Online Exercise Tips for Women

What is a perfect body image?

Well it tends to have toned hips and legs with a pert

bottom, a strong stomach and an open chest. Only

the genetically gifted or determined fitness freaks

seem to embody this ideal, and yet this is in fact how

everyone is designed. We all have bigger muscles in

our legs than ourarms because nature intended us to

use our legs as our means of transport. Around our

middles are muscles in a similar shape to a girdle that

hold our internal organs in the right place. Along our

spines are muscles similar to struts that can hold the

spine long.

In the middle of our body we have a big

hinge, the hips, surrounded and protected by big

muscles (thighs, buttocks, hamstrings), which help us

move around it.

So if we move using our hips as a hinge and our legs as

support they will be fitter and toned. If we then hold

ourselves upright using our "girdle" and maintain a long

spine with our "struts" we will then not tend to let our

stomachs bulge and our shoulders collapse.

Abdomen Tuck

Most of the stomach exercises we are used to performing

seem to make the abdomen bulge out, but the core

muscles of the body are made active by pulling in.

Therefore, begin by lying flat on the floor on your front.

1. Rest your forehead on your hands and feel the

   weight of your body on the floor. Feel the front ribs

   and pelvis pressing into it. You are going to try to

   pull your stomach up off the floor, keeping your ribs

   and pelvis down.

   

2. Begin by simply pulling the tummy up and lowering

   it down. How high can you pull your stomach

   up from the floor? Can you feel the lower spine

   lengthen? Have you created a gap underneath

   your body? When you feel confident with this,

   move on.

3. Keep the lower ribs firmly grounded on the floor

   and your hip bones and pubic bone flat on the floor.

   Now pull your tummy in as high as you can. Feel

   the lower spine lengthen and push your legs

   straight - so straight that you feel your toes spread.

   

4. Push your left hip and upper thigh up by squeezing

   the buttock and lifting your left foot off the floor.

   Is your tummy still in? Repeat, inhaling alternate legs

   up, exhaling them down. Can you begin to feel that

   the tummy can remain in, while the lower spine is

   kept long, even when you move your legs? Try to

   gain control of those pulling-in muscles as your limbs

   are moving.

   
   
   

Lengthen the raised leg from the thigh, as opposed to

lifting by squeezing the buttocks. This exercise has the

advantages of pulling your tummy in and of relieving

tension from the front of your hips - a major cause of

lower back pain. It can also lift the buttocks and add

shape in quite a short time.

Stomach Curl

The pubic lift starts in the stomach. It is very easy just

to squeeze your bottom to tuck in your tailbone,

which provides the same action. Pay attention to

the feeling of the correct action - allowing pressure

to be equally distributed throughout the body will

relieve problems.

1. Sit with the soles of your feet on the floor

   and your knees in the air. Sit up as high as you

   can, pushing your sitting bones down into the floor.

   Cup your hands on your knees, so as not to use your

   arm strength to interfere with the exercise.

   

2. As you roll back, point your toes into the floor and

   feel your thighs work and lengthen and your knees

   push down towards the floor. As you come up,

   pull your heels towards your buttocks. The hamstrings

   and deep abdomen will engage to pull you up.

   

3. Look down at your stomach and pubic bone so you can

   see how you are moving. Using both hands, grab hold

   of your lower ribs and lift them up. Now suck in your

   stomach and all the muscles that connect from the pubic

   bone all the way up the front of the body.

   

4. As you roll backwards, keep lifting your ribs. You will find

   that your stomach will pull in as before, but now also up

   into your rib cage, making it possible to feel a lift in

   the body as you roll down. Try to detect the origin of

   the movement in the groin. The fact that the tummy

   pulls in so hard gives a feeling that the pubic bone is

   lifted, which is turn tucks the spine between the buttocks

   and rolls you down.

   
   
   

Elbow Lift

In this exercise extend through your legs to your feet,

feeling the work in the thighs. Push your chest high

off the floor so you can feel the space between your

shoulder blades. This will strengthen your stomach muscles,

and train them to hold your insides in.

1. Lie on your front and tuck your toes under your

   heels. Place your hands together, thumbs on your

   sternum, tucking your elbows in towards your ribs

   and then push yourself up to balance on your elbows

   and toes.

2. Lift your pubic bone into your stomach, as in the stomach

   curl. Practice pulling your abdomen in and up

   without sticking your bottom out, as that will disengage

   the stomach muscles, which is the part of you that this

   exercise is designed for.

   
   
   

Alternative: if you find this too tricky, rest your knees on

the floor, but make sure you really pull your pubic

bone up into your stomach and lengthen the lower spine,

or the hip flexors will get a good workout and nothing more.