Personal Trainers Share The Best Ab Workouts For Men

When gaining strength, it's important to pay attention to all parts of your body. It's no good bulking up your arms and chest and ignoring your legs and abs, not unless you want to look weirdly proportioned, right? Of course, to properly dedicate yourself to training these areas, you need to know the right exercises to do.

When it comes to abs, there can be a lot of information out there telling you all sorts of different things to do. Rather than try to do a bit of everything, though, personal trainers have been sharing the best ab workouts for men to help.

The plank works the entirety of your core

A good ab workout to start off with is the plank. It's a classic for a reason, with personal trainer Morgan Rees stating that it's good to do because it targets the entirety of your core. What's more, it also helps to stabilize the spine, which definitely isn't a bad thing. You may already know how to do a plank, but you need to make sure that you're doing everything correctly to really benefit from this workout. Ensure that your hands are shoulder-width apart on the ground and that your arms are straight as you engage your core. Try to maintain the position for 30 seconds each time, resting for ten seconds in between. Rees suggests doing this for three sets.

Hanging knees to elbows majorly engages the core

Anyone who is a fan of pull-ups might want to take Cori Lefkowith's recommendation on board. She says that hanging knees to elbows is a "great supplemental core move to include" when trying to improve pull-ups. To achieve this, you need to hang with your hands shoulder-width apart from a set of parallel bars. As you then bring your legs up to your chest and elbows, make sure to engage your core before lowering them again. After three sets of ten reps, you can consider this exercise done. Just make sure that while attempting this workout, you "round through your spine to curl your knees up." As Lefkowith says, this is what engages your abs, not simply "flex[ing] at your hips to tuck.

Russian twists works the side of our abs

The problem with some of the most popular ab exercises out there is that they ignore the obliques, which are an important area to strengthen. To ensure you don't do the same, Morgan Rees suggests incorporating Russian twists into your workout. Doing more of these should also engage your internal abdominal muscles, which is a nice bonus. You can complete this exercise by sitting with your legs bent, and your arms extended ahead of your chest. Then, twist your torso from one side to the other, ensuring that your core is tense throughout the workout. Keep your legs and hips stable as you complete ten reps on both sides for three sets. You can try this with dumbbells or a medicine ball for an extra challenge if you wish.

The extended opposite elbow-to-knee crunch is particularly challenging

If you really want to feel the burn in your midsection, Morgan Rees recommends that men try out the extended opposite elbow-to-knee crunch. The exercise isn't easy by any means, so it's probably not the best to start with if you're completely new to this. However, there's no gain without pain when it comes to strengthening up, and an exercise like this can do a lot of good. To pull it off, lie on your back with your limbs extended, then lift your head, shoulders, and legs off the floor simultaneously. Afterward, move your right elbow to your left knee and hold it for 30 seconds before switching sides. Again, Morgan recommends doing this for three sets of ten reps on both sides.

Standard and reverse crunches both target separate areas

Another familiar ab workout that personal trainers recommend is crunches. Matt Claes suggests that men should do both regular and reverse crunches to really benefit from this exercise, as these target different areas. While the former strengthens your upper abs, the latter is good for your lower abs. Both types of crunches involve lying on your back and bringing your legs into the air. With standard crunches, you want to maintain a tabletop position as you lift your chest up to your thighs and squeeze. Meanwhile, for reverse crunches, it's your legs that do the movement as you bring them to your chest and squeeze. As with these other workouts, three sets of ten reps are ideal. Note that if you have gym access, you could also try a cable crunch.

Doing each of these workouts once won't leave you with amazing abs. You'll need to do all of them several times a week for so many weeks before you start to notice a difference. However, if you keep at it and make sure you're doing these exercises correctly, you should find that you eventually have abs to be proud of