The hanging leg raise is a powerful exercise for building core strength, but doing it correctly requires precise form and focus.
To perform a hanging leg raise properly, use an overhand grip on the bar, keep your core tight, and slowly lift your legs without using momentum to ensure your abs are doing the work—keep reading for a detailed, step-by-step guide to mastering this exercise.
Setting Up Properly: The Importance of the Starting Position
The starting position for the hanging leg raise is foundational to executing the exercise effectively and safely.
Without a proper setup, it’s easy to compromise form, which not only decreases the exercise’s effectiveness but also raises the risk of injury.
Grip Setup
The grip you use is the first crucial step in setting up for hanging leg raises.
An overhand grip, where your palms face away from you, is preferred over an underhand grip for several reasons.
An overhand grip minimizes unwanted swinging, providing greater control over the movement.
This is essential for a core-focused exercise like hanging leg raises because it helps you stay stable and maintain proper alignment throughout each rep.
With an underhand grip, there's a higher likelihood of swinging, which shifts focus away from the core and makes it challenging to control the movement effectively.
Additionally, an overhand grip places less strain on the wrists and elbows, allowing you to maintain a strong hold longer without discomfort.
Grip strength is also a key factor when performing hanging leg raises.
Since your entire body weight is supported by your grip, weak forearm muscles can become the limiting factor.
To build grip strength and improve your performance, consider incorporating exercises like farmer’s carries, dead hangs, and wrist curls into your training routine.
Regular practice will strengthen your forearm flexors, allowing you to focus on core engagement rather than worrying about slipping from the bar.
Chalk can also be used to prevent slipping, especially if sweaty palms are a concern.
Body Position Before Starting
Once you’ve established a strong grip, it’s time to ensure your body is properly positioned.
Begin by hanging from the bar with your legs fully extended beneath you.
Your legs should hang straight but slightly in front of your body rather than directly below you—this small shift helps prevent swinging and allows you to maintain better control.
To protect your joints, it’s crucial to avoid locking your elbows. Instead, keep a slight bend in them, which distributes the tension more evenly and prevents undue stress on the joints.
This small adjustment can go a long way in reducing the risk of elbow or shoulder strain over time.
The next key element is adopting a hollow body position. In this position, your lats, abs, glutes, and quads are all engaged to stabilize your body and prevent excessive movement.
Engage your lats by slightly pulling your shoulders down and away from your ears.
Tightening the abs pulls the belly button towards the spine, which braces your core effectively.
Engaging the glutes and quads further stabilizes the lower half of the body, ensuring that your legs stay aligned and don’t start swinging independently.
The hollow body position is integral because it supports spinal stability, ensuring that the lift is driven by core strength rather than momentum.
Many people overlook the importance of this setup and make common mistakes that can negatively affect the quality of the movement.
One frequent error is over-relaxing the legs or allowing the lower body to dangle loosely.
This can lead to unwanted swinging and make it difficult to maintain a controlled, slow movement. Instead, aim to keep the legs active by lightly engaging your quads—this will help you lift them smoothly without sudden jerking motions.
Another common mistake involves improper elbow positioning. Locking out the elbows completely can place significant stress on the shoulder joints, particularly during the descent phase of the exercise.
By keeping a slight bend in the elbows, you maintain tension in the arms and shoulders, which provides better support for your core and reduces the risk of injury.
Finally, keep your head in a neutral position throughout the movement.
It can be tempting to look up at the bar or down at your feet, but either position can strain the neck.
Instead, keep your gaze forward or slightly upward, maintaining a relaxed yet steady neck position.
This allows you to focus on core engagement without introducing unnecessary tension in the upper body.
Step-by-Step Execution of the Hanging Leg Raise
Once you’ve established a proper starting position, executing the hanging leg raise effectively is all about precision and control.
Each movement must be deliberate to engage the core properly and prevent relying on momentum.
Core Engagement and Pelvic Positioning
Before lifting your legs, core engagement is the first and most critical step.
Think of engaging your core as “switching on” the muscles that will power the exercise.
The best way to activate your core is to pull your belly button in towards your spine.
This action isn’t just about tensing your abs—it’s about bracing your entire midsection to create stability and support.
This helps prevent your lower back from arching and ensures that your abdominal muscles are taking the load instead of your hip flexors or lower back.
Another key aspect of core engagement is positioning your pelvis.
Many people mistakenly think that the hanging leg raise is only about lifting the legs, but the movement truly begins in the pelvis.
By curling the pelvis slightly upwards, you are engaging the lower abdominals more intensely.
This makes a significant difference in how much work your core is actually doing.
Instead of simply lifting your legs, think about tilting your pelvis and using it to initiate the movement.
This focus ensures the exercise targets the rectus abdominis deeply, enhancing the overall effect on your core strength.
Leg Raise Execution: Breaking Down the Movement
With your core engaged and your pelvis correctly positioned, you’re ready to start lifting your legs.
Begin by bending at the pelvis to initiate the movement, then lift your legs until they are at least parallel to the ground or at a 90-degree angle to your body.
Ideally, you want to avoid thinking of this as just a “leg lift.”
Instead, think about lifting your entire lower body by using your core.
The higher you lift your legs (while maintaining control), the more you engage both the lower and upper abdominals.
However, lifting beyond a 90-degree angle typically shifts more of the work to your hip flexors, which may be less effective if your primary goal is to strengthen the abs.
One crucial aspect of executing a proper hanging leg raise is the distinction between lifting and curling.
As you lift your legs, make sure you are also curling your pelvis slightly upwards.
This curling action maximizes engagement of the lower abs, whereas lifting without curling tends to shift some of the strain to the hip flexors.
Curling is also more effective for creating the rounding effect in the core, which intensifies the muscular contraction and makes the movement more challenging.
Aiming for this rounding motion ensures that your abs are the main drivers of the lift.
The Importance of Controlled Movements
The success of hanging leg raises relies heavily on maintaining control throughout the entire range of motion.
This means not allowing momentum to take over, which can shift the focus away from the core and reduce the effectiveness of the exercise.
Using momentum often leads to swinging, which diminishes stability and can lead to poor form, even potentially causing injury.
The goal is to keep every part of the movement slow and deliberate, allowing your core muscles to do the work rather than relying on swinging to get your legs up.
To maintain control, focus on lifting your legs slowly on the way up, pausing slightly at the top to reinforce engagement, and then lowering them just as slowly.
The downward phase is just as important as the lift itself—this is where many people tend to let gravity take over, but this is a missed opportunity for increased strength.
Control the descent by keeping your core engaged throughout, and resist the urge to simply let your legs drop.
This will ensure that tension remains in the abs throughout the entire set, maximizing the muscle-building benefits of the exercise.
If you notice yourself starting to swing or lose control, it’s a good idea to pause, re-establish the hollow body position, and then continue.
This re-engagement prevents bad habits from forming and keeps the movement strict and effective.
Remember, it’s not about how quickly you can perform reps; rather, it’s about how effectively you can move through each repetition while keeping the tension on the right muscles.
Variations for Targeted Muscle Activation
Hanging leg raises are a versatile exercise, and by making a few modifications, you can target specific muscle groups more effectively.
Whether you want to emphasize your obliques or increase the involvement of your hip flexors, understanding how to adjust the movement can help you tailor your workout to your goals.
Targeting the Obliques
If you want to bring your obliques—the muscles on the sides of your abdomen—into the action, incorporating rotational movement into hanging leg raises is a great approach.
By adding a twist to the traditional leg raise, you effectively target both the internal and external obliques, which are crucial for core stability and creating that tapered, well-defined waist look.
To target the obliques, start in your regular hanging position with an overhand grip and a hollow body setup.
As you lift your legs, instead of raising them straight up, direct them towards one side of your body.
For example, if you are aiming to engage the right obliques, raise your legs in a controlled manner to the right side, creating a slight twisting motion in your core.
After completing the movement on one side, bring your legs back down with control, and then alternate by lifting towards the other side.
This alternating pattern helps balance engagement across both sides of your core, ensuring even muscle development.
The key to targeting the obliques effectively is to keep the movement slow and intentional.
Avoid using momentum, as it reduces the effectiveness of the twist and risks injury to the lower back.
Focus on actively twisting your torso from the waist as you lift your legs, making sure the movement originates from your core rather than just swinging the legs to the side.
To maintain the focus on the obliques, engage your core tightly throughout each rep and resist any tendency to let your hips or shoulders do the turning.
It’s also helpful to imagine your legs as an extension of your core, guiding them smoothly from one side to the other while keeping your upper body stable.
Focusing on the Hip Flexors
If you’re aiming to emphasize the hip flexors, modifying the range of motion can make all the difference.
The hip flexors play a crucial role in raising your legs, especially when moving beyond the point of a 90-degree angle relative to your body.
This range of motion requires a deeper level of engagement from the hip flexor muscles, making it an ideal variation for those looking to target them more specifically.
To focus more on the hip flexors, start by hanging with a tight grip and engage your core as usual.
Lift your legs until they pass the 90-degree mark, ideally bringing them as high as possible towards your chest.
This additional lift will put increased demand on the hip flexors, requiring them to stay fully engaged throughout the movement.
Make sure that your spine remains neutral and avoid rounding your lower back, as this can lead to strain and reduce the quality of the movement.
Another important aspect of maximizing hip flexor engagement is to maintain continuous tension.
This means that when you lower your legs, you should avoid letting them drop completely.
Instead, bring your legs down only partway—stopping just before reaching a fully relaxed position—so that your hip flexors are under constant tension.
Keeping the legs engaged without letting them fully hang will ensure that the muscles don’t relax, which helps build strength and endurance more effectively.
While focusing on the hip flexors, be mindful of potential lower back strain.
Lifting the legs too high or losing core engagement can shift the workload onto the lower back, leading to discomfort or even injury.
To mitigate this, always initiate the movement from your core and keep the abs braced to provide support for the lumbar spine.
A gradual increase in the height of your leg lifts over time will allow you to build up strength in the hip flexors without overstressing the area.
Muscles Worked: What Are You Really Training?
The hanging leg raise is more than just an ab exercise—it’s a comprehensive movement that engages multiple muscle groups to help stabilize, lift, and control your body through every repetition.
Understanding which muscles are involved can help you focus your effort more effectively and ensure that you're executing the exercise in a way that maximizes its benefits.
Primary Muscles Engaged
The primary muscle group targeted during hanging leg raises is the rectus abdominis, commonly known as the “six-pack” muscle.
This long, flat muscle runs vertically along the front of your abdomen and is primarily responsible for spinal flexion, which is the movement of curling your spine forward as you lift your legs.
During hanging leg raises, the rectus abdominis works to lift the pelvis upwards while maintaining core stability.
The higher you lift your legs, the greater the demand on the lower portion of the rectus abdominis, making it an effective exercise for targeting this often hard-to-reach area.
By focusing on curling the pelvis upwards rather than simply raising the legs, you ensure that this muscle is doing most of the work, resulting in better definition and strength.
Supporting Muscles
While the rectus abdominis is the star of the show, several other muscles play crucial supporting roles in the hanging leg raise.
One of the key supporting muscles is the transverse abdominis, which lies deeper within the abdominal wall.
This muscle is responsible for providing core stability and acts like a natural weightlifting belt, keeping your spine protected and your midsection tight throughout the movement.
Engaging the transverse abdominis is essential, especially when trying to prevent excessive arching in the lower back during leg raises.
By pulling your belly button toward your spine before beginning each rep, you activate this muscle, ensuring the core is properly braced and stable.
The hip flexors are another set of muscles heavily involved in the hanging leg raise.
These muscles are responsible for moving the thighs towards the torso, especially when lifting your legs above the 90-degree point.
While the hip flexors are sometimes seen as overactive in core exercises, they play an essential role in leg elevation, particularly when aiming to lift your legs higher towards your chest.
Strengthening these muscles contributes to greater flexibility and control, which can be beneficial not just in ab-focused exercises but also in athletic activities that require powerful hip movements, such as sprinting or kicking.
When adding rotational variations to your hanging leg raises, such as side-to-side twists, the obliques come into play.
Both the internal and external obliques are activated during these movements, and they help in twisting and stabilizing the torso.
Strengthening the obliques contributes to overall core strength and is essential for rotational stability, which is vital in sports and everyday movements that require turning or twisting motions.
By lifting your legs to either side, you activate these muscles, which helps sculpt the sides of your waist and contributes to a more defined, tapered look.
In addition to the muscles of the core, the erector spinae muscles of the lower back also engage to help maintain proper posture during the exercise.
These muscles run along either side of the spine and are essential for stabilizing the back as you hang from the bar.
During leg raises, the erector spinae help to maintain a neutral spine, preventing excessive arching or rounding that could lead to injury.
Proper engagement of these muscles ensures that your spine remains protected and that the movement focuses on the abdominals and not on straining the lower back.
The latissimus dorsi, commonly referred to as the lats, also play an important stabilizing role.
These muscles, which span across the back from the lower spine to the upper arm, help stabilize the shoulders and torso as you hang from the bar.
Engaging the lats by gently pulling the shoulders down and away from the ears creates a more stable base from which to lift the legs, thereby enhancing control throughout the movement.
Lastly, the forearm flexors are heavily engaged in hanging leg raises because of the need to maintain a strong grip on the bar.
The forearms work continuously to keep you hanging securely, and the stronger your grip, the more effectively you can focus on the rest of the movement.
Weak grip strength can become a limiting factor in how many quality repetitions you can perform, which is why exercises that strengthen your forearms, such as farmer’s carries and dead hangs, are beneficial complements to your hanging leg raise training.
Progressions and Alternatives for Different Skill Levels
Whether you’re just starting out or already have significant core strength, there are ways to tailor the hanging leg raise to match your current abilities.
Modifying the exercise appropriately allows you to progressively build strength without risking injury or compromising form.
Beginner-Friendly Progression: Hanging Knee Raises
If the full hanging leg raise feels too challenging at the beginning, starting with hanging knee raises is a great way to build foundational strength and get comfortable with the movement.
Hanging knee raises involve tucking the knees up towards your chest instead of lifting straight legs.
This reduces the leverage and the overall weight you need to lift, making it more manageable for those who are still developing the core strength necessary for the full version.
To start, hang from the bar using an overhand grip, ensuring you maintain a tight core and adopt the hollow body position to minimize swinging.
From there, bend your knees and lift them upwards toward your chest, focusing on curling your pelvis slightly at the top of the movement.
This curling action ensures that the lower abs are doing the bulk of the work rather than just relying on your hip flexors.
Hanging knee raises are not just a stepping stone to full leg raises; they are also effective on their own for building strength in the rectus abdominis and transverse abdominis, while also engaging the hip flexors to a lesser extent.
Moreover, this variation allows beginners to practice proper core engagement and body stabilization, which are essential for performing hanging leg raises effectively without the added difficulty of extended legs.
Consistent practice with knee raises helps develop the core muscles needed for progression while also improving grip strength and shoulder stability, which are both crucial components of a successful hanging leg raise.
Advanced Variations for Strengthening
Once you’ve mastered hanging leg raises, you can add advanced variations to increase the challenge and further enhance core strength.
Adding ankle weights or performing straight-leg raises can significantly increase the difficulty of the exercise.
When using ankle weights, you add resistance, making your core muscles work harder to lift the legs.
This is particularly effective for advanced practitioners looking to break through strength plateaus.
It’s important, however, to start with a light weight and gradually increase as you become more comfortable to avoid straining the lower back or overloading the hip flexors.
Another advanced option is the straight-leg raise, which involves keeping your legs completely straight without any bend at the knees throughout the movement.
This requires more strength in the quads, hip flexors, and core, as keeping the legs straight increases the lever length and thus the difficulty of the lift.
It’s crucial to maintain slow and controlled movements, focusing on curling the pelvis at the top and avoiding momentum, which can cause you to swing and lose form.
For those looking to incorporate more oblique work and rotational core stability, hanging windshield wipers are an excellent variation.
In this advanced exercise, you lift your legs up to about hip height and then move them from side to side in a controlled “windshield wiper” motion.
This not only engages the rectus abdominis but also activates the internal and external obliques as you twist your legs from side to side.
Hanging windshield wipers demand a high level of core stability and shoulder strength, so it’s important to ensure that your upper body remains stable and that the movement is slow and deliberate.
Proper form is key to avoiding injury—especially in the lower back—as this exercise involves a lot of rotation under tension.
For those wanting to push their limits even further, you could combine the windshield wiper with a full leg raise by raising your legs fully and then moving side to side.
This combines the core-strengthening benefits of a full leg lift with the oblique-targeting effects of the twist, making it one of the most comprehensive hanging core exercises.
Additional Tips for Success
To get the most out of hanging leg raises, there are a few extra strategies that can help elevate your performance and make your workouts more effective.
From boosting your grip strength to knowing exactly how to incorporate this exercise into your routine, these additional tips are aimed at ensuring you succeed in mastering the hanging leg raise.
Grip Strengthening Exercises
One of the most common challenges people face with hanging leg raises is maintaining a solid grip on the bar.
Since your entire body weight is suspended from your hands, grip strength often becomes a limiting factor, especially as you progress to higher repetitions or advanced variations.
To improve your performance in hanging leg raises, it’s highly beneficial to train grip strength separately.
Dead hangs are an excellent exercise to help you get comfortable with supporting your body weight for an extended time.
Simply hang from a pull-up bar with an overhand grip for as long as possible, focusing on keeping your shoulders down and away from your ears to build endurance in the forearms and hands.
As your grip strength improves, you’ll find it easier to focus on your core during leg raises without worrying about slipping off the bar.
Another effective exercise is the farmer’s carry, which involves holding heavy weights (usually dumbbells or kettlebells) in each hand while walking a short distance.
This movement works not only the grip but also the core, and it mirrors the endurance demands of hanging leg raises.
You can gradually increase the weight over time to continue challenging your forearms, allowing you to enhance both grip endurance and overall strength.
Additionally, consider incorporating wrist curls and reverse wrist curls into your routine.
These are smaller, targeted exercises that directly build the muscles involved in gripping.
The stronger your wrists and forearms, the better you’ll be able to maintain a firm hold on the bar, helping you perform more repetitions with better control and less fatigue.
Including Hanging Leg Raises in a Routine
Another important aspect of success with hanging leg raises is understanding how to integrate them into your workout routine for maximum benefit.
Hanging leg raises are primarily a core exercise, but they also demand effort from your arms, shoulders, and grip, making them best suited for the middle or end of a workout when you’ve already warmed up but haven’t completely fatigued the involved muscle groups.
If you’re focusing on strength training for the core, hanging leg raises can be used as one of the primary exercises, ideally following a warm-up that includes dynamic stretches to loosen up the shoulders and hips.
A warm core is better able to handle the demands of hanging leg raises, reducing the risk of injury.
You can include them in a full ab circuit alongside exercises like planks, Russian twists, or mountain climbers.
Doing them earlier in your core workout routine is generally advisable to ensure you have enough energy and grip strength to perform the movement with proper form.
For optimal progress, it’s recommended to train hanging leg raises about two to three times a week.
This frequency allows for sufficient stimulus to promote core strength and endurance without overworking the muscles, which could lead to fatigue or injury.
Core muscles can generally handle higher frequency training compared to other muscle groups, but it’s still crucial to give them adequate rest.
If you’re doing other intense core work or exercises that engage the abs significantly, ensure you space out your hanging leg raise days accordingly to avoid overtraining.
You can also incorporate hanging leg raises into a pull day or a full-body workout as they require substantial grip and upper body strength.
Including them on pull-focused days means you can take advantage of pre-engaged back and arm muscles, which can make it easier to stabilize your hanging position.
On full-body days, hanging leg raises are an effective way to work both the core and improve your overall hanging endurance, contributing to better performance in other upper body exercises.
In addition, consider varying your repetition ranges and sets.
If you’re aiming to build strength, you might start with three to four sets of five to eight reps, focusing on slower, more controlled movements.
To work on endurance, increase the repetitions to around ten to fifteen per set while maintaining perfect form and control.
The most crucial element is consistency—regular practice will yield the best results over time, whether that means increasing reps, adding weight, or refining your form for better engagement.
Conclusion
Mastering the hanging leg raise requires a combination of proper form, controlled movement, and strategic exercise progression.
By focusing on setup, execution, targeted variations, and including these exercises appropriately in your routine, you can effectively build core strength and stability.
Keep practicing with patience, and remember that consistency is key to making lasting progress.
