over exercising the abs?

sav · Mon Jun 11, 2007 9:54 am

hi. Does anybody know the truth behind what happens after too many abdominal exercises? if i am working my stomach muscles (crunches,reverse crunches,half crunches,sit ups and the obliques) for a period of 40 mins,five times a week, is it a good or bad idea? i still do my weights and cardio but am desperate to get those fab abs.

oldpjams · Mon Jun 11, 2007 3:11 pm

That's a bad idea and not the best way to see results or maintain muscular function. The purpose of your abs is to stabilize your core -- most importantly your spine. You should train your abdominals as fast-twitch muscles, not slow-twitch muscles. This means they should be trained just like your quads or your biceps...2-3 sets of 8-10 reps. Doing hundreds of repetitions at light weight is training your core to be functionally deficient.

maltby_gardner · Mon Jun 11, 2007 5:07 pm

Well, I do think you're over-exercising your abs, but I'm not sure I agree with pjams, either. My daughter's swim coach, who is a certified and well qualified coach with a Master's degree in exercise physiology, does not train abs "as fast-twitch muscles" in the way pjams described. They do do some work that could be categorized that way, i.e., doing sets of x number of crunches in a given time, or doing as many crunches as possible in a given time, but they also do sets with many repetitions. So maybe it depends on what function you're training for? I don't know. He does train the abs of sprint, mid-, and long-distance swimmers (up to 20 minute races, so not long in the same sense as runners) all the same.

maltby_gardner · Mon Jun 11, 2007 5:07 pm

Oops, double post. The forum is slow today!

oldpjams · Mon Jun 11, 2007 5:48 pm

That's a perfectly excellent way to train abs for swimming...which features repetitive engagement of the core...over and over. That's not a good practice for conditioning your abs for living. 95% of trainers will have you work your abs on the floor too, which completely limits your range of motion backwards (beyond 90º upright), which also is functionally deficient. They all have certifications, but they are still 100% wrong.

maltby_gardner · Mon Jun 11, 2007 6:36 pm

Well what do you do to train your abs not on the floor, just out of curiosity. I have a great book full of core exercise, but it's too overwhelming. There sre so many it's confusing and I can't choose.

oldpjams · Mon Jun 11, 2007 6:45 pm

maltby_gardner wrote: Well what do you do to train your abs not on the floor, just out of curiosity. I have a great book full of core exercise, but it's too overwhelming. There sre so many it's confusing and I can't choose.

You need to do core work on a stability ball, or at the very least on a bench, which allows you to extend backward beyond 90º. A primary function of the rectus abdominus is to stabilize your spine in the event of a sudden impact from behind (contact sports, falling, car accident, etc). If you train on the floor you are deconditioning your abs by not training a full range of motion and making them functionally deficient.

maltby_gardner · Mon Jun 11, 2007 7:58 pm

Well, all righty, then! I do my crunches on a stability ball. My husband says it's because I'm a weenie, but now I'll tell him, no, I'm conditioning my abs for rear impacts! :D

Carrye · Mon Jun 11, 2007 8:11 pm

When I was doing crunches on a stability ball, I found out that there were a lot of muscles in there that I never knew existed. They particularly liked to tell me about themselves in the morning. It was however, a great feeling.

*note to self: do that again*

sav · Thu Jun 14, 2007 12:14 pm

hmm. theres just so much information and every trainer has his/her own opinion.i have exercised on the ball and i still do my reverse double crunch and leg raises on the bench.but what everybody seems to agree to is ,that getting the fat off the belly with cardio and dieting is priority number one.So do we ignore our isolated ab exercises (esp.if the body is now used to intensive workout) until the body fat has gone down?

oldpjams · Thu Jun 14, 2007 1:04 pm

No, you are strengthening your core and adding lean muscle (both worthwile). You are correct that the muscle will be hidden under a layer of fat as long as there is a layer of fat.

DarkChocolate · Thu Jun 14, 2007 3:22 pm

A very interesting thread!

So, after a few weeks of near-daily (generally at least 6x per week) crunches, I have developed some actual ab muscles, which is extremely exciting! But - they may be "functionally deficient"? That doesn't sound so great :)

I do 60-90 per night (I've been trying to increase it - but maybe this isn't a great idea?). I do them on my mattress, actually, rather than the floor. This started out of necessity, as in my tiny dorm room there wasn't physically enough floor space to lay down and do them on the floor! And now I've gotten used to it. It's certainly gentler on my spine... and I actually think I get a bit more range of motion, since the mattress conforms to my body somewhat. This extra support probably also makes them a bit easier though too, I'm not really sure.

So anyway, this stability ball thing sounds quite interesting, so I'd like to give it a try. Any tips on what to look for? And they come in different sizes, right? - how do I know what size I should get??

Thanks!

oldpjams · Thu Jun 14, 2007 3:26 pm

At 5'6" you want a 55cm ball for crunches. Buy a good one that supporst weight and doesn't pop :wink:

If you can do 60 crunches properly, then you should switch to 3 sets of 10-12 and add weight by holding something on your chest with crossed arms -- a dumbbell, a heavy book, waterbottles, whatever. You will see faster results.

maltby_gardner · Thu Jun 14, 2007 3:28 pm

I'm 5'4" with short legs and I have the purple one from Living Arts. It came with a video, which I've never used. I think it tells on the box what size to get but it's been a while so I don't actually remember.

DarkChocolate · Thu Jun 14, 2007 4:16 pm

Thanks for the tips! I'll check it out and see what I can find!

I do my crunches in sets of 15 reps each... can't do much more than that at once. But I can do a few sets with a couple minutes rest in between. So I'll try out the weight thing, and see how that goes!

And I am reasonably confident I am doing them "properly"... the biggest thing is that I really try to focus on tightening my abs and using that tightening motion to "pull" myself up into the crunch, rather than just using momentum to keep myself going up and down (which I remember is absolutely the way we used to do sit-ups in gym class in elemetary school... completely useless!)

Also, it's been interesting to see that the longer I've been doing the crunches, the easier it's been getting to do them in a way that feels "right"... like the muscles have been developing in the right way to support the proper form. So that's encouraging!

So if I can get ahold of a ball, should I try doing my crunches on it AND try adding the weight (and do the fewer reps/sets)? Or is that all too much to try at once?

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