What if you did 5,000 sit-ups a month?
True or false:
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Proper sit-ups selectively burn fat deposits around the waist.
The more sit-ups you do, the smaller your waist.
Hooking your feet under a piece of furniture when doing sit-ups, helps you isolate your
abdominal muscles.
All are false. A few years ago, a study at the University of Massachusetts showed that even men
who did 5,000 sit-ups over the course of 27 days had no significant loss of fat in the abdominal
area. As we’ve said before, the whole idea of spot reducing is a myth. To lose body fat, you
must burn more calories than you take in – a deficit of 3,500 calories to lose a pound. This
study’s subjects burned an average of only 50 calories per five-minute daily session – not enough
to trim down. But even if they had burned twice as many calories, the energy would come from
fat stored throughout the body, not just from the tummy.
This is not to say that sit-ups are a waste of time. When properly done, they strengthen and tone
the three sets of abdominal muscles (the rectus abdominis and the external and internal obliques),
which are otherwise hard to exercise. Since strong abdominal muscles provide better support for
the back, strengthening these muscles may help prevent or alleviate many back problems. Strong
abdominals also give you more power for running, tennis, and other activities that involve the
torso.
Sit-up don’ts
NO straight legs. Skip those old-fashioned straight-leg sit-ups, in which you sit up fully while
keeping your legs flat on the floor. These can make you overarch and thus strain your lower
back. And, anyway, when you sit up all the way, much of the work is done by the hip flexor
muscles, not the abdominals.
NO hooked feet. Don’t do sit-ups with your feet hooked under a bar or piece of furniture – this
lets the legs and hips do most of the work.
NO excessive speed and repetitions. Forget about doing hundreds of rapid sit-ups. When you
perform them so quickly, the abdominal muscles don’t get a maximal workout – momentum
takes over to some extent as you bounce up and down. So rather than increasing the number of
sit-ups you do (beyond, say, 50 or so), make them more challenging by doing them more slowly,
or try some variations described later.
The better way – the crunch
1. Lie on the floor with your knees bent and feet flat on the floor.
2. Contract the abdominal muscles while pressing your lower back into the floor, which will
cause your upper body to lift up slowly.
3. Come up to no more than a 30 degree to 45-degree angle.
4. If you’re just starting to do sit-ups, keep your arms straight at your side as you sit up. To
increase the difficulty of the exercise as you progress, cross your arms over your chest, or
place your hands behind your head or near your ears. Do not pull on your neck!
5. Slowly lower your back to the ground.
6. To prevent arching, always keep your lower back pressed into the floor.
7. Beginners should start with three sets of five sit-ups with a brief rest between sets. Try
this three to five times a week. Gradually work up to three sets of 15 sit-ups per session,
to a max of 50 per set.
8. Stop if you feel discomfort in your lower back.
Variations
For a change of pace, try these variations:
 Lie on the floor; place your feet on a bench (knees bent 90 degrees, legs bent at the waist
90 degrees) and do a crunch as described above.
 Place your feet flat against a wall with your legs bent at a right angle.
 Try “reverse curls” in which you move your legs, not your torso: keeping your lower
back pressed into the floor, your knees bent, and your feet off the floor, slowly bring your
knees as close to your chest as possible.
The basic sit-ups work all three abdominal muscle groups, but especially the rectus abdominis.
To work the obliques (located toward the sides of the abdominal area) maximally, include slight
twist in any of these exercises. For example, as you sit up, bring your right shoulder (or elbow,
if your hands are behind your head) toward your left knee, then reverse.