This is the natural partner to the planche, and uses primarily the upper body 'pull' muscles as opposed to the upper body 'push' muscles used by the planche. You need a horizontal bar (or gym rings!) at least at waist height and at least as wide as your shoulders for this. The front lever has a number of progressions - too many to show in the videos - so I show the easiest and the hardest. The easiest form, the tuck front lever is not too hard. Also included are some links to good tutorials where all the intermediate progressions can be seen.
Tuck Front Lever
This is not the greatest form, but it gets to the point and shows how my tuck planche looked when I got started. I suggest looking at some of the tutorial links to get an idea of the perfect form.
Full Front Lever
...and here's where we're aiming to get to. I picked this video because once again, it gets to the point - but it also illustrates that you can really improvise! It's pretty clear that this dude has spent so much time practising his front lever that he had no time to tidy his bedroom.
Dragon Door: tutorial on progressing through the front lever and planche. PowerAthleteMag.com: tutorial on progressing through the front lever.... Read more
You can work your abs pretty hard with this one, especially if you maintain good form. The guy in this video has it pretty well nailed. The important thing is to avoid swinging - a wide grip helps with that, but it also takes a lot of additional effort from the abs to control the downward movement. If you just let your legs drop under gravity, you will swing wildly.
Engaging the lats is also important with this exercise, as you can help to stabilise your body and power your hips upwards by squeezing them and also use them to control the hips on the way down.
How straight you keep your legs affects how hard this is - I find I must keep my legs at least slightly bent to do even one rep - and to do 10, significantly bent. Simply bend your legs as much as you have to for the number of reps you want to execute. When you are very tired - as this guys is towards the end of his set, you can pretty much move to knee-raises. Or if you prefer, just raise your legs only as high as you can get them.
The plank is simple: lie on your front, then raise yourself up onto your elbows and make your body rigid, so that you are straight - like a plank. Remaining in this position requires your abs to remain under tension.
Outstretched Arms Plank
I invented this one, inspired by Jack Lalanne Push Ups, which I noticed hurt my abs as much as my chest and shoulders. Get into the basic plank position, then raise yourself up onto your hands instead of your elbows and walk your hands forward as far as you can whilst still maintaining your plank-like rigidity.... Read more
Go to 2:20 in the video to see the great Ross Enamait performing these. They can be pretty tough and I find they give my legs almost as much work to do as my abs, not to mention the upper body effort required to keep the weight stable.
This is a nice exercise to include in a circuit between harder exercises, but not a good way to build mass or strength. It works the lower abs and feels like it also works part of the upper legs. The short video shows someone sitting on a bench but you can just as easily be on the floor.
If you do crunches and are sick of having to do dozens to feel as if you have done some work, this might be for you. You use the weight stack with a rope attachment to add resistance to the crunch movement and can get a really good squeeze on the abs. In the video, this guy is facing the stack. We tend to face away from it, but I don't think it makes much difference.
I have not seen this elsewhere, so I have invented a name for it. No video yet - will have to take one of myself doing it.
It's a combination of a hanging leg raise and the tuck front lever. You hang from a bar as if you are going to do a tuck front lever. Slowly move into the tuck front lever by raising your legs. I can only do this if I tuck my knees tightly to my chest. Hold the tuck front lever for a few seconds, then straighten the legs and angle them so they are at an upwards angle of 45 degrees to the horizontal, then lower them as slowly as possible. It should get really hard as they approach horizontal - if you can hold them there for a while before lowering completely, then great. I cannot!... Read more
I saw this on Conditioning Research, tried a couple of reps and realised this would be an exercise I would use. As Chris says in his post, it's a toughie. But good.
These give you an isometric chest and tricep workout (where the muscle is under tension but remains static) as well as an ab workout. The video shows this being done on the floor, but I often just do it on the weights bench because otherwise if my chest is already tired I can't get the barbell up (you need a certain amount of weight on there to provide the necessary counter-balance.) It can be a challenge to balance your body on the weight bench, but this forces you to make the movement controlled, which is no bad thing.
This is one of the toughest abs exercises I have ever done, but the good news is that although strict standing ab rollouts are tough, there are many variations that allow a progression. Here are some videos and links showing what you can do.
If you own a pair of crutches but do not have anywhere to hang from in your house (and therefore cannot do hanging leg raise), then the crutches are a good way to suspend your body so you can do leg raises. The real challenge, way beyond me at the moment, would be do execute the movement without using the wall for support...
This is a relatively easy bodyweight ab exercise, but done strictly and for several reps, the burn does creep up on you! Thanks to Chris from Conditioning Research for finding this - a good video showing how it's done.
