Eccentric Training for Solid Abs

When it comes to strength training, adding an extra dimension to your routine can help you get strong in a short time. It’s called eccentric training, and it enables you to accomplish more in every exercise.

This is how it works. A muscle contracts concentrically and eccentrically. Concentric means that tension is created while the muscle shortens. For example, when you do a bicep curl, the muscle in the front of your arm (between your shoulder and elbow) contracts concentrically when you lift the weight. Normally you release that contraction as you lower the weight. This downward phase is where the eccentric contraction can kick in.

What you’ll need to do is focus on generating tension in the muscle as it lengthens. I describe it to my students as “resisting against gravity.” You can emphasize the eccentric phase of any exercise by incorporating two to four pauses during the decelerating phase. In the bicep curl example, that means on the way down you would pause three times, with each pause lasting one to two seconds. Your total time for this phase, therefore, would be about six seconds. This way you have enough control to eccentrically train the muscle.

This type of training is especially effective when you work on your midsection.

Eccentric Ab Curls

To begin, lie on your back and place your hands behind your head. Bend your knees with your feel flat on the floor. Breathe deeply.

A: On the exhale, press your lower back against the ground as you lift your right knee just above your hip. Flatten your navel toward your spine and concentrate on tightening your abdominal muscles as you curl your torso toward your lifted knee. This is where the eccentric phase of the exercise starts. Inhale, but instead of quickly releasing your abdominals and lowering your torso and leg down, you’ll take six seconds to do the following:

B. Simultaneously stretch your right leg straight in front of you, extend your arms behind your head, and lower your head and torso to the floor. Be sure to keep this movement slow and controlled by pausing two to three times as you extend. Check that your arms stay just above the floor. Continue to keep your abdominals firm, and don’t allow an extreme arch to form in your lower back. At the end of the movement, when you are fully extended, you should have a slight arch in your back, just big enough to fit a grape between the floor and the small of your back. Exhale and repeat the concentric contraction by curling forward. Then exhale and immediately perform the slow, eccentric contraction as you lengthen out.

After you do this movement six to eight times, place your foot and arms down; relax abdominals and rest for 30 seconds. Then repeat using your left leg.

We all know that strong abdominals can help protect us from low back pain and make daily activities easier to do. But if you want really killer abs, this is the exercise for you. It does an outstanding job of working all the muscles of your midsection in two different direction--squeezing on the way in and resisting on the way out.

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Joan Voight, a San Francisco-based journalist, contributed to this column. Karen Voight is a Los Angeles-based fitness expert whose latest video is “Pilates: Abdominals & Back.” She can be reached by e-mail at kvoightla@aol.com. Her column appears the Monday of the month.