Although I am not a big fan of sit ups and crunches in the first place, people are still going to do them.

We can’t help it.  We’ve been socially conditioned to associate 6 pack abs with doing hundreds of sit ups.  You can thank the media for that one.

Today I thought I’d just bring light to a subject I’ve had a client inquire about lately; working out first thing in the morning.  The conversation started something like this…

Client:  I figured I would wake up 5 minutes early everyday from now on and do 100 sit ups.  That would make an extra 700 a week, 2800 a month etc, etc.

The problem here; upon waking up we have excess fluid accumulation of our vertebral discs during the night’s sleep.  This would create extra stiffness of the spine and also result in extra compression during movements requiring the spine to bend and move.  Not only sit ups and crunches would be a bad idea, but most exercise would not be recommended.

The solution: try not to work out until you’ve been up and about for at least an hour.  Drink your coffee, have breakfast, go for a walk, do some work.

Is the extra 36,500 sit ups a year really worth doing damage to the spine.  I don’t think so.

PS Lay off the sit ups and crunches and do some more reading on The Buff Geek.