How to Do the Abdominal Sculpt Exercise

This sequence will combine small movements with intense periods of holding postures to create washboard abs, core strength, and a healthy spine. You will need a mat or a padded surface and an open wall space. For this first abdominal exercise, we will put our feet up on the wall and Liz will demonstrate the easier version of the exercise with bent knees. You place your feet on the wall, hips width apart, rest back on your elbows, pulling in your abdominal muscles, and tilting your tail bone under to create an ab lock. This is really important concept in core fusion that you can breathe without moving your abdominals. Now, take your hands to your outer thighs, roll your shoulders back, open your chin, look up towards your feet, and breathe. You will notice just being in this position, your back muscles are stretching while your abdominal muscles are contracting and that's why this position is orthopedic. I am taking my hands off my legs right now, and right away I can feel my abdominals working to hold me there. For those of you who do a lot of crunches, this is one crunch and you are holding the top of it. Notice as I raise my arms up, I am increasing the intensity. Hold back on to reset, roll my shoulders back, widen my elbows. If you need to pause, follow Liz and rest back on your forearms. I am tapping my fist now above my knees, keeping my body in the position. Those of you working a little easier, follow Liz's version as she stops and starts and holds on one hand at a time as necessary. What we are trying to do here is just increase the amount of time we can stay in that position. When I hold on, I reset, shoulders down, elbows wide, abdomen in. When you let go off your legs, you can pump with either one arm or both, depending on your level. Try to keep yourself going here, this is really intense, and just holding yourself in position, you are getting tremendous strength in your abdominals. Pulling in tightly to hold yourself there. Keeping your chin open to avoid using your neck muscles. When you need, elbows wide, shoulders down, just pumping the arms now by the hips, holding yourself in the position. Remember, the abdominal muscles are working in stillness. They are bracing the body and they are keeping you up off the floor. Breathe, pull and reset. As I widen my elbows and drop my shoulders, I relock my abdominals into the position, open the chin to keep it out of my neck, and feel the power of the stillness. Just staying still is a lot of work for the abdominal wall. Breathe and focus, twisting to the left side. Now we work more into the obliques, which are the side abdominals. By now your abdominals might be burning. Hang in there. Try to keep yourself in the position, let go if you can, even for a second or two, you are increasing your strength. Hold on, reset, pull in, small crunches, exhale up, exhale, lift, pull into lift. Hands off if you can. Arms higher if possible. Try to stay lifted off the shoulder blades. As soon as you feel yourself falling back, hold on, reposition, tapping the fist on that left side. Arms higher for a little more advanced work. Notice Liz holding on and resetting as needed. Keep yourself into position, the longer you stay there, the stronger you are getting. Repositioning, drop the shoulders. Rest back if necessary. Come back to center. Over to the right side. Again, this is working the side of the waist, reducing inches around the waist just by holding the position and pulling the abdominals down towards the spine. Breathe, feel the abs working, let go if you are ready. One hand off, other hand off. Arms up, really increases the intensity. Try to hold that. Throw up, throw up, exhale up, pull into lift, keeping the chin open. Shoulder blades off the mat. Holding the position, tapping the fist. So we are really building abdominal strength and endurance by staying off the shoulder blades and holding the position. Arms higher to increase the challenge, which increases the amount of weight that the abdominals are holding up. Arms higher and back to center. Wide elbows, shoulders back. Notice Liz taking the break, follow her if necessary. You will build your strength over time, be patient. This exercise is probably the most challenging abdominal work you will ever do. Now side to side with the arms. Again, working into the oblique muscles, as we rotate the ribcage across the waist. Side, side, side. Again, go for the endurance in this set. See how long you can stay there without touching your legs, reset when necessary. Breathe, side again. Side, side, crunch, side, side, crunch. Combining oblique work and center abdominal work. Keep your chin open when you are doing this, look up towards your feet, breathe. Hang in there now, and reset when necessary. Let's bend the knee and roll all the way up to the thigh. Roll the shoulders down and back, keeping the knees bent for this set. I am going to push back just off the wall slightly and now roll back into our signature position for core fusion; this is called the Curl. In this exercise, the back muscles are stretching while the abdominal muscles are working. Now, to find the position, we come back reclining on the elbows. From here we are able to tilt the pelvis under, pull the abdominals in, and then reach up and take hold of the outer thighs. Press your shoulders down, that will eliminate using the neck. Take the hands off the legs, and slowly notice how I raise my arms to increase the challenge, for the advance athletes. Nothing like a challenge to help you increase your strength. Notice how Liz reclines back when necessary, so pace yourself and be patient. It takes time to get to the level where you can raise your arms without falling back. Reposition. Now we will move to a variation, bending the left knee at a right angle, holding on with both hands, small crunches. One time, uphold, exhale, uphold. Both hands off when ready. Pull into come up. Arms higher to increase your challenge, exhale, exhale lift. Try to coordinate your breathing with your movement, so the abdominals are pulling in as the body is lifting. Reset, and roll all the way up to the top. Take your shoulders up back and down, take a deep breath, but try to roll right back into the position, just to maintain the momentum of what you are doing, and to really experience the abdominal burn. Let's take the elbows back to the floor here and just reorganize. Again, in core fusion the position is the most important component, so pressing your lower back down and finding that anchor position on the floor is always important before we start the real work. Taking the arms up one more time, pull in deeply with your front. Tucking the tail bone under so the back stays pressed down into the floor. Hold there, breathe, and right side. Elbows high and wide, shoulders down and back, chin is open, exhale one. Exhale lift. Taking one hand off, both hands off. Whatever you can do, you will find that as you do this exercise over time, your abdominal strength will increase and you will be able to take your hands off your leg and raise your arms up toward your ears. Hold the position, raise the arms higher to increase the challenge. Stay there, breathe, hold, and reset. Come up slightly if you fell back. Now taking both legs up, wide elbows, shoulders down. When you are in stillness you are really working, so be patient with yourself. Take the arms up now. Notice, not falling back, hands across the shoulder blades, very advanced work. Try to curl off one time, hold the position, pull in, breathe, stay right there, and release, hugging the knees into the chest.