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Have you ever noticed how much the world of fitness revolves around men? It's true: most ab exercises are designed for men; women often have to improvise or modify them to get effective results.
Fortunately, there are plenty of great core-building exercises women can do at home or in the gym. Here are a few exercises you probably haven't tried yet or mastered:
Ab Exercises for Women
Here's a look at six such exercises for women:
1) Lying Leg Raise
Lying leg raises are a great exercise for beginners and advanced gymgoers alike. They can be made more difficult by not resetting after every repetition.
Here's how to do lying leg raises:
- Lie on your back with your legs straight, and lift them up till they're in line with your body, keeping them together if you're feeling tight or bringing them apart if you're feeling flexible.
- Keep your back on the floor, and don't let your low back arch off as you do this exercise; it should remain flat throughout.
- Make sure to keep your head and neck in line with your spine so that they don't also lift up off of the floor during the movement.
2) V-up
This is an advanced exercise, as it requires great core strength to hold this position while raising and lowering your body quickly in succession.
Here's how a conventional V-up is done:
- Lie on your back, and lift your legs up so that they're perpendicular to the floor.
- Keep your arms straight out at shoulder height, and bring them together as you raise your torso off the ground.
- Pause for a second, and lower yourself back down. The exercise is done when you've raised yourself all the way up and lowered yourself all the way back down again.
If you want to make it easier, try doing a leg V instead of an arm V. To do that, lie on your back with knees bent at 90 degrees. Keep your feet flat on the floor. Lift both legs up about 45 degrees from the horizontal, but ensure there's still some weight on them.
Bring them together as if making an L shape before lowering them again by extending hips forward slightly at end of the movement.
3) Hanging Leg Raise
Hanging leg raises are a great way to strengthen the core and glutes. They're a little tougher than the other exercises on this list, but they offer the most resistance and potential for muscular hypertrophy.
Here's how you do a hanging leg raise:
- You will need either a pull-up bar or a TRX strap.
- With your legs straight, raise them up till they're parallel with the floor; lower them back down slowly for ten reps.
- For added resistance, try going further than parallel. When bringing your legs up, bring them beyond the point where they are parallel to the floor. That will increase the stretch in your torso and make things more difficult.
4) Abdominal Crunch on the Ball
This move works the abs and lower back. The use of a medicinal ball adds a degree of resistance as the body must adapt to a different type of surface.
The medicinal ball stabilizes and supports the back while also giving it some height off the ground. That makes it harder for you to crunch up and complete the reps.
Here's how you do this exercise:
- Lie face up on a medicinal ball with your knees bent, feet flat on the floor and hip-width apart.
- Using your core muscles, slowly lift your torso off the ball as far up as it feels comfortable (try not to drop back down).
- Lower back down to the starting position.
- Repeat ten times for one set before moving on.
5) Half Crunch
A half crunch is a great exercise for beginners and can be easily modified to increase or decrease the intensity. It offers only a limited range of motion but can greatly engage the torso, if done correctly.
Here's how you do it:
- Lie on your back with your knees bent and feet flat on the floor.
- Raise your upper body up so that it's parallel to the floor, and hold for ten seconds.
- To make the exercise more challenging, use dumbbells in each hand to target more of your core muscles (you will get better results if you do that).
6) Plank
The plank is an age-old exercise when it comes to core development, although it has garnered quite an infamous reputation for being a chore to complete. However, it doesn't always have to be annoying.
Planks are more fun than you think and are also very rewarding. Completing a minute-long ab-burning plank instills you with a feeling of accomplishment not many exercises can give you.
To do a plank:
- Start in a push-up position, with your hands slightly wider than shoulder width and feet hip-width apart.
- Keeping your core tight, extend one arm at a time out in front of you, and lower it back down to the ground.
- Repeat on the other side to complete one rep. Aim for three sets of 20 reps per side.
To make this move easier, use an elevated plank (placing your forearms or elbows on an aerobic step) instead of performing it on the floor. That also makes it more sustainable over a longer period.
Takeaway
Ab exercises are a great way to get a toned core and improve your health.
If you’re looking for easy workouts that don’t take much time, the aforementioned exercises are perfect, as they can be done anywhere and at any time.
