Best Lower Ab Exercises For Men You’re Not Doing
2 Weird Abdominal Exercises That Rock Your Lower Abs
On today’s episode of Live Lean TV, I’m sharing two of the best lower ab exercises for men you’re not doing.
That’s right, I’m bringing you down on the mat, to show you two lower abs exercises that I don’t see enough men doing at the gym.
Even if you don’t workout at the gym, you can do these lower ab exercises at home.
I don’t know why I rarely see people doing these lower abs exercises in the gym.
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Maybe they feel weird doing them, or maybe they just don’t know how to do them.
Regardless of the reason, I’m going show you how to do them correctly to get wicked lower ab results.
Let’s go check them out.
Best Lower Ab Exercises For Men You’re Not Doing
If you want to get incredible rock hard abs results, these lower ab exercises need to be in your workout program.
How To Breathe During Ab Exercises
When training abs, your breathing technique is very important:
- To shorten and contract your abs, breath out during the concentric raising of your arms and legs.
- To lengthen your abs, breath in during the eccentric lowering of your arms and legs back down towards the floor.
Lower Abs Exercise #1: Single Leg Jackknife
The first exercise we’ll be doing to target the lower abs is the single leg jackknife.
To get started:
- Lie down on the back, with one leg bent, foot firmly planted into the floor, with the other leg straight on the floor.
- Extend your arms over your head to create a straight line with your body.
- Keeping your arms extended over your head, contract your abs, then explosively curl your upper torso up, as you bring the extended leg up to touch your hands to your toes, to create the letter V.
- When you go up to touch your foot, keep your abs turned on by breathing out to feel a strong contraction.
- Think about coming up with force, while keeping the movement under control.
- Control the eccentric portion, by slowly reversing the movement, as you lower your arms and legs back down towards the floor, without allowing them to rest.
- Immediately complete another rep and do as many reps as you can on one leg.
- After you finish all the reps with one leg, without taking a break, switch sides and repeat the same movement on the other leg.
Reps: 20 per leg
If you can complete 20 reps per leg pretty easily, without weight, add some resistance to make it more challenging for your abs.
Advanced Modification #1: Single Leg Jackknife With Ankle Weights
The Single Leg Jackknife With Ankle Weights is an excellent exercise to target the lower abs.
If you can complete 20 reps per leg of the single leg jackknife, adding resistance with ankle weights, is an advanced progression to make the exercise harder.
To get started:
- Attach ankle weights securely to your ankles.
- Lie down on the back, with one leg bent, foot firmly planted into the floor, with the other leg straight on the floor.
- Extend your arms over your head to create a straight line with your body.
- Keeping your arms extended over your head, contract your abs, then explosively curl your upper torso up, as you bring the extended leg up to come close to your hands, to create the letter V.
- When you rise up, keep your abs turned on by breathing out to feel a strong contraction.
- Think about coming up with force, while keeping the movement under control.
- Control the eccentric portion, by slowly reversing the movement, as you lower your arms and legs back down towards the floor, without allowing them to rest.
- Immediately complete another rep and do as many reps as you can on one leg.
- After you finish all the reps with one leg, without taking a break, switch sides and repeat the same movement on the other leg.
Reps: 20 per leg
Advanced Modification #2: Dumbbell Single Leg Jackknife
The Dumbbell Single Leg Jackknife is an excellent exercise to target the lower abs.
If you can complete 20 reps per leg of the single leg jackknife, adding resistance by holding a dumbbell, is an advanced progression to make the exercise harder.
To get started:
- Lie down on the back, with one leg bent, foot firmly planted into the floor, with the other leg straight on the floor.
- Extend your arms over your head, while holding a dumbbell with your hands at both ends, to create a straight line with your body.
- Keeping your arms extended over your head, contract your abs, then explosively curl your upper torso up, as you bring the extended leg up to come close to the dumbbell, to create the letter V.
- When you rise up, keep your abs turned on by breathing out to feel a strong contraction.
- Think about coming up with force, while keeping the movement under control.
- Control the eccentric portion, by slowly reversing the movement, as you lower your arms and legs back down towards the floor, without allowing them to rest.
- Immediately complete another rep and do as many reps as you can on one leg.
- After you finish all the reps with one leg, without taking a break, switch sides and repeat the same movement on the other leg.
Reps: 20 per leg
Lower Abs Exercise #2: Bent Knee Lying Garhammer Raise
Another excellent lower abs exercise I want to show you is the Bent Knee Lying Garhammer Raise.
When most people do crunches, they only bring their torso to their knees.
To target the lower abs more, you want to do the reverse of that by bringing your knees to your torso.
This movement is similar to the reverse crunch, however the bent knee lying garhammer raise has a more distinct raising of the hips directly up into the sky.
You will feel a different sensation in your abs as the majority of the contraction will come from your lower abs.
In addition to this, your feet never come close to the floor as you’ll maintain a 90 degree angle at the hips.
To get started:
- Lie down, face up on the ground with your feet off the floor, and knees bent, positioned directly above your hips, creating a 90 degree angle.
- If you prefer it, you can also cross your feet.
- Place your hands behind your head.
- Your neck remains in neutral position throughout the movement, therefore you should not be pulling on your neck.
- Pull in and contract your lower abs, then raise your hips up into the air as your knees come towards your torso.
- Think about trying to hit the sky with your knees.
- While keeping your knees bent, lower your hips back to the floor, while maintaining a 90 degree angle at your hips.
- Repeat for reps.
Reps: 20 per leg
Advanced Modification: Straight Leg Lying Garhammer Raise
If the bent knee lying garhammer raise becomes too easy, you can complete the same movement, but this time complete the Straight Leg Lying Garhammer Raise.
To get started:
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- Lie down, face up on the ground with your feet off the floor, and legs straight, positioned directly above your hips, creating a 90 degree angle.
- If you prefer it, you can also cross your feet.
- Place your hands behind your head.
- Your neck remains in neutral position throughout the movement, therefore you should not be pulling on your neck.
- Pull in and contract your lower abs, then raise your hips straight up into the air as your legs go straight up into the air.
- Think about trying to hit the sky with your feet.
- Lower your hips back to the floor, without lowering your legs back to the floor.
- Your legs should maintain a close to 90 degree angle at your hips.
- Repeat for reps.
Reps: 20 per leg
There you have it Live Lean Nation.
I want to see you putting those two lower ab exercises to use in the gym, or at home, if that’s where you train.
It’s Time To Define Your Lower Abs With Live Lean Abs 2.0
I want to help you get leaner, stronger, and more cut abs faster.
If you want a full abs workout program that’s really going to target all areas of your abs, I want you to go check out our Live Lean Abs 2.0 program.
It contains all of my best ab workouts, that can be done:
- In the gym
- At home
- Outdoors at the playground
These two lower abs exercises are also in that program.
It’s time to get rock hard abs.
To do that, go check out the full abs program here.
I love you guys and keep Living Lean.
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Question Of The Day:
- Have your tried either of these lower ab exercises?
- What is your favorite lower ab exercise?
Share your experiences in the comment section below.
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Brad Gouthro is the founder of Live Lean TV, a media company focused on helping men and women “Live Lean” 365 days a year. Brad’s programs and content have helped millions of people all over the world learn how to get in shape, and more importantly, sustain it for life.