It’s a completely different thing when you’re talking about ab work that translates into 500 pound squats and deadlifts and ab work that makes you feel confident at the beach or the pool party.

 

Very few know how critical really abs and obliques are in very heavy power and Olympic lifts, until they do them. Try squatting max efforts with weak abs and you’ll find yourself getting bent over like a melted cheese sandwich. The same with deadlifts. The abs and front panel must be seriously strong enough to resist the downward pull of the barbell and gravity in the squat, which is trying to crush your spine through your butt or trying to make sure that barbell never breaks the floor making you look very foolish indeed.

 

The abs hold you up, keep you from collapsing when heavy weights and big exercises are on the schedule and the exercises needed to train them to do so are no walk in the park.

 

I’m pretty familiar with ab work from every possible angle, and as an Elite level gymnast my abs got worked every single second of my daily five hour workouts. From the serious front back and sideways action on them in dynamic tumbling to the simultaneously static/dynamic work in the transverse plane of pommel horse circles to the insane demands on every inch of them in giant swings, L sits front levers and planches on rings.

 

Then a serious stint as a bodybuilder with the normal complement of crunches, legs raises of all kinds, cable work and tons of static work in the form of flexing and posing. None of which is a joke when you actually have to do it. Bodybuilders are judged most seriously on ab definition. If you don’t have it you’re not in shape, no matter how big your arms or chest are.

 

Then onto powerlifting, where I truly got my Ph.D in ab strengthening. As a disciple of Louie Simmons and his classic WSB system I learned from the Master himself (via weekly phone calls) just how critical a strong waist was- " A small waist is a weak waist"- Louie says frequently, and which exercises to do to get it. Again, these are not isolation exercises but full movements which use your hip flexors as well as the rectus abdominus. Situps, leg raises and side bends are done frequently and HEAVY. As in VERY Heavy - think 3-5 rep heavy.

 

Abs, like all special exercises in the WSB system are rotated on Max Effort days and we did straddle straight leg sit ups with 100 lb. plates at our forehead, straight leg situps with cable pulleys behind us, traditional bent knee situps on an incline bench as well as standing cable sit ups done to make sure we could activate the abs from the same posture we would be using in the squat and deadlift.

 

But the hardest, the toughest, the most demanding and productive ab move we ever did was the Decline Bench Zercher sit up. This is a KILLER from start to finish. And potentially VERY dangerous if you go back too far, or do it wrong, so get TWO side spotters to make sure things don’t get wonky.

 

Here’s a video clip on the basic setup.