core strength

After an incredibly lazy/recovery week after the Marine Corps Marathon, I continued to take it pretty easy last week and actually still haven’t gone running. I hope to change that today, but I have gotten in a little bit of strength and cross training in.

Here’s the day-by-day breakdown of last week:

Monday: My version of P90X Ab Ripper and push-ups.

Tuesday: More P90X Abs and push-ups.

Wednesday: Again, P90X Ab Ripper and some push-ups. Are you starting to see a theme here?

Thursday: I mixed it up a little bit and added a great extended body ride at Revolve DC’s spin studio to my P90X Ab Ripper routine and push-ups.

Friday: Yet another day of P90X Ab Ripper and push-ups. Sorry if this is the most boring weekly recap I’ve ever written!

Saturday: I got in just part of my ab routine and some push-ups today before heading over to Revolve for a real ride.

Sunday: Rest Day. I did get some good motivation today though spending the morning cheering and volunteering at the Veterans Day 10k and the afternoon on my couch reading my latest issue of Runner’s World cover-to-cover.

In my New Year’s Resolutions post I talked about wanting to work on building up my core strength. I made it my main focus for the month of January, so I thought I’d share my favorite core workout with you. I LOVE the P90X Ab Ripper workout. It’s tough and hurts like heck the first couple days, but that goes away and the results are amazing. It includes ins and outs, bicycles, cross-leg sit-ups, leg climbs, mason twists and more. It only takes about 15 minutes a day, so I try to think of it in terms of how little of my time that requires each day and there is really no excuse.

Here’s a link to the Ab Ripper workout. I do 30 reps of each exercise, and have also added 30 back extensions and a 2-minute barrel roll plank on to the end. I’m always looking for new ideas, so tell me about your favorite core exercises in comments.