Abs on Trial
Judge Thibaudeau Brings the Gavel Down on Ab Training
by Christian Thibaudeau

Abdominal Court is now in SessionHigh
intensity vs. volume training. Olympic lifting vs. powerlifting. High
intensity cardio vs. low intensity cardio. The list of debates and
disputes in this field goes on and on, and perhaps the most disputed
area is abdominal training. It’s sad really, because everyone
wants rock-hard abs. But when they try to learn how to get them,
they're drowned in a sea of contradiction that makes progress
difficult. In this article, we'll examine both sides of popular ab
training arguments and I'll give you the verdict on who's right and
who's dead wrong. Court is in session!

Case #1: High Reps vs. Low Reps with Resistance The
Plaintiffs — High rep proponents: These individuals make the argument
that abdominals, being postural muscles, are predominantly slow twitch.
As a result, they'd be better suited for work of long duration at a low
intensity. High rep proponents also argue that since the ab
muscles are activated almost all day long, they're built to handle a
lot of training volume. Most of the time they recommend performing
unloaded (non-weighted) sets of basic ab exercises, generally doing at
least 15 reps per set and sometimes up to 50-plus reps. The
Defendants — Low reps with added resistance proponents: According to
this school of thought, muscle tissue is muscle tissue. The abs are no
different than any other muscle group in the body and should be trained
accordingly. This group sneers at the supposed slow twitch
dominance of the abs, arguing that even slow twitch fibers have the
potential to hypertrophy and should still be trained in a
hypertrophy-friendly zone. Their recommendation is to train the abs
just like any other muscle group: if you want more abdominal definition
you must hypertrophy them, and that requires work in the 6-12 rep range
with added resistance.
Loaded crunch on Swiss ballThe
Verdict: Both camps have valid arguments. It’s true that muscle tissue
is muscle tissue and if you want to hypertrophy your abs, you must
respect the overload principle. At some point that'll require using
added resistance. A lot of people cringe when they hear
"abdominal" and "hypertrophy" in the same sentence: they think that
this necessarily means making their waist thick and blocky. Not so! In
fact, if you want maximum abdominal definition, you must hypertrophy
them! That’s what will cause the contrast between the muscle bellies
and the linea alba, which will give you that six-pack look.On
the other hand, EMG research has shown that unloaded exercises such as
the crunch, reverse crunch, V-sit, and crunch with a twist all activate
the ab muscles to at least 60% of their maximum capacity, with a high
point of 75% for some exercises. This is a sufficient hypertrophy
threshold for beginners and even for intermediate trainees.
The V-SitOne
last point is that some people have dysfunctional abdominals. As a
result they have a tendency to switch the bulk of the workload to the
psoas and rectus femoris, taking away from the abs. Using added
resistance will only compound the problem as the body will be even more
prone to resort to the more powerful hip flexors. Individuals
with dysfunctional abs should start with unloaded abdominal work
performed at a slow tempo, focusing on contracting their abs maximally.
(Touch training, or touching the abdominal muscles as they contract,
can also be of great help.)The verdict is that both types of
work (loaded and unloaded) should be part of your ab training program.
With loaded exercises you should train in the upper portion of the
hypertrophy zone which is 10-12 reps. Beginners should use mostly
unloaded slow movements and intermediates should use an equal mix of
both. Finally, advanced trainees should use a ratio of two loaded
exercises for one unloaded exercise.

Case #2: Diverse vs. General TrainingThe
Plaintiffs — Diversity advocates: This group likes to remind us of the
biomechanical functions of each of the abdominal muscles. The rectus
abdominis is a trunk flexor; the external and internal obliques are
lateral trunk flexors, truck rotators and assist in trunk flexion and
spine stabilization. Finally, the transverses abdominis is a spine
stabilizer. Because of this, you should use exercises for all
of these functions: use trunk flexion exercises (e.g. crunches) for the
rectus, trunk flexion with a rotation (e.g. Russian twist, twisting
crunch) for the obliques, and the vacuum/tummy tuck for the transverses
abdominis. Not only that, but diversity advocates contend that the
lower and upper portions of the rectus abdominis are recruited
separately and thus demand the use of different exercises (e.g. reverse
crunches or leg raises for the lower portion).
The Russian TwistThe
Defendants — Generalists: These people contend that you don't need to
use a wide variety of ab exercises, only the most basic drills, like
crunches and cables crunches, to activate all the abdominal muscles. This
is supported by recent EMG research by Willett et al. (2001) who found
that the crunch, reverse crunch, V-sit (double crunch) and twisting
crunch all recruited the three abdominal structures (rectus, obliques,
transverses) above 60% of their maximum contractile capacity. Generalists
further their argument by saying that if one performs basic lifts while
standing up (deadlift, squats, Olympic lifts), the abs (especially the
spine stabilizers such as the obliques and transverses) already receive
a lot of stimulation and thus don't require a lot of additional work.
So, according to them, there isn't a need to seek the "optimal" ab
exercise because such a thing doesn’t exist: stay basic and use
ground-based lifting and you’ll be fine.The Verdict: One again,
both camps present very interesting cases. While it's true that all ab
exercises will recruit every abdominal muscle to some extent, the fact
remains that different exercises emphasise different regions. The
aforementioned study by Willett found that, not surprisingly, the
reverse crunch produced the greatest muscle activity in the low portion
of the rectus abdominis, with the V-sit or double crunch coming in a
close second. The same study didn't find any difference in the muscle
activity of the upper region of the "six-pack" between a crunch,
reverse crunch, double crunch or twisting crunch. Traditionally,
we’re led to believe that the crunch and similar exercises are superior
for building the upper portion of the six-pack, but it seems that this
isn’t so. In fact, another study (Axler and McGill, 1997) actually
found that the twisting crunch exercise involves the greatest
activation of the upper portion of the rectus abdominis.The
study by Willett brings us another surprise because they found that the
greatest obliques activation is seen in a reverse crunch and a double
crunch, not a twisting crunch! This goes against what most people have
always believed.
The Rope CrunchAlso
note that during a reverse crunch, the abs are activated mostly during
the last portion of the range of motion. In the beginning, the psoas
does most of the work. So if you want to focus on your abs you might
want to perform only that last portion of the exercise (from legs
perpendicular to the floor to the chest).After reviewing this
info, my verdict is that you should use several different abdominal
exercises, but without overdoing it. Furthermore, it’s important to
understand that exercise variation will have as much to do with keeping
interest up as it has with stimulating the different muscle groups.
Using three exercises in a session is more than adequate: one crunch
variation, one reverse crunch or double crunch variation, one exercise
using a twisting motion.

Case #3: High vs. Low FrequencyThe
Plaintiffs — High-frequency advocates: These guys are also advocates of
the high rep school of ab training. Their arguments are basically the
same: the abs are postural muscles and thus are predominantly slow
twitch and are used to being activated for a long period of time. As a
result they can and should be trained often. Training them everyday is
a common recommendation for this group, however 4-5 times per week
seems to be the norm.The Defendants — Low-frequency advocates:
This group can be linked to the advocates of high load ab training.
They argue that since the best way to train the abs is to train them
just like any other muscle group, a frequency of 1-2 times per week is
optimal when training for hypertrophy. Since they believe in using more
intensity (heavier weights) they reason that their ab muscles will need
more time to recover from the higher amount of micro-trauma. The
Verdict: While we established earlier that loaded abdominal work in the
hypertrophy zone should be part of your ab training program, this
doesn’t necessarily mean that we should adhere to the exact same
parameters as we use when planning the training of other muscles
groups. For one thing, the force production potential of the
abs is lower than that of most muscle groups and they're less prone to
suffering from a high amount of micro-trauma. Furthermore, the
relatively short range of motion of most ab exercises means that the
amount of work performed (work = force x distance) will be low. As a
result, the ab muscles can be trained more often than most muscle
groups even if loaded exercises are used. A frequency of 2-3 times per
week is optimal in most cases.

Case #4: The Transversus Abdominis DebateThe
Plaintiffs — Tummy-tuck lovers: It's well established in the literature
that the TA acts as a trunk/spine stabilizer. In fact, a direct
relationship exists between TA activation and intra-abdominal pressure
(Cresswell et al. 1994). It's also been shown that during unexpected
movements of the body (due to external factors), the TA is the first
muscle to be activated, indicating that the body uses it to stabilize
the spine when faced with a sudden motion. So, our tummy-tuck
group argues that you should train this muscle as it'll increase trunk
stability and make an athlete better at resisting outsides forces.
Their exercise of choice is the vacuum/tummy-tuck but some also like
training on unstable surfaces to increase TA activation.
Frank Zane performs a vacuum pose. Think Ronnie Coleman could do that? The
Defendants — The traditionalists: While it's true and established that
the TA is an important trunk stabilizer, this group is quick to point
out that TA activation occurs in any movement involving the
body (especially when performed from a standing position). Simply
moving the arms around leads to some TA activation. So in that
regard, any strength training exercises will train the TA. This is
especially true of exercises such as the squat, deadlift and Olympic
lifts. Furthermore, our traditionalists contend that specific TA
exercises such as the vacuum have a limited strengthening potential
because you can't increase the amount of resistance on these exercises.
So while there might be an initial gain in TA strength when first
performing this exercise, it soon becomes ineffective. On the
other hand, if you use the squat and deadlift regularly and progress on
these exercises occurs, the stress imposed on the TA can only go up. So
in that regard, heavy ground-based exercises are better than
TA-specific exercises to increase TA strength.The Verdict: The
traditionalists bring some very good points and I tend to agree with
them. There's no doubt that the strengthening potential of TA-specific
exercises is very low compared to ground-based exercises. So in most
cases, I'd award the case to the traditionalists. However, in
some cases there might be some validity in performing the
vacuum/tummy-tuck exercise — those who have problems recruiting their
TA for example. These individuals are normally plagued by lower back
problems, have trouble performing a technically correct squat, and most
of the time they’re office workers. In their case, a TA-specific
exercise might be good to improve the capacity of their CNS to activate
their TA. But once this problem is solved, vacuums will have little
effect.

I Rest My Case Abdominal
court is now adjourned. Hopefully you’ll be able to weigh the pros and
cons of each case and form your own opinion. I think that I pointed you
in the right direction, but it’s up to you to digest all of this and
come up with your own verdict!

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