Creating The Perfect Ab Roller Exercise Routine 

man with strong abdominal muscles posing with one arm held up in a dark gym

When you incorporate an effective ab roller workout routine into your daily or weekly exercise, you’ll see incredible benefits. Ab rollers can help you improve your mobility, improve your posture and balance, and improve your overall strength. 

If you have back pain or weak joints, don’t let that stop you. Ab Rollers are ergonomically designed to prevent wrist strain, so you’re not barred from these exercises. Beginners and experts alike can benefit from ab roller exercises!

Here are some tips for how to create intense ab roller exercises for the best core workout routine at home.

Benefits of Ab Roller Exercises

When you’re creating a core workout routine at home, it’s easy to neglect one of your core muscles. Most ab exercises target specific muscles—like Russian twists for the obliques or sit-ups for the lower abs. When you try to create your own routine, you often end up either doubling up exercises for a muscle or undertraining another muscle. Balancing training across all muscles is very hard to come by without an all-in-one exercise.

The primary benefit of ab roller workout routines is that they target every muscle of your core at once, including the frontal abs, lower back, and obliques. Ab roller exercises allow you to hone in on every muscle throughout the extension, accelerating your core training process and ensuring you’re training your entire core evenly. 

In addition to the core benefits, ab rollers also help develop shoulder stability and upper back strength if you’re balancing correctly. It’s no wonder they’re so touted among bodybuilders and fitness experts!

How To Roll Out Progressively

Like any exercise, you need to make sure you keep the correct form. 

A common mistake first-time ab roller users make is overextension. You might assume that to make an ab roller exercise harder, you need to roll out as far as possible as much as you can. This is a misconception: if you’re rolling out further than you’re capable of, you risk an increase in back pain or wrist strain. 

Another common mistake is weight imbalance. Naturally, an exercise that trains your entire core isn’t going to be easy, but some first-time ab roller users compensate by transferring too much force on their wrists or upper arms. 

Here’s how to avoid this pitfall:

  • Make sure your glutes and abs are constantly engaged.
  • Don’t lock your arms.
  • Use an ab roller wheel with forearm supports.

If you’re just starting out, start with a steady ab wheel rollout progression. Make sure you keep the following in mind throughout your exercise:

  • Do not let your butt sag or your hips twist.
  • Do not flex your knees past 90 degrees.
  • Exhale rolling forwards, and inhale rolling back.
  • Keep your head parallel to the ground.

Read this excellent demonstrative article from Men’s Health to observe how you can progress from a bench rollout, to a kneeling rollout, to the classic floor rollout. As physical therapist Jeff Cavaliere, C.S.C.S., says, “The best part about this exercise is once you feel it done right you’ll know immediately because it’s much harder!”

He’s right: when you’re doing an ab roller exercise correctly, the intensity skyrockets right away. You should feel it throughout your entire core, along with some good stabilizing tension across your shoulders, hips, and upper back.

Why Choose Ab Rollers?

Ab Rollers are perfect for a convenient core workout routine at home. The ease of balance makes them especially friendly towards beginners. If your core is weak, using a flimsy ab roller could cause you to slip and fall. Our extra-wide wheel and specialized rubber material makes it easy for you to keep your balance during all ab roller exercises. The added support of the armrests makes it even easier to control your rollout and progress naturally.
Not only are they designed with safety and intensity in mind, but they’re also lightweight and portable. It’s easy to assemble and disassemble these rollers wherever you go, so you can take your core workout routine home, in the gym, or in a small studio.