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Bicycle Crunch – The Best Abs Exercise
Table of Contents
The Bicycle crunch exercise is ideal for effectively strengthening the oblique abdominal muscles. You do not need to visit the gym or purchase additional equipment. All you need is a flat surface, a minimum level of physical fitness, and your desire.
In other words, if you are practicing home workouts, you must include this wonderful exercise in your program.
What muscles are targeted by bicycle crunch?
Bicycle crunch exercise primarily loads the oblique abdominal muscles. The rectus muscles, hip flexors, and to a small extent the back work. In general, the exercise is great for developing the press. However, you can work your oblique abdominal muscles only with the right technique.
Bicycle crunches work great on the oblique abdominal muscles
Remember, pairing bicycle crunch exercise with other abs workouts will allow you to achieve harmoniously developed and aesthetically pleasing abs. Please note, extra weight should be used with caution as excessive burdening can lead to trouble. To give an example, overworked oblique muscles may cause the opposite effect – the waist will visually expand unnaturally.
Proper exercise technique
The bicycle crunch exercise is not as easy as it might seem at first glance. Therefore, we’ll consider two options for the bicycle crunch exercise (from simple to difficult).
Learning to pedal
Beginners should gradually increase the difficulty of the exercise. First, you need to learn basic movement (pedaling). Take a starting position:
Take your time, correct technique is more important than speed. The number of sets depends on your training.
The loin doesn’t come off the floor
Start with two sets of ten reps. Next, build up to three to five sets of twenty reps. And try to move from a simplified version to a full-fledged technique.
Do the bicycle crunch exercise correctly!
The technique is as follows:
Try to do all movements as smoothly as possible, avoid sudden jerks and you’ll achieve maximum effect.
Important recommendations
If you find it difficult to keep both legs elevated, place your fixed leg on the floor. However, such an approach is not correct, better use the technique described above as soon as possible.
The perfect abs can only be achieved when the fixed leg is suspended. Moreover, the closer the leg is to the floor, the stronger the tension will be, try not to raise it too high.
The obliques work best if the elbow and knee touch during the twist.
Benefits and contraindications
The bicycle crunch is especially useful in combination with other abs exercises. Exercising your oblique abdominal muscles will help you do many of the basic exercises more effectively.
The bicycle crunch does not imply any special contraindications. Everything is pretty standard, you should refrain from exercise if you have injuries, cardiovascular problems, and fever. This exercise is also not recommended during pregnancy, it is better to give preference to special workouts.
