Saturday Fitness Post | Favourite ab exercises

Today I will talk about my top 3 favourite exercises for abs - without crunches. Say what? Crunches are actually one of the most ineffective exercises for sculpting abs, especially if you have bad posture, weak back and neck. Yes, you gain muscle and abs get tighter with crunches, but with tighter abs your upper body will lean forward, you're scrunching your body, which will cause upper body pain and lead into bad posture. To prevent that, you can try full body exercises, which will help you shed fat, sculpt the muscles and tighten inner corset of your abdominal muscles.

Source: Google.

1. I have a love-hate relationship with squats. I love them, because they are super effective and you see quick results, I hate them because they hurts. And they hurt so good :).

Exercise posture: abs tight and back straight. Then you go down as low as you can, imagine that you are sitting down on a chair, making sure your knees don't go past your toes, so it's not hard on your knees and then come up, squeeze your glutes and still keeping a good posture.
This exercise is not just amazing for your abs, but also your tights, glutes and it can be amazing cardio, if you do it fast enough. If you feel strong enough and you're up for a challenge, do jump squats. It's basically the same, you just add a jump when you come back up from a squat. Repeat and try to do them as quickly as you can (keeping a good posture!) for one minute.

Source: Pinterest.

2. Plank is killer for your abs, back and shoulders.

Exercise posture: Get on the floor, arms in 90 degree angle, elbows underneath your shoulders, body in one straight line, keeping your abs tight. Time yourself how long can you hold in this positing, try to add 5 more seconds every couple of days. You'll see how fast you can progress.
If you're up for a challenge, you can switch arm posture into full extended arms and then switch again. Do this exercise for 1 minute and you'll see how your abs and shoulders are shaking :).
You can also modify this exercise by keeping your hips little bit more above your body, but always remember not to drop them. Keep your abs tight.

Source: Google.

3. Last but not least are push ups. This exercise is basically plank with an arm movement and it always leaves me with abdominal pain (good pain).

Exercise posture: arms are extended straight underneath the shoulders, body in one straight line, back straight (not curved), abs tight. Holding the good posture, bent your elbows and bring your whole body towards the floor and push up. Repeat.
If you're not strong enough, you can modify push ups doing them off your knees and if it still feels too hard, you can keep your hips above your body (same as plank), which will take some benefits off your abs, but will still sculpt you. You'll gain your strength faster than you think.


You also need a good cardio session and clean diet. My favourite cardio session is still Zuzana's Zcut power cardio (check out my review here), which also contains all of the above exercises, and I love jumping rope as well.


What is your favourite exercise for abs? Do you go to the gym or workout at home? Do you even workout? ;)

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Saturday Fitness Progress: getting ripped

I decided to keep you updated about all my New Year's goals, you can read them here: CLICK. I'll start posting my fitness progress every second Saturday or even just once a month, I'll see how it goes :). 

source: Pinteres

Now, let's talk about my body shape a little. I thought I was full figure (an hour glass with wider waist), that was when I was wider all over, lol. But when I started losing weight (I lost 25 kgs total) I lost it mainly in my upper portion of the body, especially bust line, and I would call my legs and hips my "problem areas". If I gain weight, I gain weight in my lower portion of the body (and face). Also, my bum got bigger from a lot of bum exercises, which is not a bad thing, I had no bum before! So, I'm more of a pear shape now, I guess?

I didn't workout for almost whole month of November, I had Lasik eye surgery on 9th Nov, I took time to recover, I just went for walks every now and then, also I did yoga few times. And I felt like crap, so my diet wasn't the best, I just didn't feel the need to eat clean (it's a mental thing) or I even overate healthy food (I had problem with emotinal eating in the past). So, I lost some muscle definition and strength (I wasn't able to do a regular push up, just from knees). I started working out on 12nd Dec again, mainly high intensity interval training. I took measurements and I measured myself after one month. Here are my results (all measurements are in centimeters):

	12 Dec 2012	9 Jan 2013
Upper arm	32	31   (-1 cm)
Bust line	102	96   (-6)
Waist	88	84   (-4)
Hips	107	105   (-2)
Thighs	64	63   (-1)
Left calf	44	43   (-1)

That's 15 cm total, woohoo!
I don't weight myself, I have my own philosophy on that. And yes, I have huge-ish calves, left one is wider for 2 cm ^^. And I'm 1,62 meters high or should I say small (but I have a big heart!:)).

I started doing more cardio, leg lifts, squats, lunges and planks ... these exercises are great for defining abs.

I am still doing modified version for pull ups, but I can already see that my back muscles got stronger.

Head stand is still just a half head stand :P.

And cellulite? Well, still visible on my legs, but skin is a lot smoother!

And this is how I look right now:

Sorry for a crappy picture and of course I don't have the before picture, but I'll compare them with my next SFP (Saturday fitness progress that is :)).

Happy healthy weekend to you all!!