Stop Doing Russian Twists Like THIS!

The Russian Twist is one of the most popular ab exercises. The problem is, most often it is performed incorrectly by limiting the amount of trunk rotation that is done on the exercise.

When this happens, it becomes more of a Russian Tap. The goal of the movement is not to make hand contact with the ground necessarily but to achieve rotation of the shoulders and trunk when doing it. This is due to the fact that the abs and obliques not only drive rotation as one of their main functions but they also seek to control it and act to prevent or decelerate rotation. The properly performed Russian Twist will include rotation and the momentum created during it will demand control of the core.

If you seek to simply touch your hands to the floor on every rep then you likely won't get the trunk rotation needed to maximally stimulate your abs. Tapping the hands to the ground can actually be achieved with little to no rotation at all. It becomes a test of whether you have long arms or the flexibility in your shoulders to reach across your body to the opposite side of you.

That said, when performed correctly I love the Russian Twist. Not only is it a simple ab exercise that can be performed without any equipment at all but it also gives you the rotational component that is often times lacking in many bodyweight ab exercises that are crunch dominant.

In order to effectively train your abs you need to be sure that you are working in rotation along with your movements that cause posterior pelvic tilt.

To perform the Russian Twist properly, sit back onto your tailbone so that you already set your pelvis into posterior tilt. From here, instead of focusing on what the hands are doing, think instead about what the elbows are doing. If you want a great cue for getting this right every time try to think about rowing the elbows back behind you as far as you can. This will feel as if you are doing a seated row one side at a time if you get it right.

What this will also do is ensure that you're getting the rotation needed to engage the obliques and abdominal muscles.

The best way to program the Russian Twist is for time. Some have tried to program it based on the number of times that you make contact with the ground with either your hands or the medicine ball that you're holding while performing it however, as you can see, this is not the end goal of the movement and definitely not something that you should be keying off of.

Instead, if you concentrate on doing this in good quality form for as long as you can then you will be able to increase this length of time as your abs get stronger and the obliques become able to handle more volume. Additionally, you can always weight the exercise as noted by holding onto a progressively heavier medicine ball or weight plate. The stronger your abs get the more weight you will be able to handle.

Either way, whether you do this weighted or unweighted the key is that you learn how to do this ab exercise right if you want to see the most benefit from doing it. It is a popular abs exercise for a reason. The issue comes when you take what could be beneficial and turn it into something that at best won't do anything for you and at worst could actually hurt you.

Hopefully with this quick athleanx shorts video you now have the knowledge to apply the right technique to this movement every time you include it in your ab workouts.

If you're looking for more ab workout videos and exercises for abs that will get you training like an athlete even with just your own bodyweight that are quick and easy to do at home, be sure to subscribe to our new AX Shorts channel at the link below today.

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[staircasefunction]

After a few months:
"Doing Russian twists is killing your gains."

[rebeccabond]

i love these twists especially the standing broomm handle twist

[shahtayyib]

Don't forget, leaning back increases intensity, much more than a medicine ball will

[brianandrade]

The elbow movement really does make all the difference. Thanks

[diy]

Oh thank goodness. I was afraid I was doing something wrong:)

[I-have-a-Dodo-Brain]

I thought that it was obvious u need to move the Torso and hips, not your arms. 😐 and thanks for telling me I was doing it right. From what i can tell and if I'm wrong, explain how Please

[Blackjack-qspr]

Hey jeff
Q: Should I be doing strength sets in a fast rate or slow? thx for the advises and taking time to answer me.

[clovermedia.]

as a newly turned femboy im working on reducing overall body fat

thx for the vid!

[dustyV-yz]

People always do these in such a hurry…. 😬

[IDcLuc]

Should you rest your feet on the ground when doing russian twists? I've always done it lifting my feet but seeing you do it with your feet resting on the ground makes me second think myself

[SamarthxAGENT]

How much should I do?? I'm 15 years old

[jaivir]

Jesse Pinned this cause he LOVES his FANS.

[charlieparks]

How should this be loaded. Overhead cable?

[theincarnateofkurro]

idk, but i always do russian twists by reaching for my ankles for some reason

[kopwagwan]

I didn't realise you could put your legs down 😂

[Ray-ulrw]

He goes over this in almost every ab video because people still keep doing this and it doesn’t do shit

[santoscortez]

This is a long show but is there any way you could talk about the opposing side of russian twists info that its actually bad for spine to do this exercise at all? I like this workout but at the same time I don't wanna mess up my spine

[vault]

This is why I usually do these with a battle rope

[henrygobblesag]

I feel like Jesse blew up and then completely stopped lifting. What happened?

[underhill]

It doesn't look like the fixed version has much more rotation if any. Wouldn't the better physical cue be to keep your arms stationary relative to your torso and thus to accomplish the "taps" you are forces to rotate your trunk instead? Jeff seems pretty consistent in his advise on moving the elbows behind, so I'm sure there's a reason that mental cue will achieve better physical results. But why? A lot of physical therapists don't like the russian twists because of the twisting that can happen at the lower back. Would keeping the arms stationary and forcing the body to rotate hurt the lower back more, and does focusing on bring the arms behind you protect the lower back while still getting more oblique activation?