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Your winter was spent in hibernation, living on soul food like butter chicken pies, nachos and hot chocolates, and doing lots of intense interval training (meaning there were lots of long intervals between gym visits).
So you’ve just had the shock of your life after seeing that summer dresses have started to appear in shops, realising that soon there will be new season swim wear just waiting to be tried on! If the thought of revealing your slightly “soft” tummy makes you feel a bit off colour, we’ve thought of five easy exercises to get you back into shape for summer! They’re easy enough to incorporate either into your gym routine or everyday life, so you can do them as part of a wider gym workout or every week when you’re watching America’s Next Top Model (depending on how soon you want to hit the beach)!
 1: Ab Crunch
First off is the most common and popular abdominal exercise, the standard ab crunch. Start off by lying on the floor. Keep your knees bent and your hands behind your head. After a deep exhalation, curl your body forward and upward, which will lift your shoulders and shoulder blades off the floor. Hold this position for at least one second and then return to the starting position.
2: Reverse Crunch The second abdominal exercise is the reverse crunch, which works the lower abdominal muscles. Begin by lying on your back, feet on the floor and hands at your sides. Next, move with your lower body - bring your knees up towards your chest and lift your pelvis off the grind which will curl your spin. Hold this position for one second and then return to the starting position.
3: Double Crunches Double crunches are also lower abdominal exercises. Once again, begin by lying on your back, this time with your hips bent and your legs extended to a ninety degree position, and then place your hands behind your head. Next, curl your torso forward, pulling your knees to your chest - the ideal being to try and touch your knees to your elbows. Hold this position for one second and then return to the starting position. 4: Bicycle Crunches Next up are a form of abdominal exercise called bicycle crunches. Once more, the starting position consists of lying on your back. Keep your hips bent at a ninety degree angle and place your hands behind your head. Begin by curling your body forward in the same manner as a standard crunch, only in this exercise, you then move your right knee towards your left elbow and place your left leg at a forty five degree angle. Keep your shoulders off the floor while continuing the manoeuvre, alternating constantly: left knee to right elbow, right leg at forty five degrees; then right knee to left elbow, left leg at forty five degrees.
5: Leg Raises
The last abdominal exercise is leg raises, which begin by lying on your back with your hands either at your sides or just beneath your rear end. Keep your knees bent slightly and lift your legs straight into the air - but keep your back flat against the floor during the manoeuvre, especially when you return your legs to the starting position. Make sure to keep tension in your abs - you do this by not lowering yourself all the way to the floor.
Victoria Fruean |
