Cranks - A Brutal Abdominal Exercise

[Coach Sommer]

What if I told you that there is a fantastic exercise that will fry your abs, back and shoulders in only one repetition? There is and it is called "The Crank".

For the vast majority of people, the crank will be far too difficult to even attempt, let alone train consistently. There are however, several ways to progressively develope enough strength to be able to tackle the full-fledged crank successfully.

1) Begin from a hang on a bar with your legs pulled up into a tuck L. From here, extend your body forward until you are in a tucked front lever position. Now, with straight arms and keeping your hips flat (not piked) pull upside down with to an inverted hang. This is half a repetition. To complete the second half, simply reverse the movement until you are back where you started in the tucked L hang.

2) The next step is to complete the movement with one leg tucked and the other leg extended out straight. Be sure to strive to get completely open and extend the hip of the straight leg. After completing one full rep, be sure to switch legs and do one more to balance out your ab and hip development.

3) The third progression is to perform the exercise with the legs straddled. The wider the straddle the easier the exercise is. As your strength improves, gradually narrow the straddle of your legs.

4) Now the time has come to perform the movement with legs together, but with the hips somewhat piked. Over time, strive to gradually lessen the degree of pike in your hips.

5) Finally we arrive at the full-fledged crank. The primary difference between the regular version and progression #4 is that while following all of the above performance caveats there will be no pike in the hips; none whatsoever.

To increase the difficulty of this version, try to perform the repetition as slowly as possible rather than adding repetitions at a faster speed. The stronger you are, the slower you will be able to move.

6) For those among you who are super human, perform the crank with extra weight on the ankles.

I had some of my advanced athletes experiment with the "crank" on the day that I first discovered it. They loved it. The most that they could do was three reps. This from athletes that can do weighted straight leg lifts with up to 10lbs hanging on their ankles.

We also did a reverse version of the crank; from an inverted pike (on straight bar or rings) extend out to a back lever pull to inverted hang and than reverse the process. Not too hard by itself until we added the "as slowly as possible" part. Ouch!

The progressions for the crank will work equally as well for building up to the reverse crank.

Yours in Fitness,
Coach Sommer

[Paul]

Great exercise Coach. I tried progression number 1 and thought that was easy. Then I tried progression 2 with one leg straight and that's when I see what a killer it is. Did a slow pull from hang to 1 legged front lever which was ok but I sort of got stuck at that point. The pull from the front lever to inverted hang requires a lot of strength to do it slowly. I guess negatives only would work or is it best to stick with progrssion 1, or do both? Already doing the back lever version so both together will be a good upper body workout.

Paul.

[ed x]

i'm a little confused . just with the last variation or the real thing i guess do you start in an L-sit, raise your body and lower your legs similitaniously (i'm a bad speller) ending up in a full front lever then pull straight body to inverted?

also i'm sure this helps your front levers and probably leg lifts but how well? do you think it would be all right to substitute this one day for front lever progressions?

[serotonin]

I didnt understand crearly the exercise.
Is this the same as Jason Ingram talked in another thread and he called Pull to Inverted Hang Progression?

http://gymnasticbodies.com/forum/viewto ... highlight=

Here is a video of what he was talking, he also has pictures in his blog.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jfGAtWLXoYQ

[Coach Sommer]

No, the two are distinctly different movements.

The pull to inverted hang is just that; a pull or swing up to an inverted hang. The crank begins from a hanging L-sit variation, then extends from the L-sit out to a front lever variation and finally pulls up to an inverted hang. The extension from the L-sit to the front lever is what makes the crank substantially more challenging than the pull to inverted hang.

Yours in Fitness,
Coach Sommer

[serotonin]

Thank you, now i understand, when i was reading your first post i was thinking all the time in the pull to inverted hang so i didnt realize how it was performed the crank.

it's incredible how little changes can make something different. Ive been doing front levers for some time and i never thought in this variation.

[pistol33]

Could you post a video of the crank variations?

[Chiflado]

I tried the crank yesterday (at least I think I did not sure if I did it right... did the first variation... also tried going from hanging L and then tucking up int tucked front lever.) I really feel it in my shoulders today. Could you post a video of it so I can see if I'm doing it right?

Thanks!

[Coach Sommer]

Above is a video clip of the Crank. The video demonstration is correct in general terms; although the athlete could have had better extention on his last couple of repetitions.

As a side note, the reduced price on the best selling Xtreme Rings used in the video continues.

Yours in Fitness,
Coach Sommer

[serotonin]

Great video!!! It seems very intense exercise. I also like a lot the training of the gymnast of the background doing some kind of straddle handstand press to planche to L sit.

[kbryk]

I tried the crank today, it's a hell of a work out, the only real problem I'm facing now is sticking the front lever, and pulling up to inverted straight/hollow body.

[Paul]

When this exercise was first posted I could only manage the first progression. I've stuck with them a couple of times per week and I'm now doing the second progression which is the 1 legged L-hang and pulling to the 1 legged front lever and then pulling from that to the inverted hang. In the same rep when I reach the inverted hang I continue over to a 1 legged back lever for a 5-10 second hold and then drop down into the bottom of a skin the cat hold. Then with one leg still extended I pull back to the back lever, hold it and then go back to 1 legged front lever and slowly return to the starting positon. I couldn't manage the transitions between any of that a month ago although I could hold the individual moves. I only train at home and the ideas on this site have really brought me on with my strength.

Paul.

[MatthewM]

What is the athlete on the rings in the back doing? Where he is quickly going from a tuck front lever to a full front lever.

Thanks,
Matt

[Erik]

A question about the grip I see in this exercise (and many others on the rings); the athlete is using a false grip for the entire duration, is this something that we should be focusing on as well, or would simply holding onto the rings be sufficient?
(I realize that that may be something done to get yourself used to the false grip (something I sorely need to do), like doing pull ups/dips with an (straddle) L helps your hip flexors...unless I'm wrong about that too >.<)

[Blairbob]

Just simply hold on to the rings. I don't know exactly why he is using a false grip.