How to stimulate an orgasm from ab training, according to the author of 'The Coregasm Workout'

• A "coregasm" is an orgasm triggered by intense abdominal work.
• Exercises like leg-raises and crunches often lead to them, researcher Debby Herbenick said.

A "coregasm" is an orgasm triggered by exercise, usually ab workouts.

Technically called an exercise-induced orgasm (EIO), it's very real and can feel pleasurable if not sexual, as three women told Insider.

Debby Herbenick, PhD, professor at the Indiana University School of Public Health and author of "The Coregasm Workout," revealed the exercises that are most likely to trigger a coregasm.

Leg-raises are often coregasm triggers

According to Herbenick, exercises most likely to trigger coregasms are ones that require a lot of abdominal engagement, including:

• Lying leg raises
• Hanging leg raises (using a Captain's/Roman's chair)
• Pull-ups
• Crunches

"For exercises like crunches, the key is engagement and seemingly to exhaust the core, which is likely why we don't tend to hear about EIOs happening from just 10 crunches (because that doesn't exhaust the core for most people), but more often in the 50-200 range for crunches," Herbenick said.

With a more demanding exercise like pull-ups, however, some people have had coregasms from as few as five reps, Herbenick said.

While some people presume coregasms are caused by external factors such as tight gym clothes or friction on the genital area (ex. from a bicycle seat), Herbenick said her research suggests they are triggered internally from within the body, involving the core and pelvic floor muscles.

The stronger your core, the more likely you are to achieve coregasm

If you want a coregasm, work on strengthening your core.

"It's not going to happen" if you don't work out much, Herbenick said.

Her research suggests that as people strengthen their core abdominal muscles, they find it easier to experience exercise orgasms.

This might be because people have the capacity to perform more challenging exercises like hanging leg-raises and pull-ups, she suggests.

"I have heard from a number of men in particular who have described easier exercise orgasms when they are stronger or fitter, and losing the ability when they are more sedentary and only exercising on occasion," Herbenick said.

Housework can trigger coregasm

Herbenick said she's spoken to military and elite athletes who have experienced coregasms, but it's possible to have one from everyday movement outside of the gym, too.

"Exercise can look like lots of things," Herbenick said. "Some people experience EIOs from housework (sweeping demands core engagement) or from physical labor - we've had people in our research describe EIOs from airline baggage handling or lifting heavy equipment, which also are core-demanding."