Extension of the hip joint is the most important functional movement there is.
Stop for a moment and think about it, if you need to…
This is why women check out men’s asses.
Train your hip extensors for power, speed and endurance – it will GREATLY improve your quality of life
The stuff about core strength is right, too, of course.
But I think the best reason to train legs is that it’s hard. You’re not just training your muscles in the gym, you’re training your ability to self-motivate. I might go to failure on an upper body exercise, but I never get that little voice in my head telling me to give up. Training legs, he shows up all the time. Training legs, I’ve learned how to ignore him, how to shut him up.
Prof X is blunt, but dead right. Keep training. If you’re that worried about leg growth, switch up training priorities. Alter technique. Start using the brutal squats that Leistner recommends: 1 set of 15-20, lifting until you puke. You’ll see moderate hypertrophy, good strength, and excellent strength-endurance gains. When you’re done with those, do dumbbell pullovers until you’re ready to explode. You’ll see a noticeable difference in your overall torso mass pretty quick, and it’ll murder your triceps.
Instead of doing isolation exercises for the biceps, do chin-ups with your palms facing you, shoulder width. Do them weighted. Maybe do some curls after to finish them off.
Don’t bother with isolation movements for the tris – do presses. Close grip or reverse grip bench can be brutal. I’ve seen good gains off both.
If you’re worried about your arms, train them as a priority, but dropping leg exercises is foolhardy. The reasons you list above for skipping miss the point. You don’t want functional strength? Then get used to scrawny arms. Strength builds muscle.
Sure, you can build muscle without functional strength, to an extent. Gyms are full of pretty-boys that have achieved this to one level or another. But they always freeze up at a certain point, hit a plateau, because they don’t have the foundation to build a more sturdy house. Compounds are your foundation. Squats and deadlifts are the cornerstones. I’d go so far as to say DLs in particular. They help build the willpower and muscular support network that you need for long-term success.
Weight-training isn’t about setting your sights on the here and now. It’s about looking into the future and planning for success. Aim high, man.
How many of you have had trouble lifting a tv for someone that weighs 100 pounds, yet clear 300-400 pounds in the DL 25 times in a session?
Anyways, thanks for the responses
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Well… it’s more awkward than a barbell certainly, but it’s sure as hell a lot easier than it was when I could only pull 150. I am the man people go to when moving furniture and it’s not because I flip tires.
[quote]Hawkson101 wrote:
How many of you have had trouble lifting a tv for someone that weighs 100 pounds, yet clear 300-400 pounds in the DL 25 times in a session?
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I worked in a furniture warehouse, and I quickly discovered one thing that was a truth above all others: it’s all about technique. Some of the guys there were skinny little rails, but could heave around 36" TVs all day long. They could throw couches up on one shoulder and run the length of the warehouse. They had a dozen tricks for moving these things, or taking best advantage of their balance, that made it seem easier.
And they loved watching guys twice their size struggle with it.
One of the movers was a former personal trainer and bodybuilder, though. Strong as an ox. He employed the same tricks, and made their heaving efforts look puny. Deadlifts build practical strength, but that doesn’t excuse you from thinking when you’re presented from the task of lifting a cumbersome object.
I’ve found that when I neglect or cut back even a little bit on my leg work, deads/squats, that my upper body work starts to stagnate. There are numerous theories floating around to explain this phenomenon so apparently I’m not alone on this one. When my squat goes up, my bench goes up with it. When I don’t squat heavy for a month or two (knee injury) my bench flat lined. As soon as I was recovered enough to start squatting again, my bench started moving back up.
Legs collect more subcutaneous fat than arms and it’s usually spread more evenly so your legs can look reasonably lean and still be carrying an inch or 3 of fat that your arms aren’t. I’d be reluctant to give advice based solely on numbers like the ones you provide.
Train everything, focus on core stregth. After a few solid years of training then you might start to fine tune your training for aestetic purposes but I like Dorian Yates philosophy on the subject of balance and symetry, essentially he said work the whole body with equal intensity and balance will come with size. When you focus on isolatino work or neglect entire areas you’re begging for imbalance and injury.
Please. Don’t do the Beach Workout. (Chest/Biceps) Even when I was neglecting my legs, I ran a lot, rode my bike to work, and at least did ham curls and leg extensions. Nobody likes the Yield Sign look.
The deadlift is one of the best ways to work your back. It also allows you to do bent rows, military presses, lift boxes, etc… with out fear of “throwing out your back”. Without deadlifts and goodmornings you’ll never have an appreciable lower back in my opinion.
[quote]Lift4Life wrote:
The first thing people tend to forget about when lifting weights is how your hormones are triggered. Squats and Deadlifts (as far as the entire body goes) produce the most hormonal increases. If you cut out the Squat and Deadlift entirely, you’re going to be missing out on some serious gains in hypertrophy, strength and possibly speed.
From what I know, agreeing with ProfX, it seems as though you are a begining lifter, or you have been working out for several years without a good foundation (of knowledge). [/quote]
I train legs simply because it makes up 50% of your body. Why would I ignore that much real estate and focus just on my top half? It’s like doing only half a curl.
Now if you’re unblanced give your legs a rest and focus on your upper body and don’t forget about them. They are, after all, the pillars you stand on.
Wow, so you think you should just stop training legs because you have small arms. That is a bad idea. I would agree with those saying that is just lazy. So what you are saying is you are going to do arms what 3 times a week or something since you are not doing legs now? Arms just dont take that long and who says you have to fgo heavy on legs. Go lighter with lots of reps so you dont gain alot of size but still keep your strength. Like I have head before you are not going to wake up one day and suddenly have 30" legs. I would be willing to bet you are not very strong at all with those legs of yours. How about you dont have large legs you just have small arms. That doenst mean drop the legs it mean you have to work that much harder on arms.
Training legs is hard work. Most guys(at my gym anyway) are wusses and that is why they don’t have a proportioned body.
My legs grow easily and are one of my strong points, so, I like training them of course! and it seperates me from the other dilettantes at the gym and elsewhere.
Legs do get noticed…and calves too, by discerning eyes.
Some people have discussed working “the core” with squats and deads…and that is true; you also elevate your metabolism and that makes getting lean a much easier task.
I would do this: I would go “low reps” with heavy weight, without alot of “time under tension” created.(We are not talking about “light speed” descents on the squat!-more like 2 seconds on the lowering.)
This will allow you to keep strength without most of the hypertrophy.
. . . however I am seriously thinking of stopping leg training all together. First of all, I have naturally big legs. At 5’11, 185 lbs, my thighs are 24" and my arms are 15". I know that in his prime Arnold had 28" legs and 22" arms. So his legs were 16% bigger than mine and his arms were 50% bigger than mine. I’d say that I’m unbalanced.
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This is the first time I’ve ever posted without even finishing the post, and one of the few times that I dont read through all the responses, but I’m sorry, are you holding arnold up as the golden standard for legs? Jeez, the man had no legs!! Whatever you think of his overall package - and I’m sure we could debate that all day - you cannot look at the olympia competitors from the 70s from the waist down and tell me that arnold deserved to win it. I’ve seen more impressive legs on this board than his…
Some of the guys there were skinny little rails, but could heave around 36" TVs all day long. They could throw couches up on one shoulder and run the length of the warehouse. They had a dozen tricks for moving these things, or taking best advantage of their balance, that made it seem easier.
