5 Best Core Exercises for Men to Tone Abs and Build Core Strength

Core exercises are important to build abdominal muscle strength and tone the muscles. It’s quite important to include core exercises in your workout routine.

More often than not, these exercises are skipped, and many keep them for the end of their workout. It so happens that after going through a series of compound and isolation exercises, the body begins to give up. That prompts us to end the workout without doing core exercises.

Therefore, it’s important to work on the core workout sets in the middle of the workout to ensure they don'y get skipped.

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Best Core Exercises to Develop Strength

There are various reasons why you should develop core strength. One of the most important is that the abdominal muscles engage during several compound exercises for balance and stability.

On that note, here's a look at the five best core exercises for men to develop strength.

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1) Rope Crunch

Here's how it's done:

• Attach the rope to the cable pulley machine, and adjust the anchor to the top.
• Hold both grips, and either face the machine or face outwards. You have the option to stand or go on your knees.
• Pull the rope downwards by bending from your hips, using the core muscles. Ideally, your neck should be between the ropes when doing the exercise.

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2) Hanging Leg Raise

You can do hanging leg raises on a cable pulley machine, as most come equipped with pull up handles/bars.

Here's how it's done:

• Hold the handles, and allow yourself to hang.
• Using your core muscles, pull your legs towards yourself.
• Lower your legs slowly to control the negative for the optimum effect.

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3) Ab Rollout

This is an advanced abdominal exercise to build core strength. You will need access to an ab roller for this pose.

Here's how it's done:

• Go on your knees, and hold the handles of the ab roller.
• Roll it outwards while being on your knees so that your upper body is stretched.
• Use your core muscles to pull yourself back to the starting position.

It might take you a while to completely stretch yourself. Therefore, only stretch till the point where you can, and keep increasing the stretch as the core muscles become stronger.

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4) Oblique Twist

Abdominal exercises should focus on the entire core muscles, including the sides. The oblique twist allows you to focus on your sides.

Here's how it's done:

• Lie down on a mat, and fold your legs from the knees, ensuring your feet are firmly on the ground.
• Hold your upper body halfway up using your core muscles.
• Twist towards the right and the left of your hips, keeping the upper and lower body as stable as possible.
• Use a weight plate or a dumbbell as you become stronger.

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5) Plank

Planks are one of the best core exercises. They help work the entire core muscles and improves strength massively.

• Here's how they're done:
• Lie on your chest on a mat.
• Go to your forearms and toes while engaging your core muscles and back.
• Keep your core engaged, and hold the position for at least 30 seconds before relaxing.

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Bottom Line

Core exercises shouldn’t be ignored at any cost. While you don’t have to work on your core muscles every day, it’s beneficial to work on them every alternate day or twice or thrice a week.