most effective abdominal exercise for women is an exercise called the “Bicycle.” What you basically do is lie down flat on your back and lift your left elbow to your right knee (and vice versa) while you crunch up.

This “Bicycle” exercise allows you to work your rectus abdominis and hit your obliques; the muscles on the sides of your tummy. Working these three muscles together will help make your tummy flatter instead of bulkier.

Another abdominal exercise for women I’ve found to be very effective is used with a yoga ball. I believe it’s called the “Ab Roller.” What you do is get down on all fours then carefully rest both feet on the yoga ball (shoe laces facing down). Extend your legs back so that your body is basically in a push up position then retract your legs until your knees come close to or touch your chest.

Repeat the extending and retracting motion until you’re satisfied (they recommend 10-15 crunches for 2-3 sets). You can also work on your obliques in this exercise by turning your body to one side then the other (at your hips). I would only recommend this if you are comfortable with your upper body strength.

CLICK HERE TO THE THE YOGA BALL TO HELP DO YOUR ABDOMINAL EXERCISES

It seems that using a Yoga/exercise ball will allow you to do a myriad of abdominal exercises. Something that I really like about using a Yoga ball when I do my abdominal exercises is that it helps me tone and strengthen my “stabilizer” muscles while the exercise itself focuses on my core.

If you like using the Yoga ball, here is another exercise you might enjoy because there are a couple variations that you can do as you get stronger. At the most basic level of this exercise, you’ll want to lie down on your back (preferably on some sort of exercise mat or pad) and rest your legs (just from the calves down) on your Yoga ball. Then you can do normal crunches and even go from side to side to incorporate your obliques. Raising your legs help take strain off of your lower back.

What I do now with this exercise is instead of resting my legs on the Yoga ball, I squeeze the ball in-between my feet and raise the ball about 6-8 inches off the ground, legs extended fully, and do 3 set of 15 crunches. I’m trying to work my way up to 30 crunches per set but holding the ball in the air really burns my abs.

There are so many more abdominal exercises you can try and do depending on your experience and comfort level. I personally would recommend buying a Yoga/exercise ball because it can really help maximize your workouts and allow you to mix things up when your normal routine gets boring.

So there you have it. A few abdominal exercises that I like that geared more towards women to help us flatten our tummies and strengthen our cores. I’m sure I’ll come across more Abdominal exercises for women and I’ll share what works and what I like.

CLICK HERE TO THE THE YOGA BALL TO HELP DO YOUR ABDOMINAL EXERCISES

CLICK HERE TO THE THE YOGA BALL TO HELP DO YOUR ABDOMINAL EXERCISES

After deciding to start working out and strengthening my core, I found that if I do Abdominal Exercises with Ball my results are better and the workout becomes a little more fun. More fun you ask? Well, by fun I probably mean more challenging.

I was doing normal crunches and a few abdominal exercises I learned back in school but I wasn’t getting the results I wanted. So I looked around the internet and found that if you use a Yoga ball or exercise ball (same thing, name seems to change depending on who you buy it from) you can really improve your workouts and get more from them.

I’ve been using the TKO Anti Burst Fitness Stability Ball (65cm) because it has great reviews and the price was definitely right. There are a bazillion brands and colors and sizes available so find what works well for you. Personally, I would recommend checking out the TKO stability ball, it’s been fantastic for me.

In addition to the great abdominal exercises I do with my exercise ball is that I seem to be getting better stabilizer muscles (I think that’s what they’re called). A lot of the abdominal exercises I’ve tried with my Yoga ball incorporate both ab workouts and balance and sometimes a little strength.

One of the abdominal exercises with ball that kills my abs has me lie down on my back, hold the Yoga ball with my feet and keep it raised off of the ground about 6-8 inches while I do crunches. The real pain sets in when I start crunching side to side to work on my obliques, ouch!

Since I’m on the subject of abdominal exercises, I’ll keep listing off a few that I’ve liked to do with my exercise ball.

CLICK HERE TO THE THE YOGA BALL TO HELP DO YOUR ABDOMINAL EXERCISES

Another intense abdominal exercise with ball is where you lie down on your back, legs completely extended. Hold your exercise ball with your hands directly over your chest, arms extended. Then lift your legs off of the ground about 4 inches and start doing little alternating kicks in the air.

To really add another element to this abdominal exercise do some crunches while you’re kicking and holding the ball. And if you’re feeling like super woman work in your obliques by rotating left and right on your crunches. That one burns.

For a much more basic abdominal exercise with ball simply lie down (as always, preferably on a mat or pad) bend your legs at the knees and then rest your lower legs on your exercise ball; essentially making your body a “Z” shape. With your legs raised and resting start doing crunches.

I’ve read that it’s good to only go 4-6 inches off the ground; going higher off the ground doesn’t really improve the exercise it just takes more effort for the same effect. Also, don’t forget to crunch side to side as well as in the middle so you work out your entire tummy.

I hope those couple suggestions have helped you. There are a lot of abdominal exercises that I’ve tried that I don’t use in my normal routine so don’t be shy to try out a bunch of ab workouts so you know what you like and what you can handle. In my opinion abdominal exercises with ball are a lot more effective than ab workouts without one.

CLICK HERE TO THE THE YOGA BALL TO HELP DO YOUR ABDOMINAL EXERCISES