You could always go the Mariah Carey route (hint: it involves an airbrush, several colors of spray tan, and a drastic underestimation of the observational abilities of the general public.)
Sit-ups: they’re the one exercise everyone has tried. Mostly because you can’t help it. Even as a baby it was one of the first things you learned – right after how to spit-up. You want to get out of bed in the morning? You sit up.
But these days sit-ups have gone from blase to being a raging topic of debate in the fitness world. They’re either the yellow brick road to brick-hard abs or they’re evil incarnate and not only are pointless (“you have to lose the fat first!!”) but may even be counterproductive by building – and I’m using the technical phrase here – pokey outey muscles. Madonna and Gwyneth Paltrow are reportedly in the former camp, regularly clocking hundreds of abs, sans roller, a day. Britney Spears once bragged of doing 1,000 sit-ups a day to stay in Toxic snake-dancing form. In the other camp you have Angie Harmon who boasts of never intentionally sitting up unless she has an actual reason to do so, such as getting out of bed for a bikini shoot. Right along with her is Abtastic Spice Geri Haliwell who says her Bond girl stomach comes from eschewing abs and sticking with dog walking and yoga. I’ve yet to hear anyone, celeb or otherwise, say “Sit-ups? Meh. I do a few here and there. They’re all right.”
Regardless of which side of the ab spectrum you fall, there is a serious side effect to sit-ups that you should know about. (If I worked for Self or Vogue right now I’d be all “The Disastrous Exercise You ARE Doing That May Be RUINING YOUR HEALTH! Search madly for our non-existent table of contents to find this article before the grocery checker gets to your order or you WILL DIE!” Ahem.) Two friends, who shall remain nameless for reasons soon to become apparent, both came down with the same, um, medical condition. And they both got it from doing sit-ups.
Problems of the Butt
The official term is “posterior ulcer.” I call it blistered badonkadonk. Basically it happens when you do sit-ups in such a way as to rub all the skin off your tail bone. As painful as a carpet burn and as embarrassing as a bed sore, these ulcers can take months to fully heal. Knock on formica, I’ve never had this issue but it is hard to ignore when two super-fit girls in my life both did this to themselves in the same week.
I giggled. A lot. But it really isn’t funny (stop laughing!). These ladies both now have problems with anything that requires just basic sitting, even with out the -upping. In addition to experiencing serious ridicule from their friends and loved ones, they’ve had to put up with tons of invasive questions from me. True story: had a 20-minute convo on the treadmill about one friend’s blister. Nothings says “run on the free hand sanitizer” like oozing fluid talk on the tready!
So What To Do?
Both friends would like to maintain their lovely flat tummies and so were asking my advice as to what kinds of ab work they could do that didn’t involve leveraging off their broken butts. While I came up with hanging leg raises, the Roman chair and various Pilates moves, Women’s Health Magazine did me one better:
Called “the craziest ab move ever invented,” the Wicked Wiper is supposed to be the best ab exercise out there. In fact, it’s so crazy your average fitness model can’t do it! If you read that last paragraph on the picture (click to enlarge) you’ll find:
Full disclosure: As for the ripped gal in our photos? Not even she could do it! We used photoshop magic to erase the dude holding her up.
I gotta say I was wondering how she was managing to smile while doing such a stunt. How’s that for truth in advertising?
So there you go – if you break your butt, you’ve always got the Wicked Wiper to keep you in shape. Or you could just ask Angie Harmon’s mom to please birth you.
But where does one go about finding a large bar to dangle from in order to attempt a Wicked Wiper? Which sounds more like a cocktail than an exercise anyway?
I’d like to break the mould here and say “Sit-ups? Meh. I do a few here and there. They’re all right.”
Honest!
TA x
blistered badonkadonk.
I LOVE IT.
I never knew there really was a reason out there I could seize for doing nary a sit up in my workout routine…
IMO they’re a waste of time…
M.
Charlotte, I have never read a more entertaining post about sit-ups, let alone blistered badonkadonks.
I thought I was the only one whose tailbone got chafed by sit-ups! However, when things hurt I STOP, so it never became a chronic blister problem.
I still do a sit-up like move (one of my own invention that involves lifting my legs too and twisting to opposite sides and… well never mind, it’s weird). But I’ve discovered that doing it on a padded weight bench instead of the floor takes care of the posterior chafing.
The serious weightlifter folks do NOT like me hogging a bench just for my abs, but screw ’em.
My husband has that problem every time he has to do a PT test. He heals pretty fast though.
I’m on the side of the sit up, though. I like them and find them to be a good move, but they aren’t comprehensive. You’ve gotta throw in some other moves to cover the obliques and lower abs.
Okay, if the fitness model can’t do the move, why show it to us? I can just see someone trying it and falling on their head. Then suing the mag for giving them the idea in the first place!
Thought it was just my BIG blistered badonkadonk! We have to do 120 in KB class. I just try not to go back as far and keep it a contracted crunch.
Too funny… thanks for the post.
I’m a little peeved about the “full disclosure” thing – how are normal mortals meant to do an exercise without a dude to hold us up?
But yeah, glad to hear I’m not the only one whose tailbone shudders at the thought of situps. 🙂
I don’t know why the model struggled – I can do the Wiper quite easily…sometimes I challenge myself by doing it one-handed.
I have to say, I used to do endless crunches on the ball but when I hurt my neck, I had to stop anything of the sort. Now, 8 weeks later, the only ab move I can do involves lying down, contracting my lower abs and lifting one bent leg (90 degree angel) a few inches off the floor at a time – it’s a stabilizing PT move. And guess what? My abs love the exact same as they did two months ago. Literally, zero difference. I happene to really like my tummy and am frankly astounded that it hasn’t dissolved into a pile of oatmeal without crunches. I wonder if this means I have a naturally toned tummy or if my nomal routine is simply sufficient and I wasted hours and hours and hours doing crunches. The latter makes me sad – that’s a lot of bad reality TV I could’ve been watching.
Yea right! Ur probably fat.
How did I miss that business about Mariah Carey. Seriously, does she not have a mirror?
I hate situps. Don’t do them. Fortunately, I was blessed with a flat stomache, so I look like I do situps when all I really do is think about my posture and tighten my tummy muscles often. It really helps, and is not mind numbingly boring like sit ups. 🙂
Ha ah, “blistered badonkadonk” I totally think you should copyright that! I can’t imagine how bad that must feel. Yikes. I skip the sit ups and get my core work with kickboxing and kettlebells. I bet there is a flat stomach under all my fat! Heh. Great post.
I’ve done crunches, V-ups, and high incline ab exercises for years! For a while now, I’ve been doing this and it seems like a decent ab exercise. I sit on a bench, lift myself up by my arms, and while balanced on my hands, I raise my knees up and down, maybe 60-80 times both to the front and both sides. Try it and tell me what you think!
I haven’t done full sit-ups since those tests they made us take in high school. For group fitness certification, they started out telling us to do crunches instead (full sit-ups hurt my back), and now they’re saying that basic crunches aren’t as effective.
http://exercise.about.com/od/abs/ss/abexercises.htm
Basically, I feel like if someone can do 1000 situps/crunches in a day, they’re seriously doing the wrong exercise. That’s just an example to me of how ineffective they are. Most effective are bicycle crunches, roman chair, crunches on the ball, and planks.
Your friends would be able to do any kind of plank, and possibly the roman chair, depending on where the back of the machine hits them.
I teach a boot camp class twice a week in which every weight station is 2 minutes. And no matter what ab exercise I do, whether it’s holding a plank, doing ball crunches or bicycles, they normally start dying and taking breaks after about a minute. So I feel like that’s a more effective exercise than the ones where you can do 100 or 1000 with no problem whatsoever.
And I love the blistered badonkadonk. That’s so hilarious!
Yeah, I think I’ll pass on attempting the move that even the magazine fitness model can’t do. Thanks! What’s the point of that?
On my birthday, our neighbors had a garage sale and my husband bought me a workout tower (I don’t know what they are called) where you can do pull-ups, captain’s chair, and such. I know, I know, how romantic – just what I always dreamed I’d get as I turned 30! – but I’d been wanting one.
I’ve found that captain’s chair and exercises on this work really well, and work more than one part at a time. Plus, planks and stuff. Sit-ups? I’ll pass. No blistered butt for me, at least not without having some fun getting it!
Dear Geri Halliwell,
It really annoys me to no end when people who clearly exercise quite a bit to earn their beautiful physique go around saying things like “Oh, I do nothing ya know!”. While skinny sometimes just happens for some women, toned beautiful musculature does not. So quit it.
As for the ab exercise in the magazine. You can do a number of ab exercises while hanging in this fashion that are much easier than the one pictured, and still hit your abs like nobody’s business (and no bum bruising too!)
Dear magazine,
If you are going to feature an exercise that even your fitness model cannot perform without being held by a third party, could you please re-think your choice and go with something more… achievable? realistic? Ya know… DOABLE!
The Ab Wheel – $5 Ebay investment that will only teach you to appreciate pain and suffering.
That “full disclosure” bit is too funny. And ouch those ulcers have got to hurt! I LOVE abs workouts but my problem is that the two bones right above my butt get scraped- so now I’ve got the thickest pilates mat I could find to keep my bum nice and cushy.
Laughing my *you know what* off! You are so funny!
I really enjoy full sit ups when they don’t hurt. I feel like they give me the biggest bang for my buck. Planks hurt my knees. And crunches don’t do anything for me.
I’m just going to have to make sure to use a nice cushy mat that will cradle my delicate behind!!
I have an ab wheel but don’t use it much. It does really hit the abs, but if I don’t pay really close attention, I also end up hurting my lower back.
Gretchen, have you ever tried planks on your toes? They kick my abs like crazy, especially holding them for a while. I don’t much like doing them on my knees, but I do do pushups on my knees sometimes, just because my chest muscles aren’t as developed as my abs and I can only do about 12-15 pushups without taking a quick break.
LG, thanks for that link, I’m going to try out some of the ones I don’t normally do this week. I usually rotate between straight arm crunches, side crunches, bicycles, double leg raises (I don’t know the real term, but you lie on the floor and bring both legs above your head without moving anything else), supermans, and planks. Looking forward to killing myself with something new!
And I remember my old gymnastics days doing those wipers. I’m pretty sure we had someone lightly spotting us so we didn’t fall over though. =)
wipers look crazy.
i’m glad i never have gotten a blistered butt.
that is all.
oh, and part of me thinks that no amount of cardio will take away the bit of belly fat i have to let my core muscles shine through. boo.
I think my stomach is finally starting to look a little defined again after my last baby- and he’s over 1!
I don’t do traditional sit ups often. Usually I lay on my back and raise my legs, then I bend my knees to one side (then the other) and do sit ups that way. My back hasn’t ever even felt sore.
I’d like to try the wiper, but I’m not sure where I’d find a bar to do it on….
Well that’s that. I’m never doing a sit-up again. THANK YOU for that. 😉
And yes, plenty of torturous options to choose from instead. I even used to own a Denise Austin vid that did standing crunches. You really had to focus and squeeze, and you didn’t get as much as a “burn” but you didn’t get a blistered badonkadonk.
I just have to delurk because oh my stars and garters. That Mariah Carey thing is about the most enjoyable thing I’ve read all day.
And also, Judy, it’s called a power tower. I only know this (my gym friend and I used to call the roman chair “the fun machine”) because my husband pestered me forever until I finally agreed to let him buy one. Though the fact that I remember the name probably has more to do with the fact that it reminds me of the Backyardigans episode “Race to the Tower of Power,” and that is what I have renamed the contraption. And yes, I sing the songs to dh whenever he’s using it. I’m just helpful like that.
Charlotte, looove your blog.
I’m in the “I hate sit-ups” camp. Did them in gym class, and despised them. Moved on to crunches. Those didn’t really do it for me, either. Pilates? Now THAT makes my abs and back strong! I can do things now that I could never do before, and I haven’t had any back pain since I started Pilates. (OK, except for when my kids kick me in the back. Or head-butt. But that’s a different story altogether.)
LOVE this post!!!! And I hope your friends’ backsides heal quickly!
“You could always go the Mariah Carey route “
And sad part is she doesn’t have to. She doesn’t need to look like she has abs to look good.
Sorry, I had to laugh at the blistered badonkadonk 🙂
It’s always a good idea to change things up. So if you always do situps, maybe you should give something else a try. If you never do situps, maybe you should give them a try for maybe a month or so.
There are a zillion different ab exercises, so it should be easy to change things up often.
Those wipers look ridiculous, I can barely do hanging leg raises for more than a couple of reps.
I’m going to pass on the wiper and save my bar hanging to any and all attempts to do more than one chin-up in a workout session. 😀
Let me clarify…it hurts my knees to do planks on my toes! I try locking the knees, I try unlocking the knees – either way it still hurts. I like planks but just can’t do them often!
When i got my copy of Women’s Health, i laughed at that “full disclosure” bit. And I, like others, wondered why it was even in the magazine if the fitness model couldn’t do it.
Hey! I’m ALMOST back on the internet. Actually I’m probably still 2 weeks away from stopping the travels and setting into a home — renting a little house in Wichita Falls.
The CF Games ’bout killed me. It was really, really bad. The future looks really bright, though.
Ah yes, why I’m commenting — I’ve had these rug burns quite badly from doing sit-ups. So has my wife. Ugh.
I’ve done the ‘wicked wiper’ as well.
My favorite ab method involves a special piece of equipment — and I’ve forgotten the name, but they’re two soft loops of padded cloth hanging from a bar, for some reason I want to call them “harnesses” right now. They’re only big enough to grip the top of and the loops fall under your elbow, so you hang on the back of your upper arm.
Thus you do knees-to-chest, knees-to-elbows, straight-leg raises, and yes ‘wicked wipers’.
I also think the trampoline (the big, dangerous ones on which you try to bounce your friends to the moon) is a sadly neglected fitness tool, and should be a favorite core workout.
Hope we get a chance to catch up soon!
I used to have the same problem; still do on some PT tests. But I solved it in training by taking the situp vertical. Hook your knees around a tree branch, punching bag, or pullup bar, and you’re good to go.
Brendan
Thanks for the tip, Brendan! I love hanging abs!
I do sit-ups every morning. How do you avoid a blistered badonkadonk? Get a stability ball. Not only will your ass thank you, but your abs will get a much better work out, and you are less likely in injure your back and neck. Plus it's squishy!!
Pingback:Answered: All of Your Questions About Abs! [I'll tell you my favorite move if you tell me yours!]
Pingback:Answered: All of Your Questions About Abs! [I'll tell you my favorite move if you tell me yours!] | Elite Daily Diet and Fitness
If you get the soar,use an alcohor pad press on the wound, it is paniful but soar will go off in a few days. doing so basically burn the skin. anything burnt is dead. anything dead has no feelings.
Hi there to every single one, it’s really a fastidious for me to pay a quick visit this web page, it contains helpful Information.
I did about 100 sit ups and haven’t worked out in a long time my stomach has been sore for 4 days is that normal and approximately how long until I feel no pain
Google brought me here for the comment above mine. Never work out, decided to do sit-ups. Did 5sets of 10 back to back and have had tearing burning paid in lower abs for five days.
Normal or oh my god what have I done??
🙂