V-Ups Exercise: Strengthening the Core

Nov 26, 2012

V-Ups Exercise

The V-Ups exercise is a total core working movement. It is also known as the Jackknife or Pike Crunch exercise. The V-ups exercise is a more advanced form of most ab workouts. This challenges your core, abs, back, and flexibility.

You want to try to touch your toes in the V-Ups exercise. If you can’t, that’s OK, but a sign you want to stretch more to gain flexibility. Here are the health diagnostics for V-ups exercise:

Main Muscle Used: Abs
Secondary Muscles: Obliques, Quads
Equipment Required: None
Movement: Isolated
Exercise Type: Push

Here’s a video explanation of the V-Ups Exercise. With this trainer, you touch your toes before each V-Up exercise:

Here’s a video explanation of the V-Ups exercise, which shows a few different variations of the traditional V Ups exercise:

To do the V-Ups Exercise:

Lie down on a flat surface or mat.
Start with your legs straight, then come up.
Touch your toes, and then let your torso fall back down
Bring your legs up into the air, touching your toes again.

Popular V-Ups Exercise Workouts:

The Jessica Alba workout uses V-ups exercises doing her abs routine. Using the 3-2-1 workout, she does this exercise 3 times a week.
The Patrick Willis workout uses the V-ups exercise. He says that core strength is crucial to his success in the NFL.
The Zac Efron workout uses V-ups exercises doing his 3-2-1 workouts.
The Ab workouts for women shows you how to do a variation called V Sits. Here, you keep your hands behind your back. Then, you perform the exercise with your legs constantly off the ground.
The crew of 300, as seen in the Gerard Butler workout, used this exercise.
Brad Pitt Workout for Troy used this workout to focus on his core.
Pink uses this core workout to get in shape for her singing tours.
Demi Moore worked her abs, lower back and butt with this workout for “G.I. Jane” and “Striptease.”
The Sexy Abs Workout Video: 15 Minutes to Bikini Abs uses One-handed V-Ups to work the obliques. You start with one hand going cr0ss-body, then switch to the other hand.
Leonardo DiCaprio worked with Gregory Joujon-Roche for “Departed”.
Tobey McGuire used this routine for Spiderman.
Michael C. Hall (Dexter) used this abs routine to get in shape for his role as Dexter.
The Jay-Z workout and Beyonce workout both use V-ups in their workout routines with trainer Marco Borges.

V-Ups Trainer Advice

The V-Ups trainer advice from celebrity trainer, Marco Borges, is simple. Marco Borges says:

Imagine you are balancing your body on your glutes as you touch your toes and fingers.

Another illustration of the V Ups exercise:

It’s also good to keep your legs straight, to keep your core tight. Slowly lower your legs and arms to starting position. Then, toes to your fingers, while keeping your legs straight.