If you want a strong, functional set of abs, you need to do more than sit-ups. Building a stable core and strong torso helps you stabilize through each step you take. Another underrated function of your abs: helping your torso twist with aggression and power—it’s an action you make every time you start to turn around.
It’s worth training your body to do this well, too, so you can twist and rotate at your torso more effectively. Twisting your torso requires obliques, intercostal muscles, and serratus muscles to work with your abs, and it brings out the details in those muscles. And one of the easiest ways to train that is with the “Sprinter Sit-Up to Hollow Rock Challenge” from Advertisement - Continue Reading Below.
This count-up game looks simple and requires just your bodyweight (translation: it can be done anywhere) but it’s deceptively challenging. You start in the hollow hold position, already a position of core work, and transition to a twisting sprinter sit-up, pushing your obliques into action. Then you land in a corkscrew hollow rock, an ultra-challenging position for your abs and obliques. “From this stance, you’re twisting and continuing to twist, a new challenge for your abs and obliques to work together,” Samuel Says
The best part? You don’t need any equipment at all. Here’s how to do it:
- Start in a hollow body position: Lie on your back. Press your lower back into the ground. Lift your shoulder blades off the ground one inch, and your legs off the ground — all without letting your lower back lose adjunction with the ground. Tighten your abs to drive your lower back into the ground.
- Do a sprinter sit-up, contracting your abs then bringing right elbow to left knee; your right leg stays straight. Do 1 rep.
- After that one rep, keep your right elbow connected to your left knee; you’re now in corkscrew hollow rock position. Do one hollow rock, then return to hollow body position.
- Do 2 sprinter sit-ups; after the second one, stay in corkscrew hollow rock position and do 2 hollow rocks. Continue this pattern, laddering up to 5 sprinter sit-ups and 5 corkscrew hollow rocks.
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The entire blend of moves challenges you to both rotate and own rotation, Samuel says, and it’ll force perfect sprinter sit-up reps.
“By forcing you to go right into corkscrew hollow rock position after a sprinter sit-up, you have to own sprinter sit-up position,” he says. “It prevents you from being sloppy with your sprinter sit-ups. I often see people forget to really touch elbow to knee—you can’t do that when you know you have to get elbow to knee and keep them there at some point. It makes every rep better.”
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Try this challenge if you want an ultra-quick core workout after your run, or tack it onto the end of any total-body gym session. “It’s a quick ab burn you can do anytime,” Samuel says. “That’s one of its best parts.”
Ebenezer Samuel, C.S.C.S., is the fitness director of Men's Health and a certified trainer with more than 10 years of training experience. He's logged training time with NFL athletes and track athletes and his current training regimen includes weight training, HIIT conditioning, and yoga. Before joining Men's Health in 2017, he served as a sports columnist and tech columnist for the New York Daily News.
