Exercising your ab muscles while standing is better than doing so on the floor as it engages more muscle and helps tone up entire torso. A regular workout to tone up your muscles in the ab is recommended four times per week. Ideally you should exercise your abs after your regular cardio and strength exercises. You may or may not use weights to do these exercises.
Using weights will increase the resistance that you are working against and help tone up your abs. However, it is recommended that you first try out the free hand versions of the exercises before moving on to weights and advanced exercises that involve more repetitions or more weights.
Free Hand Exercises:
1. Stand straight with your feet shoulder width apart. Now bring up your right hand above your head, palm facing out. Lift your left leg as high as you can in front of you. Simultaneously bring down your raised hand to touch the toe of your left leg as you lift it high. As you are coming down to touch your left foot, scrunch your stomach muscles in and keep the move sweeping and strong. Repeat about 10 to 12 times and do the same with your left hand and right leg. Allow 30 seconds rest and repeat 2 more repetitions.
2. Stand with your feet firmly on ground about shoulder width apart and your torso centred. Bring your right hand up and hold above your head. Now bend your elbow and bring down your hand towards your torso. At the same time bring your left knee up to meet your right elbow. As your elbow and knee meet, crunch in your stomach muscles. Repeat 10 to 15 times before doing the same on the other side. Rest for 30 seconds between reps. Repeat 2 more times.
3. Stand with feet shoulder width apart and slightly bent at the knees. Clasp your palms in front of you and then lift them over your body towards the right. Feel the stretch on the left side of your body. Now bring down your hands bending your torso to the left in a kind of chop. Every time you chop down scrunch your side muscles. After 15 counts, repeat on the other side. Do 3 repetitions, taking care to allow 30 seconds between each rep.
4. Stand with your feet shoulder width apart. Now take a step forward with your left foot. Your right food is behind your right foot. Clasp your palms behind your head in this position, taking care to keep your shoulders straight and elbows out. Keep your chest out. Now bend down forward towards your right knee. As you straighten, bend your torso towards the left and look towards the left side. Repeat 10-15 times on one side before going on to the next side. Do 3 repetitions.
5. Exercises with Weights
All the above exercises can be done using 5 to 10 pound dumbbells. Make sure to use only one dumbbell when you are performing exercise no. 3.
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