While variety is important for phenomenal leg development, we may not always have access to the wide array of machinery needed to hit the wheels from ever conceivable angle. Not to worry. There is no need to over-complicate the leg training process. In fact, if a session is short, intense and focused on perfect form, we need not spend an hour or more on endless sets and movements. The following four movements, properly programmed and performed to perfection, will give you results you want.
Even a newcomer to the iron will know of the squat’s well-earned reputation as the king of resistance
training movements. Not only does it promote size and strength through the entire lower body (working the prime movers, stabilizers, and synergists), it’s an excellent way to improve balance, stability, and growth across the physique as a whole.
5, 8 If you can squat, then you must squat – period.
While variations of the leg curl are ideal when seeking to isolate the hamstrings (by working the muscles from the knee joint), the Romanian Deadlift hits the hams from the hips, thus providing top to bottom mass that might otherwise be neglected with the curls.6, 7 Great hamstrings are essential part of the physique that should never be overlooked (as is often the case). A solid set of hams also assists with movement execution when it comes to hitting the quads, thereby helping to flesh out all of the major lower body muscles. In addition, because the quads remain the strongest leg muscles and tend to take over on most leg training movements, the hamstrings need to be developed in such a way that they provide a suitable counterbalancing effect. Of course, great hams make the lower body aesthetically more impressive. More importantly, however, a good ham/quad balance offsets knee injury to ensure training longevity and a more efficient training progression. Romanian Deadlifts remain the best way to fully overload and supersize the hams from glute to knee.
Lunges come in many different varieties. Walking lunges (performed with a bar or dumbbells) may however be the superior choice for their ability to enhance functional movement patterns and the difficulty it takes to perform them (which makes them more exhaustive, challenging, and growth-enhancing). The walking lunge is also predominantly a unilateral lift, meaning one leg at a time is largely forced to coordinate and shift the weight, making it difficult to do with perfect form and heavy weights. Thus, the walking lunge can be more effective at targeting the stabilizers (predominantly the gluteus minimus and gluteus medius, which stabilize the hips; and the tibialis anterior, which stabilizes the ankles) to ensure the correct movement pattern is maintained at all times. Lunges are also an effective way to hit the quads,
glutes, and hamstrings along with the hip flexors, making them a great total lower body movement.
The calves can be an incredibly stubborn bodypart to train. The truth is, their ultimate development is largely governed by genetics (some reports have it that calf development is 90% genetically determined).1, 2 While other muscles can be finessed to grow, the calves, it appears, remain resistant, regardless of training approach. While they can be improved, the calves are the one area that simply fail to materialize for certain genetically disadvantaged people no matter how hard and for how long they are made to work. This is to say that even though we must work them hard to bring them up, if our calves are not responding after several years of hard work, don’t continue to prioritize them ahead of areas that do respond well. Remember: any time we train one muscle group we compromise the recovery of another muscle group. As such, if the calves refuse to grow, don’t run out and buy implants as a surprising number of high-level bodybuilders have done. Rather, work to maintain their size. All that being said, anyone’s calves can be improved to a certain extent. The best way to stimulate them to grow is with the simple standing calf raise. There are many different ways to program calf training: heavy for moderate reps and light for ultra-high reps being but two common approaches. Whatever approach is used, the key thing to remember is to go full range on each and every rep: get up on to the tippy toes for a full positive contraction and go all the way down for a full stretch.