Day 27! Approaching the finishing line – hopefully you’ve improved (and practiced) your abs basic training and are enjoying the advanced exercises I’m sharing with you.

Hopefully you have discovered that actually you CAN find 4-6mins a day to do something for yourself, for your body.

Hopefully our mini-challenge is helping to develop one thing that always get’s overpowered by our instincts – the willpower!

Enough preaching 🙂 Let’s do it, foxes!

Today, we have Slide Out Push-ups + Weighted Mermaids – 3 x 30sec/10sec

Sliders and a 2-4kg dumbbell in use

Both exercises were recommended to me, I agree these are definitely challenging, for me personally there’s still still room for improvement in my ordinary push-ups and Mermaids 🙂

Slide Out Push-ups

This is a tough exercise and you might need to modify it by starting on your knees, like I did, rather than on your feet. 

• Rest your hands on the Sliders whilst adopting a pushup position. I was aiming to work from the table top position but to keep legs and bum engaged was easier in 3/4 position. 
• Keep your core braced and slide one hand forwards as far as you can, the other hand supports your body – palm by the armpit, elbow at 45 degrees.  
• Maintain a flat lower back, do not allow your hips to sag! 

I found this exercise somewhere between the rollout and push-up, sliders add an element of instability and also make the single arm push up possible, however for now I think I’ll stick to paused pushups and roll outs, need to develop more strength and practice these Slide Out Pushups from the full plank.

Weighted Mermaids

I thought thanks to Slow Mermaids it is fine to get onto Weighted Mermaids. As you can see the small dumbbell has really challenged holding the side plank!

Follow along with 2-4kg weight max or practice the traditional Mermaid (full or from the knee).

Stay in the side plank position. You can do this in kneeling position (see previous posts with Mermaids) or take the split stance (top leg goes on top and slightly forward). Feet are on their sides, not on their soles. Extend the free arm upwards, so your chest is open, then reach with your arm under your torso as far as you can, feel your shoulder blades opening as your back rounds, then return into the start position – open your chest and reach up.

Whether you are working off the knees or from the full plank – in your top position you are flat against the wall fully engaged, including legs and bum and reach underneath your torso as far as your can

Focus and control your body. Keeping your legs, bum and whole body tight, reach underneath your torso as far as your can.