Written by There is a time and a place for getting your abs and cardio in but a lot of people don’t know when this time is. Should I do my cardio before my weight training? Should I do abs at the end of the workout or before? These are two very common questions that fitness specialists are asked all the time. The truth is very simple and there is solid research that supports this along with a bit of common sense.
“Short on time? Always find yourself skipping out on the cardio and core work? Just do it first before you do anything else”…..WRONG
Cardio: There is a difference between conditioning style workouts and strict weight lifting. Conditioning usually has some kind of cardio style structure to it along with muscle endurance. When you’re talking about strict weight lifting, you DO NOT want to do a full on cardio session before yout start. A 5-10 minute warm up is fine but a full out cardio session has the potential to do more damage then good.
Why not before? Pre-fatigue. Surprisingly there are a lot of heavy lifters who don’t understand what this means. Doing cardio before a lifting session taxes your nervous system as well as your physical muscles themselves. Therefore when the athlete starts his weight lifting program his body is already exhausted and unable to perform at his/her peak. There are a lot of obvious reasons why this would be a bad idea.
- Lack of Mental Awareness.
- Lack the Muscle strength to lift his/her usually weight.
- Lack of core stability (due to fatigue) to do serious power or Olympic lifts.
- Pre-fatigued nervous system
Basically you want to be fresh when you step into any weight room. If you’re really trying to pack on size and strength your muscles need as much energy and growth hormones they can get in order to grow. Depleting the possibility of getting a true maximal effort because you’re too tired to do anything heavy will not help you grow.
Abdominals: Why would you want to wear your core out before you lift any serious weight? Your core is one of the main focus points with anything from standing bicep curls to dead lifts. No matter what you do, you use your core. Save the core isolation for after your lifting session. A stronger well rested core means stronger lifts. Exercises like dead lifts, squats, and military press are just a few of the major movements that require a solid core.
Save your energy for the lifts and train the abs later. Just like anything else you gotta make it a priority. It’s not a lack of time that your not getting your core workout in. Do your main core work on your off day or after your workouts if you have time. Remember, you don’t have to be in a gym to get them in!
Get after it,
William
