What component of fitness is sit ups

With all the exercise options available today, simple sit-ups can seem outdated. But there’s a reason this classic exercise continually reappears in workouts — several reasons, actually! 

Why should you do sit-ups?

Sit-ups help you build a strong core to ward off injury, help with your posture, and boost your athletic performance. Here are seven reasons to incorporate sit-ups into your daily workout routine:

1. Build Muscular Endurance

Sit-ups train your abdominal muscles to engage for extended periods of time, contract against resistance, and lift weight. It is primarily an exercise for muscular endurance. 

Muscular endurance isn’t exactly the same as strength — it’s more about stability and support, less about power. Muscles that are associated with endurance activities are made up of slow-twitch fibers. 

Compared to fast-twitch muscles, which provide explosive power, slow-twitch muscles contain higher levels of oxygen-binding proteins and have greater access to blood supply. Training your slow-twitch muscles will improve your stamina, allowing you to push your body for longer periods of time.

That said, it’s impossible to fully separate endurance from strength. Sit-ups require engagement from high-twitch muscles as well, but that just means a more comprehensive workout for you.

2. Improve Your Posture

Sit-ups strengthen your core, which will pay dividends in your day-to-day life. For instance, the core strength you develop from regular sit-ups will help you develop a healthy posture. Good posture requires that the muscles around your spine be balanced and strong to provide equal support to your body — this state is known as “neutral spine position.” Good posture isn’t just attractive; it’s necessary for good health.

The benefits of good posture are:

1. Reduced lower back pain
2. Fewer tension headaches
3. Increased energy
4. Better neck and shoulder health
5. Lower risk of uneven wear on your joints
6. Increased lung capacity 
7. Improved circulation and digestion
8. Reduced jaw pain
9. Better form during your workouts

Sit-ups help condition your muscles to provide better support and enable a healthier posture.

3. Reduce Your Risk of Injury and Pain

Your core is your body’s shield against injuries; strengthening your core increases support to the rest of your body and reduces your risk of getting hurt. 

Strong and flexible trunk muscles have also been shown to improve recovery time. When compared to a historical control group, a group of firefighters that had undergone a core-training intervention showed a reduced tendency to injury by 42%. Lost time due to injuries decreased even further by 62%.

4. Exercise Multiple Areas of Your Body

Sit-ups are a fantastic choice for when you have limited time and need to be efficient with your workouts. 

Unlike crunches, which isolate your core, sit-ups work out multiple muscles, including:

• Abdominals
• Internal and external obliques
• Chest
• Lower back
• Hip flexors

Hip flexors tend to be particularly weak in comparison to their antagonist muscles, the gluteus maximus. However, they play a key role in stabilizing the pelvis and spine and safeguarding your lower back — so it’s a great idea to strengthen them with some sit-ups.

5. Burn Calories 

Because sit-ups target so many areas of your body, they burn calories at a much higher rate than comparable exercises do. The numbers vary according to age, sex, weight, and workout intensity. 

If you want to know specifically how many calories your sit-ups burn, you can use an online fitness calculator.

6. Improve Athletic Performance  

All athletes, from experts to beginners, can elevate their game by strengthening their core. 

Many movements in sports employ a kinetic chain of muscles. A well-developed core transfers energy and power more efficiently up the chain while protecting the body from injury.

As an example, a baseball player throwing a ball starts with their feet. This initial energy travels through the core before being transferred to the arm and, finally, to the ball. A weak core will result in an unimpressive throw or even an injury, as it won’t provide the proper support needed for the motion.

Solid core strength results in better:

• Balance 
• Stability
• Power
• Coordination

7. Modify the Sit-Up With Variations 

Whether you need to build up to sit-ups or challenge yourself with more demanding exercises, you can find a large number of sit-up variations. Changing things up will also help prevent boredom and burnout.

One way to make sit-ups more challenging is to perform them on a balance cushion or stability ball. You might also supplement your body weight with free weights or a medicine ball. Also try using an ab bench to perform sit-ups on an incline.

Proper Warm Up and Form

Before doing your sit-ups, limber up your abs, waist, back, and hips. This will ease the pressure on your spinal muscles and lower back, which help your hip flexors pull as you sit up.

Take your body through a series of slow, dynamic stretches that engage your full range of movement:

• Torso twists: Stand with your feet slightly more than shoulder-width apart and raise your arms to waist height, elbows bent. Twist your trunk, looking slowly over one shoulder. Come back to center and then twist in the other direction.
• Side bends: With your feet slightly shoulder-width apart, raise your arms and place your hands behind your head. Face forward and bend to the side, bringing one elbow towards the waist. Straighten your body and then bend the other way.
• Toe touches: With your feet shoulder-width apart, raise your arms straight up over head. Sweep down, bending forward at the waist as you bring your arms down to touch your toes. Bend your knees slightly as you rise up.

As with any exercise, make sure you perform sit-ups with the proper form to maximize results and prevent injury.

How to do a sit-up:

1. Lie on your back and have your knees bent pointing upward and your feet flat on the floor. Ideally, find something to keep your feet in place or ask a workout partner to hold your feet.
2. Either cross your arms, putting each hand on the opposite shoulder, or put your hands behind your head with your elbows pointing to the walls instead of curled inward and tugging on your neck.
3. Bend your hips and waist to raise your body and bring your chest toward your knees.
4. Lower your body all the way back down to the ground.

Sit-ups are an excellent exercise to build your body’s endurance and stability. Be sure to add them to your daily workout routine to reap the benefits. Also check out the LiveFit Blog for more great exercise tips and workout ideas:

For more tips on building your home fitness room, we recommend these articles: 6 Tips for the Perfect Fitness Room, The $100 Home Fitness Room, Getting a Gym Quality Workout at Home, Lower the Bar: Fitness for Real Beginners, The Top Five Reasons You Should Have a Home Gym, Get Fit in the Gym, Lose Weight in the Kitchen, 5 Tips to Stop Treadmill Static, It's Not About Getting Skinny, Ab's Aren't Just for Show.

And, when you're ready to talk about buying home exercise machines and equipment, ask your G&G Fitness Equipment store about special financing options like no money down and 0% interest plans for the best fitness equipment on the market with affordable monthly payments.

If you’re ready to take the next steps in your fitness journey, contact the fitness experts at G&G Fitness Equipment today or stop into a G&G Fitness Equipment showroom and let us show you why we are the best home fitness equipment retailer in the northeast.

Why Choose G&G Fitness Equipment

Home > Fitness Testing > Tests > Home Tests > Sit Up

Push-Up | Sit-Up | Squat | Step | Vertical Jump | Sit & Reach

Abdominal muscle strength and endurance is important for core stability and back support. This sit-up test measures the strength and endurance of the abdominals and hip-flexor muscles. How many sit-ups can you do in 1 minute? Count how many you can do in one minute and then check the chart below for your rating.

Starting Position: Lie on a carpeted or cushioned floor with your knees bent at approximately right angles, with feet flat on the ground. Your hands should be resting on your thighs. The feet are not anchored.

Technique: Squeeze your stomach, push your back flat and raise high enough for your hands to slide along your thighs to touch the tops of your knees. Don't pull with you neck or head and keep your lower back on the floor. Then return to the starting position.

How did you go?

Compare your results to the table below. Remember, these scores are based on doing the tests as described, and may not be accurate if the test is modified at all. Don't worry too much about how you rate - just try and improve your own score.

1 Minute sit-up test (Men)

1 Minute sit-up test (Women)

Source: adapted from Golding, et al. (1986). The Y's way to physical fitness (3rd ed.), pages 113-124.

Download your free copy of the Home Fitness Testing Manual — a guide for you to plan, conduct, analyze and interpret fitness testing at home.

• I am 13 years old, i can do 97 situps in 1 minute, is that good? (Adam, Dec 2021)
  
• I do roughly 150 sit ups a day and do 50 in each set. Sometimes I do more. When your stomach begins to hurt, take a deep breath and go again. Stay motivated! (Ella, Feb 2021)
• I am a female,11 and did 49 in 1 minute. A good tip is to take deep breaths when you can instead of taking multiple short breaths every time. (noname, Nov 2020)
• 66, female, 58 in a minute. My goal is 77, I believe i can do it. (Amy Bwecknell, 2013)
• male 15 years old got to 111 sit up (Ethan Meinders Amy Bwecknell,2018)
  • Veronica Kang Ethan Meinders (2020)
    That's awesome, but do you take a break between? When you are doing 111 sit ups?
• Brynne Muir (2013)
  29, female, 52 in a minute. My goal is 63.
• Svipper (2013)
  peeps with mega scores, don't mix sit-up and crucnh, they are absolutely different. Real sit up, full body raise, is way harder than crunch
  • Commodore665 svipper (2014)
    Exactly it's all technique
  • David Morgan svipper (2017)
    No, a full sit-up, whilst slower than a crunch, is much less useful and physically tiring ... only the middle 2/3 of a full sit up is useful as the very bottom and top of the sit up are using thigh not abdominal muscles... in order to get full gain from a sit up it should not be done to the very top
  • KJ svipper (2014)
    Full sit ups are generally considered to be really bad for your back and not really that helpful for functional movement anyway.
  • John KJ (2016)
    That is actually incorrect, people just don't know the proper technique. A sit up require some modicum of abdominal strength to prefor to begin with it is something that should be done in a paced manner without swinger your arms or using any thing but abdominal strain to pull yourself up and EASE yourself down, I did around 48 in one minute going slow and making sure my technique was correct. When done correctly it helps your back, seeing as your abdominals support your spine the most. Crunches work a different area of abdominal and are also a risk to your spine if done incorrectly. They are easier to preform at a quick pace so most prefer crunches over sit ups when I fact they are two completely different workouts working two different areas of your abdominals, I recommend doing both.
• David Bilbo (2013) Wow... I must be super excellent. I got 63 in one minute, and I stopped at the last 5 seconds. I knew a kid who could do 75+
  • Svipper David Bilbo (2013)
    Crunch or sit-up?
• The Knuckeldredger David Bilbo (2016)
  I have a friend who did 81 this year for our physical ed fitness testing. He's a freshman.
• Chanel The Knuckeldredger (2019)
  i am in year 10 and i got about 49-60 throughout the years and yes crunch is harder than sit ups as your cores are more engaged
• Hammad (2014)
  14 year old male, 60 push-ups
  • Ben Hammad (2015)
    52 same age (sit ups)
• Konstanze Pahalage fantny (2017)
  yea the world record is 139
• Someone? fantny (2016)
  ya, okay bud I'm sure you can do 150 when you're 9. I'm only a 12 year old male too and only did 46...
• LOL (2013)
  16 Year Old Male , I got 53 in a minute
• ShaniThePenguin LOL (2015)
  12 year old female, 54
• Ryan ShaniThePenguin (2016)
  There's no way you can do that many. I'm 15 years old, male, and can only 48
• Grace Blakely Ryan (2016)
  I'm 14 and female and i can do 60 in a minute
• Evelyn Ryan (2016)
  lol I know a female in my Njrotc program that can do 200, And that was our freshman year
• Dexiant Evelyn (2018)
  So she did 33% more situps than the world record? Wow, impressive -_-
• Tony (2014)
  32 male, beside having a daily workout routine I often do 100 push-ups most nights about 30-60 minutes before bed, to help exhaust the remaining energy from the day, last night I timed myself for the fist time and accomplished 100 in 57 Seconds (full push-ups: meaning all the way up until arms are straight to all the way down, when chest touches the ground and/or elbows are bend past 90 degrees and knees are straight and not bent or touching the floor)
• Gil (2014)
  the world record of situps for one min. belong to Gil Newton who done 139 situps in 1 min.all was record by video cammera ,another jym trainer with clicker,and another 3 gym trainers as a widness
• Kelsey ainsly harriet (2015)
  The most ever done was 139 lmao
• Alexis French (2020)
  so i am a 17 year old girl and i could only do 12 sit-ups in a minute..... what should i do to become better?
• JD (2020)
  I am female and only 13 years old and got to 203 sit ups.
• JD (2020)
  I am female and only 13 years old and I did 203 sit ups.
• Autumn (2020)
  I am 13 when I was younger I used to do 40 sit ups every night I think I will start doing that again so I can get back to doing 80 in a minute.
• Nizza (2019)
  Im 12 years old female and i did 40 sit ups in one minute. My goal is 45 sit ups in one minute!
• Maddy (2019)
  I'm 14 female just did 158 push-ups and 176 sit ups but mom and dad are both marines!
• Ramiresu Migeru (2017)
  I remember a couple years back I did nearly 100 in a minute I will make it happen again male 17
• Michael12321 (2016)
  I'm 13 years old and I did 203 sit-ups at once at a boy scout meeting once, all perfect form, spot checked by 3 adults. Is this too far above average? (took about 4 minutes)
• Bethy (2016) 14 yrs 73 in a minute

  (I'm doing pe as a gcse)

• Elle (2016)
  I'm a 16 year old female and I did 45 :) Very proud of myself
• Hailee Low (2016)
  I am a 13 year old girl and can do 50 in under a minute..my next goal is 60
• Link (2016)
  I'm 11female and I did 45 sit ups in 1 min. I want to get 60 in 1 minute
• Evelyn (Nick) (2015)
  15, female 90 in a min. My goal is 100.. don't feel bad i'm in military training :) before this I can only do 60
• Sacrwegf (2015) 13 year old girl, 71 in a minute
  • Ryan sacrwegf (2016)
    You must be lying. You can't possibly do that many.
• ShaniThePenguin Claire Hiddleston (2015)
  Not at all, you saw the average for people under 18 and it was 25. That's actually pretty good
• Alex (2015)
  13yr old male 55 in 1 minute
• Andreas (2015)
  Almost 27 year old guy here, did 31 reps in 1min. So barely average but hopefully I will improve in the future!
• Liamcorden123 (2015)
  I do running a lot as well and have fruit and I alwys go for a run every morning to make be feel a lot better
• Liamcorden123 (2015)
  do press ups and that always works for me and make me me a lot fitter
• Randomness132145 (2015)
  I'm 13 year old male and I got 41 sit ups in 60 sec. My age group is not in the charts above so I was wondering is that good or bad?y names Jacob by the way not randomness132145
• Chris Cooper (2015)
  19 year old male no prior working out whatsoever besides a push-up test, did 30 in about 55 seconds.
• Amira (2015)
  I'm 14 and can do about 28 in a minute
• AB (2015) 37 sit-ups in a minute (not crunches), goal is 50 in a minute

  35 push ups in a minute (normal, not on my knees), goal 50 in a minute

• Ai (2014)
  when I was little (8-10), I did 80 consecutives..
• Samy nany (2014)
  84,female. I want to know how can I increase my crunches count ,my current score is only 78 a minute.
• Ronald (2014) Can you put your feet under a couch?
  • Rob Admin ronald (2014)
    The norm table above is based on not holding the feet down, but that does not stop you from doing the test this way and monitoring your improvement based on that technique. Just don't expect the table to accurately rate your result.
• Suprised (2014)
  21, male, 26 in a minute, my goal is 30. At least I have a six-pack.
• Sqt (2013)
  I haven't exercised in awhile due to some health issues. So I'm happy with 33 a minute sit-ups (44 years old). These are full sit-ups btw, not crunches.
• 22, female, 50 full sit ups (entire top half of body off floor) in 58 seconds. Why does this website call crunches, sit ups. (Siobhan, 2014)