If you’ve spent time among endurance sporting folk, you may have heard the term VO₂ Max.

VO₂ Max is a sporting jargon term. It is a popular measure of an athlete’s performance, but what does it mean and how is it relevant to your own performance and fitness program?

VO₂ Max is defined as the maximum capacity of an individual’s body to transport and utilize oxygen during intense or maximal exercise.

It is commonly used as a benchmark of an athlete’s capacity to perform sustained exercise and is linked to aerobic endurance.

In scientific VO₂ Max is measured as milliliters of oxygen used in one minute per kilogram of body weight. In simple terms it is essentially:

How fast you’re sucking in air when running full speed!

To measure VO₂ Max accurately, an athlete is usually tested on a treadmill wearing a special mouth-piece that measures the volume of air inhaled. The speed of the treadmill is increased gradually and as intensity increases so do does oxygen consumption until a point is reached at which increased intensity does not result in greater oxygen consumption.

The rate of air intake at this point is an athlete’s VO₂ Max.

This measurement is considered the best indicator of an athlete’s cardiovascular fitness and aerobic endurance. The theory goes, the more energy you use when running hard, the more ATP energy you can produce. ATP being Adenosine Triphosphate, a chemical compound that breaks down to release energy responsible for muscle contraction.

Endurance athletes typically have very high VO₂ Max values, so if you participate in any type of endurance sport: running, riding, skiing, chances are, your VO₂ Max will be much higher than the average person’s.

Comparisons

To get an idea of where an individual stands in the grand scheme of things, here are some comparisons:

• Average young untrained male: 45
• Average young untrained female: 38
• Competitive club athlete: 70
• World class male athletes, cyclists and cross-country skiers typically exceed 75
• Five time Tour de France Winner Lance Armstrong: 85
• Three time Tour de France winner Greg LeMond: 92.5 (reportedly at his peak)
• Cross-country skier Bjørn Dæhlie 96
• A Thoroughbred horse: 180
• A Siberian sled dog: 240

All values are measured in ml/kg/min

How to Change Your VO2 Max

VO₂ Max has a genetic component, but can also be increased through training by increasing both training volume and intensity. This will be harder if you’re already quite fit because you may already be close to your genetic potential. You may also not be genetically disposed to increases in VO₂ Max in which case no amount of training will make any difference.

What Other Factors Affect VO2 Max?

Your VO₂ Max will generally decrease past the age of 20, decreasing nearly 30% by age 65. This can be offset by training. Your gender is also a factor, the average male generally have a higher VO₂ Max than the average female.

Your VO₂ Max will also be slightly lower at a higher altitude because there is less oxygen.

VO₂ Max and Athletic Performance

VO₂ Max is not a guarantee of elite performance, but an indicator of an athlete’s potential for aerobic endurance. In terms of performance and especially winning a race, many other factors come into play such as training load, biomechanics, muscle fibre types, lactate threshold, mental strength, tactics, preparation and intelligence.

VO₂ Max Treadmill Test

How to Find Your VO₂ Max

As we have touched upon, measuring your VO₂ Max accurately requires an all-out effort (usually on a treadmill or bicycle) performed under a strict protocol in a sports performance lab. These protocols involve specific increases in speed and intensity of the exercise and collection and measurement of the volume and oxygen concentration of inhaled and exhaled air. This determines how much oxygen the athlete is using.

An athlete’s oxygen consumption rises linearly in relation to exercise intensity to a point where the aerobic threshold is reached. After this occurs, consumption plateaus out, even if the intensity is increased. This plateau marks the VO₂ Max.

There are a variety of alternative methods used to estimate VO₂ Max, but none are as accurate as direct testing.

Dr. Lewis G. who Runner’s World claim is the “world’s premier running physician” certainly seems qualified to answer this question with an impressive list of credentials including: medical director of the New York Road Runners, the ING New York City Marathon and all of Elite Racing’s Musical Marathons, The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society’s Team in Training program and he also serves as Chairman of the Board of Governors on the International Marathon Medical Directors Association.

The Doc advocates “real” food over gel or GU packets:

If you were at a barbecue on the weekend and on the buffet was barbecued chicken, salad, and lots of other “real” food, or an iced bowl of gel or Gu packets, which would you eat? Of course you would go for the real food. I absolutely prefer, without a doubt, smart food choices during your training and on race day

Dr. Lewis also advises that you should try nothing in a big event that you haven’t tried and tested in your training:

[you should be trying] nothing new (including food and or drink) on race day that you haven’t done in training. You should be drinking a sports drink and doing the salt in training as a prep for race day, as I’ve said in previous blogs.

On the overuse of gels and Gu, the Doc is critical of the high sugar levels offered by the supplements:

Overuse of gels and Gu, I have found, makes my runners and walkers not feel as well on long runs or half and full marathons. Whenever the body “sees” a high sugar load, as is in these products, there is a rise in sugar, followed by a rise in insulin which causes an abrupt drop in sugar. Doing this over and over again, every 45 minutes, gets you what we call the “yo-yo effect” and by the time you finish, your body is just plain worn out.

Generally what happens if you load up on simple sugars (which gels and Gu are loaded with) is the body is immediately charged with energy and you feel really good, but then insulin levels in the body rises which causes an abrupt sugar plummet – which drops you in a hole! This “crashing” effect is certainly not what you want in a Marathon.

The Doc states that scientific evidence has shown that if you take in a sugar load only once at “the wall” or about 17 miles/27 km you’ll increase your sugar enough to finish feeling strong.

This controversial post has certainly generated plenty of debate and flies in the face of what is recommended in many other articles and sources. But you must wonder if this is due to the massive market for supplements. Of course the manufacturers want you believing you should consume their gels as often as possible.

On the other hand the Doc’s comments strike me as a bit vague and leave a lot of threads hanging.

Admittedly it’s been a while since I read any literature on this topic myself, but my understanding – at least for the elite marathoner – is you should drink a low-concentration energy drink formula, frequently throughout a Marathon. As I recall, the Marathon is also the only race where this applies, any shorter distance and you naturally possess enough energy to carry you through to the finish line. This might not be true in all cases however.

While Dr. Lewis clarifies the frequency of fueling (at least in his opinion), he does mention the type of fueling. Presumably he is not a fan of gel/Gu products. He does not state if this intake at the 17 mile mark should be gels, Gu or another type of sports drink.

The Doc also seems to lump all runners into a single category when in reality there will people of all abilities participating in any given event, from the Elite to weekend warrior. Surely the fueling needs of the 4 hour plus “plodder” does not match those of an Elite marathoner who finishes in a little over 2 hours.

One reader also argued against the Doc’s information sources (Medical Human Physiology and Endocrnology textbooks on the stimulus and action of Insulin), that the “crashing” effect occurs when the body is at rest – an entirely different scenario than when you’re continuously active and placing the body under considerable stress as you do in a Marathon. Many more calories will be expended by your body and 100 cal of a gel will get sucked up pretty quickly as soon as it enters the bloodstream.

One point of unity in the discussion seems to be the acceptance that – in terms of fueling – what works differs from person to person and the importance of test your fueling strategy before a race.

The full thread can be followed here.

The World Cross Country Championships is the most important competition in international Cross country running. Held annually and organized by International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF), it was inaugurated in 1973, when it replaced the International Cross Country Championships.

Cross country is an organized sport that originated from the Crick Run, that has been held every year since 1837 at Rugby School in England. By the early 19th century the sport was practiced in all private schools and it’s popularity continued to rise from there.

The World Cross Country Championships is among the most difficult races to win on the planet, simply because of the sheer volume of high caliber athletes participating in the same race. Some even rate it as more difficult to win than the Olympic Games. In fact Cross country became a part of the Olympic Games in 1912 until 1924 when it was dropped because many saw it as an inappropriate summer sport.

But many would like to see it reinstated including some of the greatest distance kings on the planet.

Ethiopians Kenenisa Bekele, Haile Gebrselassie and Kenya’s Paul Tergat made a request in a letter to the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF). The IOC has already referred the letter to the IAAF, since they are responsible for granting such a request.

I am a big fan of cross country running. It is always a treat to see so many top athletes battling it out over harder conditions. The tougher conditions also level the playing field for runners who possess less track speed, making the race more about strength and tactics than out-and-out leg speed.

I would love to see the request is granted, but I have my doubts it will meet with success. A recent request to have cross country running part of the winter Olympics – perhaps a more appropriate place for a cross country event – was turned down.

Cross country in the Olympics would likely not stack up to the World Titles as a lot of the high profile athletes would be running on the track or in the marathon. Still, it would pull in a different breed of endurance runner and that, I think would offer some great benefits to the sport.

Read the full article here.

Their letter can be viewed here.

I always really enjoy reading the fantastic reports on the latest sporting achievements at The Science of Sport blog. Not only do the authors Jonathan and Ross provide top quality scientific comment and analysis of sports and sporting performance, but they truly love their sport! The enthusiasm and passion in which they deliver their pieces is truly refreshing and too rarely seen!

Reporting on Haile Gebrselassie’s 2:03:59 world record in Berlin, Ross has delivered some fine race commentary and analysis including a break-down of the 5k splits.

It’s interesting to note is that Kenyan James Kwambai, who has finished 2nd in the Boston Marathon to Robert Cheruiyot and achieved a solid fifth at November’s New York Marathon when rebounding from injury that had kept him out of last years Berlin Marathon, held onto this incredible pace until the 35k mark. Unfortunately for James, the 5k between 35k and 40k proved to be the fastest in the entire race which is incredible and testament to Gebrselassie’s finishing ability given that this mark is a point where marathoners have traditionally blown out.

While Gebrselassie praised pacemakers for their great pacing strategy, Ross remains critical:

I saw the initial reports are all proclaiming the great pacing, and I disagree. Last year stood out for its magnificent pacing effort, this year was spectacular because of those final 10km. Absolutely amazing.

And yes, maybe 15 seconds (at least) in the bank if the pacing is better…!

So despite a fantastic performance and a sub-2:04, maybe there is room for improvement yet in the distance king! Ross will deliver a further analysis of the race and a comparison with last year’s Berlin Marathon soon.

Follow the link for the full report on Gebreslassie’s WOLRD RECORD run.

As a runner, I have always built up my mileage slowly and incremental with a simple pattern:

• Three weeks of buildup, each week is 5km (or about 3 miles) more mileage than the last
• The fourth week is a recovery week (typically about 80% of current load)

This has worked well over the years. It is a slow buildup, but has consistently helped me build up my base mileage without major injury.

There is the 10% rule of course. I actually did not discover the 10% rule until recently.
The 10% Rule in case you haven’t encountered it either, says that you can increase your mileage safely by 10% per week. So if you are doing 20 km this week, then next week you can do 22 km. The week after 24.2 km and so on.

The other day, while revising my own training program, I came across a system that goes a step further. Best-running-tips.com feature an article on how to safely build up your mileage.

The author argues that the 10% rule is too general and doesn’t work at extreme ranges on the mileage spectrum. For example if you are an athlete who can manage 100 miles per week. By following the 10% rule, you’d be doing 110 miles the next week then 121 the following week. Those sorts of increases are way too big, even for someone at that level.

At the other end of the spectrum if you’re doing 10 km per week now. Then the 10% rule says you can safely increase to 11 km the next week followed by 12.1 km the week after.

While this would probably be a safe increase for you chances are you’d be selling yourself short!

The author offers a simple system that goes beyond the 10% rule and my simple system. I will present an overview, but I highly recommend you go and read the full article.

Rules to increasing mileage safely:

• Increase the length of half of your runs

  Do not increase the length of all your runs at once. Instead, increase the length of about half of your runs. When you do four workouts per week, then increase the length of only two of your runs. When you run three times a week, increase the length of every second run

• Increase with only one mile (1.6 km) at a time

  Be cautious with adding too many miles to one workout at once. You can make fantastic progress by only adding a mile at most to a workout.

• Apply the hard/easy principle

  Done a long run once? Then next time do a shorter run.
  Make your body work to make progress. But let your body recover as well !

• Make every fourth week a rest week

  Every fourth week cut back your mileage to about 75 % of what it was the previous week. This gives your body a chance to recover. After a tough week, going back to 75 % suddenly seems so easy. That way, you build up your resources again and you get ready for the next few tough weeks. Build in rest weeks. You need them.

These rules may not work for everyone. Athletes invariably come in all shapes, sizes and levels of ability, so one training program or method definitely won’t suit everyone, but the general structure can certainly be used as a guide when used in conjunction with a broader training program.

If you are starting out, I would always recommend you find a good coach or fitness instructor to help you out and can back up their fitness tips with their wealth of experience and knowledge. An experienced eye can help you get on the right track faster than learning things the hard way.

It is commonly thought that running damages your knees, but is there any truth behind this widespread belief? According to this article the answer is no.

What’s more, the complete opposite has been shown to be true.

The persistent myth about exercise – and running, in particular – is that it increases joint problems, arthritis, and will ultimately destroy joints and lead to disability,” said William J. Evans, an exercise physiologist and chair of nutritional longevity at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences. Not only is this “not true,” he said, but the opposite is true: “There is decreased disability after decades of running.

In a new study by Dr. James Fries, a professor of medicine at Stanford University, which was, published in the Archives of Internal Medicine, Fries gave annual questionnaires to 538 runners and 423 healthy men and women.

The results were as follows:

• All were at least 50 years old when the study began in 1984
• After 21 years of follow up, only 15 percent of the runners had died
• This is compared to 34 percent of the non-runners, a greater than two-fold difference!
• The runners were less likely to be disabled. They were able to delay disability (defined as anything that can make it more difficult to perform normal daily tasks) – by 16 years!

In another study, published in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine, Fries focused on 45 runners and 53 non-runners, all aged 50 or more in 1984, and gave them periodic knee X-rays to detect possible osteoarthritis. After 18 years of testing, there was no increase in risk among runners, he said.

The bottom line: Move it or lose it!

Here is the link again to the full article.

In this jaw-dropping piece and another longer article Mark makes a compelling argument against the popular belief that endurance/cardio training is a healthy thing. He claims it will decrease rather than increase your life expectancy. Mark is not one to beat around the bush and argues that endurance training speeds up the aging process “almost as fast as watching TV, drinking sodas and eating potato chips”.

Of course, this goes against the conventional wisdom that fitness is good for you and I must confess, it really got me re-thinking my own belief system. Mark argues the fact that human beings are not designed to work for extended periods of time at 80-90% VO2max.

“Our two primary energy systems are: (1) fat-based, which allows for long slow steady walking across the Savannah (or the Queen K after dark); and (2) ATP-based, which gave our ancestors 20 seconds of balls-out sprint speed to escape the charging saber tooth tiger (or let grandma lift the ’67 Ford truck off gramps when the jack failed).”

It’s a reasonable argument – he goes onto say our bodies are among the best in nature at adapting to hostile environments and self-destructive lifestyles. Essentially he class endurance sport as “hostile” to how our bodies are naturally designed to function.

Being a keen and enthusiastic endurance athlete most of my life, this was naturally a startling point of view! But for some reason what Mark was suggesting didn’t quite ring true. Maybe it was because I am now running more km’s per week and training as hard as I have in years… (my come-back phase sure) I am competing at high intensity levels, (albeit over shorter distances than an Hawaii Ironman), yet I have not felt this good in ages and certainly feel nothing but better for the experience! So here I’m thinking “am I missing something?”

After close examination I think I nailed the flaw in the argument. Mark went on to say:

The problem with many, if not most, age group endurance athletes is that the low-level training gets out of hand. They overtrain in their exuberance to excel at racing, and they over consume carbohydrates in an effort to stay fueled.

The key word here is “overtrain”.

In the comments of the second article a reader challenges Mark:

“It sounds to me like you experienced a classic case of overtraining and overuse injuries, and are now claiming high intensity cardio as the problem.
The problem was not the intensity at which you worked, but rather the frequency by not allowing your body proper rest and recovery. All exercise is beneficial (low intensity aerobic, high intensity aerobic, very high intensity intervals) to overall health. However, you must recognize the intensity and frequency at which you work and allow your body time to recover and grow stronger.”

To which Mark replies:

Not sure you got the message here. Of course I overtrained. That’s what many many marathoners and triathletes do.

Yes it is true that many marathoners and triathletes do overtrain, but this would suggest a more accurate premise for the article should be: over-(not cardio) training is detrimental to health/aging.

In Mark’s second article he speaks of the negative effects of his training:

The first signal I had that something was wrong was when I developed debilitating osteoarthritis in my ankles…at age 28. This was soon coupled with chronic hip tendonitis and nagging recurrent upper respiratory tract infections. In retrospect, it is clear now that my carbohydrate-fueled high-intensity aerobic lifestyle was promoting a dangerous level of continuous systemic inflammation, was severely suppressing other parts of my immune system and the increased oxidative damage was generally tearing apart my precious muscle and joint tissue.

It wasn’t so clear to me at the time exactly what was happening – in fact it was quite confusing, since I was doing so much of this so-called “healthy” aerobic exercise – but I had no choice but to give up racing, unable to train at anywhere near the intensity required to stay at an elite level.

For young and enthusiastic (and successful) athletes the mistake of over-training is a common one. To improve as an athlete, one must gradually and progressively stress your body harder in training. This process is called Progressive Overload. You do this by increasing both intensity and volume, over time.

Obviously the ideal way is one that maximizes results and minimizes injury. The key is a slow build-up and adequate rest between training sessions. If you increase the intensity or volume too rapidly or do not get adequately rest you are overtraining. Overtraining is a bad thing, that can increase your risk of illness, injury and the motivation to train. Mark’s account of his experiences clearly suggest he was in overtraining territory.

The logic of the last paragraph also strikes me as flawed: Mark claims he was “unable to train at anywhere near the intensity required to stay at an elite level”.

Firstly, while Mark was in overtraining territory he is right, his body would be physically weaker and his performances would have dropped accordingly. He simply would not have been able to train at a high intensity.

But part of the game in being an elite athlete is managing your training load. This means listening to your body and adjusting your training according to what your body is telling you. So if Mark were in overtraining territory as an elite athlete his responsibility at that point should have been to train less intensely not more!

By listening to his body and backing off he’d have recovered his strength, health and would have been back in shape in relatively short order (depending on how much damage he’d done to himself).

So while Mark certainly made some interesting and thought-provoking points, in my humble opinion he should be blaming overtraining for his drop in health, not cardio training.

I do not mention anything about planning a structured training program which is more important, but I intend to address this in a future article.

So you want to improve your running times, but don’t quite know how to go about it?

Running can be a confusing sport when starting out. I would highly recommend finding an experienced coach when you do so.

But it is important to understand the basics of a structured running program. I will not talk much about structure here itself. That is a topic for another article. How you structure your overall training is a very individual thing and will depend on both your current fitness level and your specific goals. Again a good coach can help a lot here.

Here I explore the fundamental training types, the “building blocks” if you will of distance running training.

The long run
The staple diet of the long distance runner, the long run is essential for developing your stamina. It works your aerobic system, aerobic meaning “with oxygen”. The goal of aerobic exercise is to improve oxygen consumption by the body or how good your body converts oxygen into energy. The long run is an essential training run for all but the most speed-oriented sprinters and some would say even sprinters could benefit from one or two long runs each week. (Good luck getting them to do it!)
Depending on your level of fitness about 60-80% (but not all) of your overall training should be long slow running.

Intervals
Ok, intervals are where training starts to become more complicated, and much harder.
I would not recommend you start interval training until you have a strong aerobic foundation behind you (which you can achieved through long runs).

Intervals consist or relatively short repetitions of distances with a period of rest between efforts. Common interval distances are: 200m, 400m, 800m, 1000m, but can be as short as 50m and as long as 3k. Interval training is usually done on a 400m running track, but this is certainly not a hard-and-fast rule. An interval session can be done on any surface, road, grass, track or forest trail.

Unlike the long run, interval training works both your aerobic and anerobic systems to different degree depending on the repetition distance and the recovery time length.

You typically work more of your anaerobic (without oxygen) energy systems when the repetition distance is less than 800m and you are running fast and more of your aerobic system is worked when the distance is over 800m or you are running at a more controlled pace.

Anaerobic means “without oxygen” and occurs when you are running so fast, your muscles can no longer produce enough energy through the aerobic energy system. When this happens, different energy systems in your body kick in and you’re said to be running “anaerobically”

The goal of (fast) intervals is to adapt your body to the higher demands and your leg muscles to faster turnover. Over time this will make you a much faster runner. Even if your focus is primarily on very long distance events such as marathons, intervals an important part of any serious endurance runner’s program.

Hills
This is one is often met with scorn when suggested. If there’s one certainty in life (besides death and taxes of course) it’s that runners despise hills. But like all forms of training, hills are an acquired skill and really aren’t that bad once you get used to it.

A rather obvious benefit of hill workouts is that they make you better at running hills! An advantage in hilly courses.
But they also have the advantage of making you quicker over a level surface. In hill running, the athlete is using their body weight as resistance to push against, so the driving muscles have to push harder, improving leg-muscle strength.

Hills, when done at the right level and with the right consistency will strengthen your tendons and ligaments over time and reduce the chance of injury. Hill training can also be considered an alternative to working your leg muscles in a gym and because you are performing the act of running and will quite naturally give you a much more event-specific form of workout!

Hills can be incorporated into both intervals and your long run. Generally the same principals that apply to intervals apply to hills. Hill repetitions can be both aerobic or anaerobic (typically they’re somewhere in the middle), but unlike interval the goal of hills is to work leg strength rather than out-and-out leg speed.

Tempo runs
The classic tempo runs involves a 15 minute warm-up, followed by at least 20 minutes at around your 10k pace (it should feel challenging, but manageable), followed by a 15 minute cool-down. This pace should be close to what is called your lactate threshold, where your aerobic system meets your anaerobic one.

Often tempo runs can be done in conjunction with a long run. The goal is for your body to “learn” race economy – running at a fast pace for relatively long periods of time. Over time, tempo runs will increase your lactate threshold, a good thing, as it will allow you to hold a fast pace for longer periods.

Fartlek
Fartlek is Swedish for “speed play’. It consists of erratic bursts of speed followed by aerobic recovery periods. It is essentially a random interval session, but instead of full rest in between repetitions, aerobic exercise is used at about the pace of a long run.

The goal of fartlek is to work aerobic and anaerobic systems interchangeably which trains the body to handle changes in pace. Fartlek is idea for preparing the athlete for sudden changes in pace in race conditions.

This kind of session is great for groups of runners, where each member takes a turn at setting the training. The beauty of a fartlek session is it can be as easy or as hard as you want to make it and is one of many fun exercise ideas for making your training more enjoyable and less monotonous.

Racing
Strangely not many runners think of racing as a form of training, but it is and is perhaps even the best form of training out there. For nothing prepares you for the stress of racing than well… racing. Racing is where you get to combine all the other forms of training against other runners in a competitive environment. No other form of training quite compares.

In fact I’d go so far as to say if you do no other form of training, simply competing in one race each week will improve your fitness and performances immensely. While I certainly don’t recommend this “program” I consider this form of training head-and-shoulders above the rest in terms of effectiveness.

So there are the basic training types for the long distance runner. All of the types of training listed here except for the long run should be started only after you have done adequate warm-up exercises (a 10-20 minute jog) and stretching. This is because warming up and stretching before a high intensity workout will reduce your chance of an injury significantly. The long run is different because it is at a lower intensity, so the risk of injury is low throughout the run.

In it, I covered how core strength can improve efficiency, posture, balance and stability and also mentioned some activities for improving core strength, namely gym training, pilates and yoga, floor exercises and cross training.

Today’s article will introduce three specific exercises that have been scientifically proven as the best at working your core muscles.

What I try to do, when beginning a program, is to start on the most effective exercise (usually the hardest) for my goal and work up to doing more reps over time.

Many people, when starting an exercise program tend to start with easy exercises first with the intention of moving to more advanced exercises as their fitness improves. While this seems reasonable and logical in theory, in practice what usually happens is they never move past that initial stage, or even worse quit their program entirely when they do not experience any improvement.

While I am as reluctant as anyone when trying something new, especially something hard, I believe that being too timid can be detrimental to improvement. By setting the the bar too low, it is too easy to become complacent and never progress past the easy exercises that don’t give you much benefit.

I concede, I usually cannot do many reps when I start and that’s ok, because I’m just starting out. I know I will get stronger over time.

If I only do 5 repetitions. The next time I’ll try for 6, then 8 the time after that and so on…

But while I advocate not starting out too timid, I also want to make it clear that this isn’t the same as pushing yourself to extreme limits. From years of personal experience, I have learned that when starting new exercises is concerned, erring on the side of conservatism is usually the best policy.

So I advise you start off with the most specific exercise for your goal…. BUT don’t go crazy when you’re starting out.

In this case, I refer to core strength exercises, here are the three which have been scientifically proven to be the best.

These exercises are rated in two different areas of muscle groups. Your rectus abdominus or six-pack and obliques which are more to the side and behind the rectus obdominus.

While most people tend to be obsessed with building muscle and dream of nothing other than getting six-pack abs, for good posture and all the other benefits of core strength training it’s important to work both your obliques and your rectus abdominus.

Incidentally, abdominal exercises are measured using a practice called electromyography (EMG) and are rated in comparison to the traditional crunch. The crunch, while popular in mainstream abdominal training programs is actually far from the best of the bunch, in fact it is not even in the top three!

Ok, onto the exercises!

Bicycle Crunch

Bicycle Crunches is the KING of abdominal exercises!

To perform this exercise:

• Lie on your back as if to do a regular crunch
• Place your hands behind your head for support then bend your knees 90 degrees
• Raise your left knee, while at the same time bringing your right elbow to your left knee
• Alternate: right knee to left elbow, left knee to right elbow and over and over

The bicycle crunch exercise resembles a peddling action and can be done without expensive gym equipment.

The Bicycle crunch rates 248% better than a crunch for your rectus abdominus and 290% better than a crunch for your obliques.

Hanging Knee Raises or Captain’s Chair Exercise

This is probably one for the gym as you need to hang from something with your feet off the ground.You will also need sufficient upper body strength.

To perform hanging knee raises:

• While hanging, bring your knees to your chest, but don’t use momentum
• Keeping your upper body straight, hold for a second
• Lowering your legs again

This exercise is 212% better than a traditional crunch for your recuts abdominus and 310% better for your obliques than a traditional crunch.

Abdominal Crunch on an exercise ball

This exercise requires an exercise ball. Consider purchasing an exercise ball as a long term investment in your fitness, or head to your local gym.

• Sit on the ball in a comfortable position
• Slide your body so you are on top of it, the ball should be somewhere between butt and upper back. The closer the ball is to butt, the more difficult the effort
• Perform a regular crunch: Ensure that your hips and lower body remain still, as you “crunch” forward, lifting your shoulder blades off the ball
• Hold this position for about a second then slowly return to the starting position

This exercise is 139% more effective than a traditional crunch for rectus abdominus, 147% more effective for obliques.

These exercises are offered for the purpose of improving your core strength. These do not take into account the many factors that go into an individual training program. If you are unsure about your overall program, I would strongly advise you see a running coach or personal fitness instructor.