Abdominal crunches have become the gold standard of ab exercises, but they may not be doing as much as we think to give us the strong torso we need to run, walk, play sports, lift or perform other daily activities.

The problem is in the movement. In an abdominal crunch, we perform technically speaking, a forward flexion of the spine. But a lot of us spend the entire day in a forward flexed position. We sit forward at desks, sit forward at a computer, sit flexed to watch TV, sit flexed to drive, sit flexed at a table to eat? No wonder the typical posture of someone who ages is rounded forward in a "hunch" back posture. Why would we want to strengthen our body in a direction that we really should be trying to move out of? It makes sense that we'd want to try to counteract and minimize these forward forces. We?re not suggesting that you shouldn't be doing any abdominal crunches. But you should compliment situps and crunch exercises with more functional and appropriate movements.

When most people think of core conditioning they think of the abs. But core conditioning involves strengthening the muscles on the front, side and rear of the spine and the hip musculature. The following program will provide you with a well-rounded, balanced core conditioning program. You'll be amazed and how better you will feel and perform after following this program for 6 weeks.