As I browse through the web, I see all these people giving these exercises for lower abs without making sure that they actually function.
Most of these are just either ignorant or are Internet gurus that have never really trained in the real world.
In the real world, at least 70% of the population have very weak and non-functioning lower abs (LA).
Doing the exercises these gurus give, like leg raises or bicycle crunches, will only make your hip flexors and upper abs stronger while keeping your lower abs weak; not to mention you are creating enormous torsion in your spine with these exercises if your lower abs can't activate properly.
Why Wouldn't my Lower Abs Function Properly? Well this can be due to many reasons, but the two most popular are poor nutrition and/or scars.
A diet full of white devils (sugar, table salt, flour) will bloat up your guts because these health-destroying ingredients act like sand paper in you digestive system.
When your guts are bloated, any pressure applied to it will create pain.
Since your body tries as much as possible to stay away from pain, it will shut down the muscles of your lower abdomen abs because contraction of these muscles will create pressure on your guts.
Therefore developing healthy eating habits will greatly increase your LA strength and tone, a well as stop you from being bloated all the time.
Also note that any unnatural chemicals and gluten (in most people) will create the same effect.
Scars in the lower abdomen will also make your LA inactive.
First because the cut made creates a traumatism to the muscle tissue, which shuts down, but also because if the fibers aren't realigned properly, sensitivity (brain-muscle connection) to this region will be lost.
The most common scars are from cesarean sections or appendicitis.
To realign the fibers and bring back sensitivity to this region, simply massage the scar with essential oils for a few minutes a night.
What Happens When Your Lower Abs Aren't Functional? So lets say you follow one of these gurus and do leg raises or bicycle crunch type of exercises to develop your LA.
You might feel them working really well (you should feel it from the belly button down to the pubis) and have absolutely no problem.
On the other side of the spectrum, it might just be too painful in your back to perform the exercise at all.
But the worse situation would be the one where you do not really feel your LA working, and without even knowing it, you're actually creating enormous torsion in your spine (which will lead to chronic back pain), as your LA stay weak and upper abs and hip flexors become stronger, just creating and even bigger imbalance.
Are the Gurus' Exercises Bad? It depends.
It depends if you have good lower abs coordination; in other words are your LA even functioning and can they work in concert with the hip flexors without creating a high amount of torque in your spine.
See, if you LA aren't coordinated, this means that the lower part of your lumbar spine is controlled by the hip flexors only.
These pull it into extension at the same time as the upper abs pull the upper part of your lumbar spine into flexion, which makes the middle part tear little by little, or even quickly if the imbalance between muscles is big enough.
So How Do I Get Great Lower Abs? Well first, make sure that they are actually functioning.
Check your LA coordination and work on it if necessary.
Also make sure you correct your dietary problems and treat your scars.
Then you must evaluate if you have enough strength in them compared to hip flexors and upper abs; in other words is there an imbalance and how big is it.
Once you have the coordination and the strength, then and only then, you can do exercises that involve any type of hip flexion or even arm flexion (like the famous ab roller).
It will then be safe to perform these because your lower abs will keep your lower part of your lumbar spine in flexion, stopping the hip flexors from creating torsion.
Most of these are just either ignorant or are Internet gurus that have never really trained in the real world.
In the real world, at least 70% of the population have very weak and non-functioning lower abs (LA).
Doing the exercises these gurus give, like leg raises or bicycle crunches, will only make your hip flexors and upper abs stronger while keeping your lower abs weak; not to mention you are creating enormous torsion in your spine with these exercises if your lower abs can't activate properly.
Why Wouldn't my Lower Abs Function Properly? Well this can be due to many reasons, but the two most popular are poor nutrition and/or scars.
A diet full of white devils (sugar, table salt, flour) will bloat up your guts because these health-destroying ingredients act like sand paper in you digestive system.
When your guts are bloated, any pressure applied to it will create pain.
Since your body tries as much as possible to stay away from pain, it will shut down the muscles of your lower abdomen abs because contraction of these muscles will create pressure on your guts.
Therefore developing healthy eating habits will greatly increase your LA strength and tone, a well as stop you from being bloated all the time.
Also note that any unnatural chemicals and gluten (in most people) will create the same effect.
Scars in the lower abdomen will also make your LA inactive.
First because the cut made creates a traumatism to the muscle tissue, which shuts down, but also because if the fibers aren't realigned properly, sensitivity (brain-muscle connection) to this region will be lost.
The most common scars are from cesarean sections or appendicitis.
To realign the fibers and bring back sensitivity to this region, simply massage the scar with essential oils for a few minutes a night.
What Happens When Your Lower Abs Aren't Functional? So lets say you follow one of these gurus and do leg raises or bicycle crunch type of exercises to develop your LA.
You might feel them working really well (you should feel it from the belly button down to the pubis) and have absolutely no problem.
On the other side of the spectrum, it might just be too painful in your back to perform the exercise at all.
But the worse situation would be the one where you do not really feel your LA working, and without even knowing it, you're actually creating enormous torsion in your spine (which will lead to chronic back pain), as your LA stay weak and upper abs and hip flexors become stronger, just creating and even bigger imbalance.
Are the Gurus' Exercises Bad? It depends.
It depends if you have good lower abs coordination; in other words are your LA even functioning and can they work in concert with the hip flexors without creating a high amount of torque in your spine.
See, if you LA aren't coordinated, this means that the lower part of your lumbar spine is controlled by the hip flexors only.
These pull it into extension at the same time as the upper abs pull the upper part of your lumbar spine into flexion, which makes the middle part tear little by little, or even quickly if the imbalance between muscles is big enough.
So How Do I Get Great Lower Abs? Well first, make sure that they are actually functioning.
Check your LA coordination and work on it if necessary.
Also make sure you correct your dietary problems and treat your scars.
Then you must evaluate if you have enough strength in them compared to hip flexors and upper abs; in other words is there an imbalance and how big is it.
Once you have the coordination and the strength, then and only then, you can do exercises that involve any type of hip flexion or even arm flexion (like the famous ab roller).
It will then be safe to perform these because your lower abs will keep your lower part of your lumbar spine in flexion, stopping the hip flexors from creating torsion.
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