A developed muscle corset - internal and external oblique abdominal muscles - is responsible for a flat stomach, thin waist, and correct posture. Thanks to it, we can bear heavy loads without consequences for the spine and joints. Therefore, working on the oblique abdominal muscles is important and necessary.
You can pump up your abs in the gym or at home. It’s easier to work on yourself in the conditions of a sports complex - in any gym there will definitely be 4-5 exercise machines with the help of which you will form a beautiful relief and develop strength. The main thing is to properly develop a training program and adhere to a healthy diet.
Classes in the gym can be combined with home workouts. One day can be devoted to exercises on machines, and the other to training with your own weight at home.
At home, the range of abdominal exercises is limited. Especially if you don’t have a bench, horizontal bar and other sports equipment and equipment. However, one should not diminish the importance and benefits of training at home - many amateur athletes in such conditions managed to create a more beautiful relief than gym regulars.
What recommendations do fitness trainers give?
Before you start working on your body, you need to remember a few simple tips that you can hear from every second personal trainer and professional athlete. The recommendations are quite simple:
- Before training - 2-4 hours - you need to eat lightly. Many athletes advise giving preference to carbohydrates - muesli, fruits or vegetables. Such food will give you energy and strength and help make your workout as productive as possible. The portion should be small, as during exercise on a full stomach a feeling of discomfort may arise.
- Warm-up is mandatory. Before pumping up your abs, you need to warm up your muscles. Jumping rope for 5–7 minutes, interval training on a treadmill, or walking at a fast pace on an orbit track are suitable warm-ups. Don't forget to do 10-20 bends to the sides and forward, rotations of the pelvis, twists of the body - such exercises will prevent straining the abdominal muscles and spinal injuries.
- Too intense and frequent training is harmful. After a couple of months of daily serious training, fatigue begins to accumulate in the body. Therefore, it is necessary to calculate the program taking into account individual characteristics - level of training, goals, health status. You can train every other day or 5-6 times a week. The main thing is not to exhaust yourself to the point of exhaustion.
- During training, your muscles should ache and burn. If you don’t feel tension when working on your oblique abdominal muscles, then the exercise is being performed incorrectly.
- After training, you should not eat for 1–1.5 hours. This rule is often ignored by novice athletes, who can be found in the locker room immediately after training with a chocolate bar in their mouth. With this approach, results can be expected for years.
If you feel hungry after a workout, drink mineral water or eat a sour apple.
The first few weeks of training, the oblique abdominal muscles will hurt constantly. The discomfort will go away when the body gets used to the stress. The main thing is not to give up sports and adjust your training program by introducing more complex exercises.
Muscle pain during pregnancy
Pregnant women often report that the muscles in their lower abdomen hurt. The symptom is caused by natural muscle stretching. More often, such pain occurs after the 26th week of pregnancy, since the stomach is already large and the muscles are not adapted to the load. Pain is felt in the rectus abdominis muscles, running from the ribs to the pubic bone, as they support the uterus and the growing baby.
In women who did not exercise before pregnancy, muscle pain is significantly worse due to the fact that the muscles are not elastic.
In order to prevent the occurrence of microtraumas of muscle tissue, with the permission of a doctor, it is necessary to do special gymnastics for pregnant women. If the pain does not go away or is very severe, then you need to tell the doctor monitoring the pregnancy about this.
The cause of abdominal tension can be pathological processes that threaten the life and health of the mother and child, for example, rupture of cysts or uterine fibroids, inflammatory processes, placental abruption. Pain in the abdominal muscles during pregnancy will decrease if you wear a bandage. It will reduce the load on the lower abdomen.
How to pump up oblique abdominal muscles for men
It is much easier for men to form beautiful sculpted abs than for women - this is due to the anatomical features of the body. Therefore, the set of exercises for the stronger sex will be much wider and more varied:
- Twisting with lateral transfer of legs. Starting position: sitting, arms extended at your sides, knees bent. We lower the body back, while simultaneously raising the legs, the body remains motionless. We perform crunches by moving our legs alternately in diametrically opposite directions.
- Crunches on the horizontal bar. Starting position - hanging on the horizontal bar, arms shoulder-width apart, legs bent at the knees, pulled up to the chest. As you exhale, do twists, moving your legs alternately in opposite directions.
- Side plank. Starting position - lying on your side, legs extended, back straight. We place emphasis on the elbow, raise the body so that the body forms a straight line, and hold the plank for 40–60 seconds.
After a couple of months of training, you should increase the load, as the exercises will become ineffective.
Exercises for advanced athletes
The following exercises can be performed by people who have been working on their abs for several months. The description indicates the minimum number of repetitions. The load can be adjusted according to the level of training.
Intense exercises can be alternated with simple crunches.
Simple bending exercises with weights are suitable for people who do not have lower back problems. Starting position: standing, feet shoulder-width apart. The bar is fixed on the trapezoid, after which the bends are performed, lingering at the end point for 3–5 seconds. The number of repetitions is 15–20 times.
During the exercise, the body should be straight. To increase the load, you can hang weights on the bar.
Turning bars is one of the most difficult but effective exercises for the oblique abdominal muscles. Only well-trained people can do it. Starting position - hanging on the horizontal bar, hands shoulder-width apart. Straight legs are raised parallel to the floor and described in an arc. The amplitude should be maximum. The number of repetitions is 10–15 times.
Functions of the external oblique abdominal muscle
It is quite difficult to overestimate the importance of this muscle for ensuring normal human life:
- She lowers the ribs as we exhale, thereby helping us breathe
- Maintains the correct position of internal organs located in the abdominal cavity
- Participates in maintaining normal intra-abdominal pressure
- By contracting, it helps during childbirth, coughing and removing body waste.
- Helps us stay upright and ensures correct posture
- Without it, we would not be able to bend and turn, raise our pelvis
- Developed oblique muscles help avoid spinal injuries when lifting heavy objects
Only regular exercise will help you tone your stomach.
How to pump up oblique abdominal muscles for women
Exercises for the oblique abdominal muscles will help women get rid of unsightly folds on their sides and reduce their waist size. However, in addition to strength training, it is necessary to pay attention to cardio training - it will burn fat and make the muscle corset more noticeable. The following abdominal exercises can be done at home:
- Lying crunch. Starting position - lying on the floor or bench, hands behind your head, elbows apart, legs bent at the knees. As you exhale, twist your body, trying to reach the opposite knee with your elbow. The exercise is performed at a slow pace. Number of repetitions - 10–15; approaches - 3-4.
- Straight arm plank. Starting position - lying down. We stand in the plank for at least a minute. To increase the load, you can “walk with your arms,” alternately leaning on your straight arms and your arms bent at the elbows. During the exercise, the spine should be straight.
- Boat. Starting position: lying on your back. Raise your upper body and straight legs, trying to stay in this position for 20–30 seconds. This static exercise allows you to work not only the obliques, but also the rectus abdominal muscles.
Exercises with sports equipment
If you have sports equipment at home, the list of exercises will be longer. You can pump up your abs using dumbbells or a fitball.
Do side bends with dumbbells. The weight of the equipment is selected individually—beginning athletes can use 3–5 kg equipment. Starting position - standing, feet shoulder-width apart, one hand on the waist, and the other holding a dumbbell, extended along the body. As you exhale, bend to the side, keeping your back straight, and return to the starting position. The exercise is repeated 15–20 times, then change hands.
After a week, the load is increased - the number of repetitions remains the same, but instead of one, they do 2-3 approaches.
Exercises on a fitball will help girls strengthen their abdominal muscles. They lie on the sports equipment with their backs and rest their legs bent at right angles on the floor. Hands clasp at the back of the head. As you exhale, tense your abs and lift your upper body. Lifts are performed with twisting, then returned to the starting position. Repeat the exercise 10-15 times, after which they take a break - no more than a minute. The optimal number of approaches is 3–4 times.
Additional exercises
Below we will look at how to pump up the lateral abdominal muscles using a number of additional exercises. It is worth highlighting here:
- Body bends from a standing position. Take a position, place your feet and raise your arms. Now release the air and tilt your torso forward, while simultaneously twisting your abdominal muscles at the waist. Then touch the fingers of one hand (for example, the left) to the foot of the other foot (in this case, the right). Stand up straight and repeat this exercise, but with a different pair of arms and legs. The total number of repetitions is 16-18 times.
- Raising the shoulder blades. The peculiarity of this exercise is its maximum ease of execution. All that is required here is to lie on the floor, bend your knees, raise your arms and hold them at shoulder level. Now tense your abs and begin to lift your shoulder blades simultaneously with the limb adjacent to it. Here you need to ensure that the shoulder blades are as close to the vertebra as possible, and that the pelvic part fits tightly to the floor covering. Do several sets of this exercise (3-4) and 6-8 repetitions.
When will the results be visible?
The first results of training on the abdominal muscles will be visible only after 3-4 weeks of daily exercise. A beautiful relief will not appear during this time - only the skin on the sides will tighten, and the muscles will acquire pleasant elasticity and become stronger. To obtain visible results, you will have to combine intensive training with a special nutrition system.
Drying will help you quickly build muscle mass, reduce body fat and make your abs more prominent. With such a diet, it is necessary to increase the amount of protein, reducing the consumption of fats and carbohydrates. As a percentage, the BZHU should be either 60/20/20 or 70/10/20. To do this, you will have to switch to low-fat dairy products, lean meat, and include fish, seafood and legumes in your diet.
During drying, it is necessary to work not only on the oblique abdominal muscles, but also pay attention to cardio training. They will help keep muscles toned, quickly reduce the amount of fat in the body, and improve the condition of the cardiovascular and respiratory systems.
With an integrated approach, in 3–4 months you will create beautiful sculpted abs, form a thin waist, and improve your overall physical fitness. After this, all that remains is to maintain the result by studying for 1.5–2 hours 3 times a week.
Training scheme
In this program, exercises for the oblique abdominal muscles for men and women will be equally effective. The main thing is to follow the technique.
First, warm up. Stretch your side muscles, knead your lower back with circular movements
- Twisting, lying on your side – 5*20-30.
- Side bends with a dumbbell – 5*20-30.
- Body lifts with rotation – 5*15-20.
Between exercises, a two-minute rest is enough, but at the end of each approach, a break of no more than 60 seconds is allowed. As your fitness level increases, perform exercises without rest, in the spirit of circuit training.
