Side Planks with an Exercise Ball

Video Transcript

"Once you've mastered your basic sit-up and you've hit your transverse abs and the rectus abdominals, you want to make sure you're hitting obliques, one of the most important muscles in the core body because it serves as a girdle to the spine. Just like you would on the floor, elbow underneath the shoulder. I'm going to start by showing you a progression here. You could start with both knees bent and just do a crunch. Again, you only got about 10-15 degrees of lateral inflection involved here, so it's not a lot of momentum. You're crunching. You're pressing this side of obliques against the ball and crunching towards your feet with the other one. If I extend, I've got to control that leverage. If it helps you to put a hand here behind your head, by all means, go ahead. Just don't get in the habit of leading with your head. I want you to lead with the obliques, because that's where the workload needs to be. Crunch, and release. If we want to progress even further, we're going to take it out here. Both feet, and crunch and release. Crunch and release. If you want to take it even further and you're really good at it, you can be up here and have your legs extended out for side plank."