Kick Your Abs: Basics, Round 1

Written by Mark Mian of the AlterCenter

Kick Your Abs, Episode 1
Here’s an Inescapable Law of Nature: your core is the most important thing to condition in your body. Period. If you do nothing else to support your Muaythai conditioning, train your core. Actually, if you do nothing else at all, just train your core, dammit. You need a strong core for balance & coordination, speed & agility, posture & stability, strength & power, and vital protection against blasts to your midsection.

It’s so important that I’ve decided that the first Friday of every month will be a Kick Your Abs posting. Every month, I’ll drop more knowledge and exercises for your poor core.

WTF IS the Core?
People used to think that the abdominals were the most important thing. But, every muscle needs be in balance with its neighbors. It’s now widely understood that all of the muscles that control your spine are important. To achieve maximum development and performance, you need to do exercises for all of your core muscles and movements.

So, let me first describe these muscles and then I’ll share six killer exercises to hit them all.

Meet Your Core Muscles

You Have 4 Layers of Abdominal Muscle

Rectus Abdominis (“The Six-Pack”)
This muscle pulls together your lower ribs and fronts of your hips, curving your spine – like when you do a stomach crunch. It balances your upper body and armors your solar plexus and internal organs.

Transverse Abdominis (“The Corset”)
Because it isn’t visible, this ultra important muscle is generally ignored and underestimated. It runs behind your rectus abdominis – it’s the one you pull in to make yourself look skinny(er). It braces your lower spine and prevents it from arching and collapsing. It coordinates your body’s movement by linking your upper and lower sections to your center of mass. When it’s strong, you’re lighter on your feet, faster, more responsive, connected, fluid and agile. It also protects your spine and discs from overuse, strain, and pain. Because this muscle is a stabilizer (as opposed to a mover), it needs holding power – and thus a whole different kind of training than your other abs. We’ll cover exercises to build this system in next month’s Kick Your Abs.

Obliques “Twisters”
Your internal and external oblique muscles run criss-cross around your sides. They work in different combinations to rotate your hips and trunk, bend you sideways, and stabilize your upper body. They also armor your sides against kicks, knees, and punches: anyone who’s eaten a shot to the liver will want to make this muscle solid.

Spinal Erectors “Bowstrings”
Your spinal erectors run like bowstrings up your whole spine. They help you arch backwards, twist around, and bend sideways. When they’re weak, your posture crumples, your back gets tight and you feel pain from standing and sitting a lot, doing abs, kicking, clinching, carrying stuff, and having sex. Sorry.

TIME TO KICK YOUR CORE
Now that it’s clear (right?) what you need to work, let’s look at how to work it. There are obviously zillions of different exercises for developing your core. For this posting, I’ve selected six great ones for Muaythai that work all of the main movement patterns. Next month, I’ll show you ones that target the main stability patterns. I’ll always try to share exercises that use no or just minimal/affordable equipment. However, some equipment can’t be beat. See the end of this posting for info on purchasing the basic stuff from your local store or online.

Six Exercises for a Strong Muaythai Core
Thanks again to our Muaythai champ Neungsiam Samphusri for sharing his pain in these photos.

General Instructions

• Do all of these in one workout.
• Do them 3-5 times per week — but never when sore.
• Do 2-5 sets of each exercise.
• Rest 30-45secs between sets.
• Do them slowly without momentum.
• Do 10-50 reps,
• Never ever work through sharp or tingling pain in your joints.
• Overtraining is worse than undertraining.
• I’m serious.

1. The Jack-knife
This works your rectus abs - especially the lower region. It also forces you to do this while stabilizing your arms and shoulders, which benefits stiff punching. Balance may be tricky at first, so move slowly and try to keep your stomach pulled in. If you don’t have an exercise ball, you can drag your feet on the floor while wearing socks, or drag your bare feet in and jump them back out. The ball is best, though, and everyone and gym should have one.

Keeping your hips up, pull your knees to your chest to curl your lower back. If you can’t curl your lower back, stop. Otherwise, return to start and repeat.

2. The Disc (or Towel) Crunch
This exercise also challenges your rectus abs, but now more the upper region. It’s especially good because it works them through their full range of motion. We’re using an inflated VersaDisc in these photos, but you can use a rolled up towel if you don’t have one. The main thing is that you keep your tailbone grounded at all times while you move through your full range.

Start with your back stretched out over the disc -hips and shoulders on the floor. Don’t use a size of disc/towel that prevents you from arching over it completely. Next, “roll” your hips backwards so that your lower back pushes down hard onto the disc. This should cause your upper body to lever up into a crunch. Push hard. Return to start, touching your head and shoulders to the floor and repeat. This exercise is convenient for frying eggs on your stomach.

3. The Metronome
This one improves your oblique muscles’ twisting ability, and will add power to your round kicks. This can be a difficult exercise at first, and requires technique as well as leg and back flexibility. Be careful, don’t force or move wildly. You can start off easier by keeping your knees bent at 90-degrees.

Start with your legs up, hips bent at 90-degrees, stomach pulled in. Lower you legs to the side. The trick is to simply relax your waist and let gravity bring your legs down while you keep your stomach in. Don’t try too hard – just relax your way down, always keeping your hips at 90-degrees.

Once you’ve almost reached the ground, reverse direction by pulling with your abs and pushing with your arms for leverage. Bring your legs back up to start. Now lower them to the other side, relaxing them down in the same way. Return back up to start and repeat again, always alternating sides. Do not work through back pain. Limit your range if it’s hard at first.

4. Scissors
This next exercise works your obliques again, but more in a diagonal than parallel twisting direction. It will strengthen your punches and blocks. Make sure you keep your lower back grounded at all times.

Start by lying in a big “X” position with your lower back flat. Push down on your lower back and lunge up to touch your toes over your stomach. You can roll onto your opposite shoulder and use your grounded arm to help reach your spine up higher.

Return to Start, touching your head back to the ground. Now switch to the other side in the same way as before – always keeping your lower back on the floor. Go slowly at first. Try to reach up as far as you can -the last bit of effort makes this exercise great.

5. Lateral Hip Lift
This exercise uses your obliques and lower back muscles to bend you sideways. It’s a great exercise to give you upper body stability and armor against powerful round kicks.

Start with your elbow, hips and feet in a straight line. Push down on your elbow and crunch your lower side to drive your hips up high. Descend slowly to start and repeat. Do not work through lower back pain, I said!

6. Back Extension
This exercise will strengthen your spinal erectors, giving you better posture, balance, and resistance against being dragged down in the clinch. You will feel fatigue in the thick muscles of your lower back, which is normal. Do not overwork them and do not continue if you feel pain tingling along the backs of your hips (potential nerve damage – not good).

Lie with your hips stable against the ball, legs straight and strong. Relax and hug the ball – the more curl in your back, the better. Push on your hips (yes, hump the ball!) and extend your back upwards. Open your arms up like the beautiful swan you were meant to be. Just kidding. Spread your arms as high as you can, squeezing your shoulder blades to stretch your chest.

Conclusion
So now you have a very effective, comprehensive Muaythai core movement program. Practice these with concentration: intensity, not quantity, is what counts.

Equipment
The equipment shown above is relatively common now, and useful for many other exercises. You can find them in most sporting goods stores as well as Target in the US. You can also buy them online from us , or them.