The sit up movement is like folding the body. It uses 2 sets of muscle groups, the abs and the hip flexors. The hip flexors work to bring your knees towards your body.
The sit ups work the muscles on the front of the body, to avoid injuries, train the back of your body with lower back exercises.
Our bodies are not identical, some movements will feel more comfortable for you, start with those first. I don’t actually do sit ups at all (except the IPPT) due to the discomfort from my tailbone. I do enjoy adding in other different types of core exercises that benefit my overall strength development.
Most of the exercises here require no equipment so it’s easy to perform anytime, anywhere (some might require a resistance band).
The ideas presented here will help you develop an overall strong core and ability to perform well for the sit up component of the IPPT. Choose a few that you enjoy doing and stick to them, you don’t have to do all the variations you see here
Our core muscles have 4 main jobs, to fold the body, to twist the body (rotation), to bend the body sideways and straighten it & to stabilize the body. Train your core to do all 4.
If you are starting out with core exercises, you might feel a lot of soreness. Vary the exercise frequency and intensity to allow for recovery.
When you start exercising regularly and even daily, you will notice that the soreness will become lesser over time.
Personally, I have very little or almost no soreness after working out daily since June 2021.
Stretching helps speed up recovery. Holding the “end” position of a cobra push up can help with stretching out your abs.
You can perform core exercises without any equipment. Mini bands or resistance bands can come in handy for some of the exercises here.
Choose a level that best describes you for exercise ideas.
Level 1 - Aiming to move closer to a passing score
Level 2 - Aiming to pass or pass with incentive
Level 3 - Aim to get maximum IPPT score in a category
IPPT READY by Terence Choo
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