Bicycle Crunches
Lie on your back, hands lightly behind head, legs lifted. Rotate and crunch: opposite elbow to knee while the other leg extends; switch smoothly. Keep lower back pressed to the floor and neck relaxed to target abs and obliques.
Updated
Primary muscles: Abs, Obliques. Equipment: Bodyweight.
Muscles worked
Equipment
How to do it
- Lie on your back with the low back pressed to the floor and hands lightly behind the head.
- Lift the legs so the knees stack over the hips.
- Brace the core and rotate the right shoulder toward the left knee while the right leg extends.
- Switch sides smoothly: left shoulder toward right knee while the left leg extends.
- Keep alternating without letting the low back lift off the floor.
- Stop the set when the rotation collapses into a neck pull.
Watch for
- Yanking the neck instead of rotating from the rib cage.
- Letting the low back arch as the leg extends.
- Shrinking the rotation to a quick wiggle.
Breathing
Exhale into each rotation, inhale briefly between sides.
Tip
Slow the cycle down. One clean rotation per second loads the obliques harder than fast scissoring.
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