Honestly, there are plenty of guys who have big and strong upper body and who don’t train legs.
I would REALLY like to agree with you and say that you NEED to squat and deadlift to get a big/strong upper body, but it is simply not necessary, even without gear. If you load the upper body muscles properly they will grow, period.
I shouldn’t say this because my experience and what I do has a lot of impact on other people’s training. And I do believe that it will always be best to train all the basic movement patterns. BUT I must say that my bench press and overhead press were the strongest when I only did high pulls for my lower body. It’s also when my upper body was the biggest.
Understand that I trained for football for 8 years, where I squatted 2 days a week, sometimes 3. And then I trained 6 years for olympic lifting in which I squatted up to 6 days a week, then I did more of a powerlifitng training where I squatted twice a week. During my 4 years in bodybuilding I went back to training legs only once a week because they simply overpowered my upper body. Then when I was done with bodybuilding I had a 3 years period where I barely trained legs at all. Why? Because I honestly was sick of it after having a squat dominant program for most of my training life.
Now I am, of course, back to a more complete program and squatting heavy. But my point is that I was able to improve my upper body strength and size without squatting or deadlifting. This is not a “popular” thing to say, because it’s hardcore to claim that you need to squat or deadlift to get a big upper body. But it’s simply not true.
HOWEVER, stopping training legs have some drawbacks:
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You won’t maintain squatting/deadlifting strength if you don’t keep doing them. When I stopped training legs seriously my back squat went from 585 down to 365, my front squat from 475 down to 285 and my deadlift from 585 down to 385. I regained most of that strength within a few months, but while not doing these lifts at least for maintenance I lost strengh.
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You will lose leg size. When I stopped squatting/deadlifting I lost a significant amount of legs and glutes size. In my case it wasn’t disastrous because 18 years of squatting 2-6 times a week left me with dominant legs and even once they atrophied they were still muscular, lean and looked good. But from the post of the original poster, he likely does not have the same muscularity in the lower body, and in his case losing muscle might end up being problematic
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You will lose glutes… Biking with a high resistance (fast intervals with low resistance will not build muscle) might help you maintain leg size, maybe even build some size. But the glutes won’t receive the same stimulus and will likely atrophy.
My own opinion is that it’s fine to take a break from lower body training if you are very advanced and have great legs already. The key word being “break”. But even in retrospect, when I took my break I should have simply tuned down my leg training to what was needed to maintain. Squatting one a week, not trying to get stronger but at least maintaining the strength I had.
@joemu14 you just reached the “novice standards” which means that if you are a guy you likely are still weaker than my girlfriend. I personally would not be comfortable saying that it’s ok to stop lifting work for your legs completely. I don’t feel like you’ve earned it. That having been said, it’s your body, you can do whatever you want. It’s a hobby after all.
So the true answers to your questions are:
Can you build your upper body strength and size without training legs? Yes
Can you maintain leg size with high resistance bike work? Yes
Can you keep your squatting and deadlift strength while not training these lifts or doing lifting work for the lower body? No
Am I “okay” with your plan? No
