Is the Lower Ab Exercise Only a Myth?

I get a lot of questions about what the best lower ab exercise is, but I have to tell you, a lot of fitness experts think that you really can’t work “just” your lower abs at all. In fact, they think the idea of a low ab exercise is a big giant myth.

So can you isolate this area? Well, the doubters do have somewhat of a point. When you look at the rectus abdominis, which is the ribbed “six-pack” muscle in the front, you do indeed see that the entire muscle is continuous from the bottom of the ribcage to its attachment on the pelvis.

On one hand, it makes sense to say that working this muscle is all-or-nothing; that you use the whole thing or none of it at all. But on closer inspection, the story gets a little more complex.

The ridged appearance is due to tendons that cross the muscle horizontally and divide it into sections. Some textbooks claim that these cross-cutting tendons are a remnant of fetal development; I don’t know if I agree.

Dividing the rectus abdominis into separate, semi-discrete units allows for a lot more variability of motion- or freedom of movement if you want to call it that. If it were just a single wad of muscle, you wouldn’t have as nearly fine of control over your movements (as far as bending your torso is concerned).

Because of this, I believe that the front abs are divided into sections for a purpose- better control over the area and increased mobility. This implies that certain sections of the muscle will be more or less stressed with different kinds of movements.

If you can stress certain areas of the muscle more intensely than others, then yes, you can perform an exercise that will favor one part of the six pack more so than others. However, there are limits to this.

You’ll never be able to FULLY isolate one part of the front abs. The whole thing has to contract somewhat in order to either move the ribs towards the pelvis, or the pelvis towards the ribs (which is what the front abs do), or to maintain a static posture against gravity (like the plank position, or picture a yoga or Pilates posture).

So any exercise you’ll do will engage all of the six-pack muscles. But, as I said, you can FAVOR one section over another.

For example, reverse crunches. These KILL my lower abs, but I don’t feel it nearly as much in my upper abs. The dreaded exercise I simply call “six inches” (where you lie on your back and hold your heels off of the floor six inches high for as long as you can), definitely makes my lower abs burn more so than other areas.

This is good news for those of you who are having trouble with your low abs- exercise can indeed be fine-tuned to stress this area more so than others. Now all you have to do is actually DO it!

There’s more on this topic at www.roadmaptoabs.com/lower-ab-exercise/. Visit my website at www.roadmaptoabs.com for additional helpful tips and information on getting the six-pack abs you want.