Home-Grown Legs
How to Build Tree-Trunk-Size Thighs and Jagged, Jutting Calves With Nothing but DumbbellsIf you wanna build your quads, you gotta squat heavy for low reps. How many times have you heard that? So many that you’re probably brainwashed into believing it’the hard, scaly callous running across your traps being a testament to that fact. But it’s just not so.
Don’t get me wrong. Squats are a magnificent exercise’maybe the most magnificent of all’but you don’t have to crush your spine with titanic tonnage to pack your thighs with wicked size.
Take Tom Platz, for example. He had some of the freakiest quads ever to grace a posing dais. Did he squat heavy? Rarely. He squatted deep and did his sets in flat-footed Olympic style. Form was essential. And while he did sometimes pyramid his weight, going from 15 reps down to five over five or six sets, at other workouts he would walk into the gym, put 225 pounds on the bar and squat for 10 minutes straight. And on other leg exercises, like leg extensions and leg curls, he’d often do up to 60 reps’yes, 60!v It takes most bodybuilders a lot of time’sometimes years’to realize that they can squeeze out more quad development using higher reps. Is it stupidity or hardheadedness that prolongs the discovery? Neither, actually. It’s usually denial. They don’t want to believe it because high-rep quad work is brutal. Your quads ache, your lungs feel like they may explode, and you swear your heart is pounding somewhere in your brain, not your chest.
Luckily, if you know how to hit your quads with a precision attack, you don’t have to endure set after set of that masochistic brutality. You can get it done quickly and thoroughly without any wasted effort’that means fewer torturous sets. Best of all, you don’t have to endure an Olympic bar digging into your upper back. That’s right, you can get it done with dumbbells.
Pure hog shit, you say? Think about it. If a lot of Platz’s development’legs and even upper body’came from high-rep squats with 225, couldn’t he have gotten the same results while holding a 100-pound dumbbell in each hand, with his hands hanging at his sides? His form would have been quad-blasting perfect, and his lower back could have kept going for lots more reps. With dumbbells at your sides instead of a barbell on your back, your spinal erectors aren’t screaming for relief from prolonged isometric contraction.
The dumbbell-squat observation is damn good news for home trainees, but as I’ve said in past installments of this series, if you train in the house, you may want to add some equipment before attempting the program below.
The routine calls for drop sets, reducing the poundage after the first set and repping out immediately with the lighter weight. It also has you move quickly from one set of dumbbells to a lighter set for the second exercise in a modified superset. If you have access to a rack of fixed dumbbells, you won’t have a problem, but if all you have are those adjustable dumbbells with the screw-type collars, you may be in for some frustration and maybe even some one-legged hopping and yiping’when one of those screwy collars decides to bust loose during a set of squats or lunges and lands smack on your big toe.
The PowerBlock selectorized dumbbell set is a better solution to those screw-type dumbbells. Each PowerBlock dumbbell is slightly smaller than a shoebox’certainly no bigger than a breadbox’and the dumbbells sit on their own stand. You simply move a pin to select the weight you want, and the weights below the pin stay on the stand. Of course, a rack of fixed dumbbells will work too, but they should go up past 100 pounds. Okay, let’s get to the home-grown leg routine. It has a few innovative characteristics that make it brief but effective at packing on muscle below the waist, which means it’s as precise and efficient as possible (fewer sets, less excruciating pain).
1) Positions of Flexion. Most IRONMAN readers are familiar with POF and working a muscle through its full range of motion. To determine the positions, or arc, of flexion for the quads, you simply have to analyze its function. Here are the full-range-of-motion positions:
Quads
Stretch: You achieve total stretch at the bottom of a sissy squat’torso and thighs on the same plane, with calves almost flush against hamstrings.
Midrange: Squat- or leg-press-type movements work the quads’ midrange position. Glutes are the synergist muscles that help the quads move the resistance.
Contracted: You reach the completely contracted position at the top of a leg extension’torso and thighs at a right angle, lower legs extended and knees locked.
We’re talking legs, so we must include the hamstrings and the calves. Here are the positions for those bodyparts:
Hamstrings
Stretch: You reach total stretch at the bottom of a flat-back stiff-legged deadlift.
Midrange: The top one-third of a squat or stiff-legged deadlift trains the midrange position of the hamstrings. The lower back and the glutes are the synergist muscle groups that help the hams move the resistance.
Contracted: The top of a leg curl’torso and thighs on the same plane, with calves flush against hamstrings and feet flexed toward the shins’completely contracts the hamstrings.
Calves/Gastrocnemius
Stretch: You achieve total stretch at the bottom of a donkey calf raise’calves stretched off a high block, toes pointed slightly inward, knees locked and torso at a right angle to the legs.
Midrange: Consider this position worked during squats and leg curls.
Contracted: You reach the completely contracted position at the top of a standing calf raise’up on toes, torso and legs on the same plane and toes pointing slightly outward.
Soleus
Stretch: You achieve total stretch at the bottom of a seated calf raise.
Midrange: Consider this position worked during squats and other calf work.
Contracted: You reach the completely contracted position at the top of a seated calf raise.
POF protocol says if you use one exercise that trains each of the positions, you’ve got one helluvan efficient full-range leg program. For example, for quads you’d do squats (midrange), sissy squats (stretch) and leg extensions (contracted); for hamstrings you’d do stiff-legged deadlifts (midrange and stretch) and leg curls (contracted); and for calves you’d do donkey calf raises (gastrocs, stretch), standing calf raises (gastrocs, contracted) and seated calf raises (soleus, stretch and contracted).
Sounds logical, but you’ll notice that you can’t do a lot of those exercises in a home gym without machines. More on how to overcome that obstacle later. First, let’s talk about an optimal muscle-fiber-recruitment technique, postactivation, that’ll give you an extra growth kick.
2) Postactivation. While POF provides extra fiber recruitment via its stretch-position exercises and activating the myotatic, or stretch, reflex, postactivation can give you even more. One of the most common ways to use it is in modified-superset fashion, combining a compound, or midrange-position, exercise, such as squats, with an isolation, or contracted-position, movement, such as leg extensions. Unfortunately, some home gyms don’t have a leg extension machine, so you use the next best thing’quad squeezes. That’s just what it sounds like, but you do the quad squeezes immediately after dumbbell squats in stage-set fashion. Here’s the drill. You take a dumbbell in each hand and hold them at arm’s length by your outer thighs. Squat down deep, but only come up two-thirds of the way, then squat down again. Do as many as you can, shooting for 10 to 12 reps. When you can’t do any more, drive to full lockout, take a few deep breaths, then squat down one-third of the way, and drive all the way back to lockout. Squeeze your quads hard for a two count in the lockout position, then do another one-third squat, drive to lockout and squeeze. Do as many as you can’six to eight.
To integrate postactivation into the POF quad routine, you alternate sets of lunges and stage squats. Don’t start screaming yet. Remember, you rest about two minutes between sets. Alternating those exercises helps recruit more motor units in the quads, priming your central nervous system for maximum quad-fiber recruitment. Of course, if you have a leg extension machine, you can do stage squats as the first exercise’without the squeezes’rest, do leg extensions, rest and so on. Either way you’ll feel the burn, guaranteed.
3) Time under tension. When bodybuilders realize that higher reps help build quad size, they’ll often start doing some sets of 12 or 15, but they tend to increase the speed to get it over with. Sometimes the reps are so fast, their legs are a blur throughout the set. That defeats the purpose. Higher reps aren’t about numbers; they’re about extending the time under tension, making a set last longer to hit the endurance-oriented fibers, of which the quads have many.
For optimal hypertrophic stimulation you need a variety of rep ranges’up to 60 seconds of tension time for some muscles like quads and calves. If you don’t like higher-rep sets, drop sets can help you achieve extended time under tension. You do a set on which you reach failure at around 10 reps, and then you lower the weight and continue repping out, hitting failure at around eight reps. Two back-to-back sets like those can extend your time under tension, getting you up near 60 seconds’if you use a two-seconds-up/two-seconds-down cadence on most reps. For example, say you’re doing one-leg calf raises. Pick a dumbbell weight that has you hit failure around rep 12. When you can’t do another rep, decrease the weight’either move the pin in your PowerBlock dumbbell or grab a lighter dumbbell’and continue to rep out, hitting failure around rep 10. If you average about three seconds per rep, that’s 66 seconds of tension time. Your calves will feel barbecued.
Okay, those are the concepts. Let’s get to the routine. It should help you better understand POF and postactivation and get you some new growth in your lower body. Remember, you rest about one minute between exercises in a modified postactivation superset.
Quads
Dumbbell lunges (warmup) 1 x 8
Dumbbell squats with quad squeezes (warmup) 1 x 8
Modified P.A. superset
Dumbbell lunges (alternate legs on each rep) 3 x 8-10
Dumbbell stage squats (with quad squeezes) 2 x 10(8)
Sissy squats (no weight) 2 x 10-15
Hamstrings
Dumbbell stiff-legged deadlifts (warmup) 1 x 8
Modified P.A. superset
Dumbbell stiff-legged deadlifts 3 x 8-10
Partner-assisted leg curls 2 x 10-12
Calves and Soleus
One-leg calf raises (drop set) 3 x 12(10)
Seated calf raises (drop set) 2 x 12(10)
Donkey calf raises (speed reps) 1 x 20-25
Keep in mind that if you have a leg extension machine, you can do the dumbbell stage squats first without the squeezes, rest, then do leg extensions, alternating those two movements. You may, however, want to try the routine as it’s listed to give your thigh training a new dimension. If you have a leg curl machine, feel free to use it in place of partner-assisted leg curls, although partner resistance will give you a different mode of attack. Try ‘em sometime. It’s like you’re doing a controlled max single on each rep.
Here are a few performance tips to help you get the most out of the program:
Lunges. Hold a dumbbell in each hand, with your hands hanging at your sides. Step forward with your right leg, allow it to bend at the knee, and touch the knee of your nonworking leg to the floor. Push off with your right leg and bring your right foot back next to your left. Now step forward with your left foot, touching your right knee to the floor. Note that the knee of your working leg shouldn’t protrude past your toes. If it does, you didn’t step out far enough and you could be setting the stage for a knee injury. If you have trouble maintaining your balance as you step forward, you can step back with your nonworking leg instead.
Dumbbell stage squats. After a two-minute rest, grab a dumbbell in each hand, hold them at arm’s length at your sides and squat. Don’t come all the way up, however. Do only the bottom two-thirds of each rep. When you can’t stand the pain, around rep 10, drive all the way to the top. Flex your quads for two seconds, then squat, lowering only one-third of the way down. Drive back to the top, lock your knees, and squeeze your quads for two seconds again. Continue the top reps’and flex on each’till you can’t stand the fire, at around rep eight.
Sissy squats. Stand next to an upright you can hold onto for balance. Squat, keeping your torso and quads on the same plane’like you’re doing the limbo’till your calves meet your hamstrings. You should feel an uncomfortable stretch in your quads at the bottom of each rep, but don’t pause; continue moving. Keep your cadence slow and controlled at all times. You’ll feel the exercise much more and prevent any unnecessary knee stress. Dumbbell stiff-legged deadlifts. With a dumbbell in each hand, holding them in front of your thighs, bend at the waist, keeping a slight bend in your knees and your back flat. As the dumbbells move down your legs, almost touching them, allow your butt to jut back. Reverse the dumbbells’ movement when they reach midshin level, at which point you should feel a slightly uncomfortable stretch in your hamstrings. Stand erect and repeat. Partner-assisted leg curls. After performing a set of stiff-legged deadlifts, rest for one minute, then lie facedown on a flat bench and have your partner loop a towel around your ankles. As you curl your feet toward your butt, your partner supplies the resistance by pulling on the towel. You should pull as hard as you can on each rep, and he or she should allow you enough slack so you get a two-seconds-up/two-seconds-down cadence.
What if you don’t have a partner? You may be able to find one of those cable chest expanders’cables or springs between two handles. Attach one end of a few cables to a post or wall and fashion a foot harness to the other end so you can do cable leg curls. You’ll get more resistance at the top of the movement, but that’s the contracted position you’re concentrating on anyway. Or you can lie facedown on a situp board or inclined flat bench, your head at the high end, hook your feet around a dumbbell and do leg curls. Home trainees have to be like Marines: They have to improvise.
One-leg calf raises. Hold a dumbbell in your right hand and stand on a high calf block or step with your right foot. Hang on to an upright for balance with your free hand. Do as many calf raises as you can’two seconds up, two seconds down’hitting failure around rep 12. Immediately grab a lighter dumbbell’or you may not need any weight at all’and continue to rep out. You should hit failure around rep 10, and the calf burn should be unbearable. Repeat with your left leg.
Seated calf raises. Sit in a chair or on the end of a bench so that when your feet are on a calf block your thighs are parallel to the floor. Hold a dumbbell on its end on each of your lower thighs. PowerBlock selectorized dumbbells and fixed dumbbells have flat ends, so you shouldn’t have a problem keeping them in place. If you have the screw-collar type, you may have to sit them horizontally over your lower thighs. Either way, you’ll probably want to put a towel over your quads for comfort. With the weight in place, rise on your toes to a count of two and lower to a count of two. Don’t pause at the bottom, but do pause for a count at the top to flex your soleus muscles. When you can’t get another rep’around rep 12′lighten the load and continue to rep out, hitting failure around rep 10.
Donkey calf raises (speed reps). You can do these with a partner riding atop your hips’make sure he or she has a good sense of balance’or with a hip belt or dipping belt that allows plates or dumbbells to be suspended from your middle. Bend at the waist so your legs and torso form a 90 degree angle, your upper body parallel to the floor and your lower arms resting on a high bench or table. Your feet should be on a high calf block. Begin doing reps as quickly as you can’about a half second for each phase of every rep. Shoot for 20 to 25 reps, or until the burn and fatigue in your calves are too much. Speed reps help hit the calf fibers in a unique way and make for a searing final pump.
There you have it, a precise leg program that will pack your thighs, hamstrings and calves with new mass’and you can do it in a home gym with nothing but dumbbells and a little ingenuity. You don’t have to squat heavy for low reps to build great legs, but you do have to withstand some pain. Hey, nobody said it was gonna be easy. Just be thankful you don’t have to squat for 10 minutes straight with a heavy barbell digging into your back. Note: You can use the above routine for leg specialization in the programs provided in ‘Bodybuilding for Dumbbells’ in the February ’02 IRONMAN. Simply put the new leg workout in place of the quad, hamstring and calf exercises listed. You may want to decrease sets for a few other exercises in the workout as well to compensate for the extra leg sets.
Editor’s note: For more on PowerBlock selectorized dumbbells, see page 219 of the July ’02 IRONMAN. For more on POF, see page 169. To order equipment, books or videos, call Home Gym Warehouse at 1-800-447-0008 or visit www.home-gym.com. IM
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Home-Grown Legs
If you wanna build your quads, you gotta squat heavy for low reps. How many times have you heard that? So many that you’re probably brainwashed into believing it’the hard, scaly callous running across your traps being a testament to that fact. But it’s just not so.
Don’t get me wrong. Squats are a magnificent exercise’maybe the most magnificent of all’but you don’t have to crush your spine with titanic tonnage to pack your thighs with wicked size.
Take Tom Platz, for example. He had some of the freakiest quads ever to grace a posing dais. Did he squat heavy? Rarely. He squatted deep and did his sets in flat-footed Olympic style. Form was essential. And while he did sometimes pyramid his weight, going from 15 reps down to five over five or six sets, at other workouts he would walk into the gym, put 225 pounds on the bar and squat for 10 minutes straight. And on other leg exercises, like leg extensions and leg curls, he’d often do up to 60 reps’yes, 60!v It takes most bodybuilders a lot of time’sometimes years’to realize that they can squeeze out more quad development using higher reps. Is it stupidity or hardheadedness that prolongs the discovery? Neither, actually. It’s usually denial. They don’t want to believe it because high-rep quad work is brutal. Your quads ache, your lungs feel like they may explode, and you swear your heart is pounding somewhere in your brain, not your chest.
Luckily, if you know how to hit your quads with a precision attack, you don’t have to endure set after set of that masochistic brutality. You can get it done quickly and thoroughly without any wasted effort’that means fewer torturous sets. Best of all, you don’t have to endure an Olympic bar digging into your upper back. That’s right, you can get it done with dumbbells.
Pure hog shit, you say? Think about it. If a lot of Platz’s development’legs and even upper body’came from high-rep squats with 225, couldn’t he have gotten the same results while holding a 100-pound dumbbell in each hand, with his hands hanging at his sides? His form would have been quad-blasting perfect, and his lower back could have kept going for lots more reps. With dumbbells at your sides instead of a barbell on your back, your spinal erectors aren’t screaming for relief from prolonged isometric contraction.
The dumbbell-squat observation is damn good news for home trainees, but as I’ve said in past installments of this series, if you train in the house, you may want to add some equipment before attempting the program below.
The routine calls for drop sets, reducing the poundage after the first set and repping out immediately with the lighter weight. It also has you move quickly from one set of dumbbells to a lighter set for the second exercise in a modified superset. If you have access to a rack of fixed dumbbells, you won’t have a problem, but if all you have are those adjustable dumbbells with the screw-type collars, you may be in for some frustration and maybe even some one-legged hopping and yiping’when one of those screwy collars decides to bust loose during a set of squats or lunges and lands smack on your big toe.
The PowerBlock selectorized dumbbell set is a better solution to those screw-type dumbbells. Each PowerBlock dumbbell is slightly smaller than a shoebox’certainly no bigger than a breadbox’and the dumbbells sit on their own stand. You simply move a pin to select the weight you want, and the weights below the pin stay on the stand. Of course, a rack of fixed dumbbells will work too, but they should go up past 100 pounds. Okay, let’s get to the home-grown leg routine. It has a few innovative characteristics that make it brief but effective at packing on muscle below the waist, which means it’s as precise and efficient as possible (fewer sets, less excruciating pain).
1) Positions of Flexion. Most IRONMAN readers are familiar with POF and working a muscle through its full range of motion. To determine the positions, or arc, of flexion for the quads, you simply have to analyze its function. Here are the full-range-of-motion positions:
Quads
Stretch: You achieve total stretch at the bottom of a sissy squat’torso and thighs on the same plane, with calves almost flush against hamstrings.
Midrange: Squat- or leg-press-type movements work the quads’ midrange position. Glutes are the synergist muscles that help the quads move the resistance.
Contracted: You reach the completely contracted position at the top of a leg extension’torso and thighs at a right angle, lower legs extended and knees locked.
We’re talking legs, so we must include the hamstrings and the calves. Here are the positions for those bodyparts:
Hamstrings
Stretch: You reach total stretch at the bottom of a flat-back stiff-legged deadlift.
Midrange: The top one-third of a squat or stiff-legged deadlift trains the midrange position of the hamstrings. The lower back and the glutes are the synergist muscle groups that help the hams move the resistance.
Contracted: The top of a leg curl’torso and thighs on the same plane, with calves flush against hamstrings and feet flexed toward the shins’completely contracts the hamstrings.
Calves/Gastrocnemius
Stretch: You achieve total stretch at the bottom of a donkey calf raise’calves stretched off a high block, toes pointed slightly inward, knees locked and torso at a right angle to the legs.
Midrange: Consider this position worked during squats and leg curls.
Contracted: You reach the completely contracted position at the top of a standing calf raise’up on toes, torso and legs on the same plane and toes pointing slightly outward.
Soleus
Stretch: You achieve total stretch at the bottom of a seated calf raise.
Midrange: Consider this position worked during squats and other calf work.
Contracted: You reach the completely contracted position at the top of a seated calf raise.
POF protocol says if you use one exercise that trains each of the positions, you’ve got one helluvan efficient full-range leg program. For example, for quads you’d do squats (midrange), sissy squats (stretch) and leg extensions (contracted); for hamstrings you’d do stiff-legged deadlifts (midrange and stretch) and leg curls (contracted); and for calves you’d do donkey calf raises (gastrocs, stretch), standing calf raises (gastrocs, contracted) and seated calf raises (soleus, stretch and contracted).
Sounds logical, but you’ll notice that you can’t do a lot of those exercises in a home gym without machines. More on how to overcome that obstacle later. First, let’s talk about an optimal muscle-fiber-recruitment technique, postactivation, that’ll give you an extra growth kick.
2) Postactivation. While POF provides extra fiber recruitment via its stretch-position exercises and activating the myotatic, or stretch, reflex, postactivation can give you even more. One of the most common ways to use it is in modified-superset fashion, combining a compound, or midrange-position, exercise, such as squats, with an isolation, or contracted-position, movement, such as leg extensions. Unfortunately, some home gyms don’t have a leg extension machine, so you use the next best thing’quad squeezes. That’s just what it sounds like, but you do the quad squeezes immediately after dumbbell squats in stage-set fashion. Here’s the drill. You take a dumbbell in each hand and hold them at arm’s length by your outer thighs. Squat down deep, but only come up two-thirds of the way, then squat down again. Do as many as you can, shooting for 10 to 12 reps. When you can’t do any more, drive to full lockout, take a few deep breaths, then squat down one-third of the way, and drive all the way back to lockout. Squeeze your quads hard for a two count in the lockout position, then do another one-third squat, drive to lockout and squeeze. Do as many as you can’six to eight.
To integrate postactivation into the POF quad routine, you alternate sets of lunges and stage squats. Don’t start screaming yet. Remember, you rest about two minutes between sets. Alternating those exercises helps recruit more motor units in the quads, priming your central nervous system for maximum quad-fiber recruitment. Of course, if you have a leg extension machine, you can do stage squats as the first exercise’without the squeezes’rest, do leg extensions, rest and so on. Either way you’ll feel the burn, guaranteed.
3) Time under tension. When bodybuilders realize that higher reps help build quad size, they’ll often start doing some sets of 12 or 15, but they tend to increase the speed to get it over with. Sometimes the reps are so fast, their legs are a blur throughout the set. That defeats the purpose. Higher reps aren’t about numbers; they’re about extending the time under tension, making a set last longer to hit the endurance-oriented fibers, of which the quads have many.
For optimal hypertrophic stimulation you need a variety of rep ranges’up to 60 seconds of tension time for some muscles like quads and calves. If you don’t like higher-rep sets, drop sets can help you achieve extended time under tension. You do a set on which you reach failure at around 10 reps, and then you lower the weight and continue repping out, hitting failure at around eight reps. Two back-to-back sets like those can extend your time under tension, getting you up near 60 seconds’if you use a two-seconds-up/two-seconds-down cadence on most reps. For example, say you’re doing one-leg calf raises. Pick a dumbbell weight that has you hit failure around rep 12. When you can’t do another rep, decrease the weight’either move the pin in your PowerBlock dumbbell or grab a lighter dumbbell’and continue to rep out, hitting failure around rep 10. If you average about three seconds per rep, that’s 66 seconds of tension time. Your calves will feel barbecued.
Okay, those are the concepts. Let’s get to the routine. It should help you better understand POF and postactivation and get you some new growth in your lower body. Remember, you rest about one minute between exercises in a modified postactivation superset.
Quads
Dumbbell lunges (warmup) 1 x 8
Dumbbell squats with quad squeezes (warmup) 1 x 8
Modified P.A. superset
Dumbbell lunges (alternate legs on each rep) 3 x 8-10
Dumbbell stage squats (with quad squeezes) 2 x 10(8)
Sissy squats (no weight) 2 x 10-15
Hamstrings
Dumbbell stiff-legged deadlifts (warmup) 1 x 8
Modified P.A. superset
Dumbbell stiff-legged deadlifts 3 x 8-10
Partner-assisted leg curls 2 x 10-12
Calves and Soleus
One-leg calf raises (drop set) 3 x 12(10)
Seated calf raises (drop set) 2 x 12(10)
Donkey calf raises (speed reps) 1 x 20-25
Keep in mind that if you have a leg extension machine, you can do the dumbbell stage squats first without the squeezes, rest, then do leg extensions, alternating those two movements. You may, however, want to try the routine as it’s listed to give your thigh training a new dimension. If you have a leg curl machine, feel free to use it in place of partner-assisted leg curls, although partner resistance will give you a different mode of attack. Try ‘em sometime. It’s like you’re doing a controlled max single on each rep.
Here are a few performance tips to help you get the most out of the program:
Lunges. Hold a dumbbell in each hand, with your hands hanging at your sides. Step forward with your right leg, allow it to bend at the knee, and touch the knee of your nonworking leg to the floor. Push off with your right leg and bring your right foot back next to your left. Now step forward with your left foot, touching your right knee to the floor. Note that the knee of your working leg shouldn’t protrude past your toes. If it does, you didn’t step out far enough and you could be setting the stage for a knee injury. If you have trouble maintaining your balance as you step forward, you can step back with your nonworking leg instead.
Dumbbell stage squats. After a two-minute rest, grab a dumbbell in each hand, hold them at arm’s length at your sides and squat. Don’t come all the way up, however. Do only the bottom two-thirds of each rep. When you can’t stand the pain, around rep 10, drive all the way to the top. Flex your quads for two seconds, then squat, lowering only one-third of the way down. Drive back to the top, lock your knees, and squeeze your quads for two seconds again. Continue the top reps’and flex on each’till you can’t stand the fire, at around rep eight.
Sissy squats. Stand next to an upright you can hold onto for balance. Squat, keeping your torso and quads on the same plane’like you’re doing the limbo’till your calves meet your hamstrings. You should feel an uncomfortable stretch in your quads at the bottom of each rep, but don’t pause; continue moving. Keep your cadence slow and controlled at all times. You’ll feel the exercise much more and prevent any unnecessary knee stress. Dumbbell stiff-legged deadlifts. With a dumbbell in each hand, holding them in front of your thighs, bend at the waist, keeping a slight bend in your knees and your back flat. As the dumbbells move down your legs, almost touching them, allow your butt to jut back. Reverse the dumbbells’ movement when they reach midshin level, at which point you should feel a slightly uncomfortable stretch in your hamstrings. Stand erect and repeat. Partner-assisted leg curls. After performing a set of stiff-legged deadlifts, rest for one minute, then lie facedown on a flat bench and have your partner loop a towel around your ankles. As you curl your feet toward your butt, your partner supplies the resistance by pulling on the towel. You should pull as hard as you can on each rep, and he or she should allow you enough slack so you get a two-seconds-up/two-seconds-down cadence.
What if you don’t have a partner? You may be able to find one of those cable chest expanders’cables or springs between two handles. Attach one end of a few cables to a post or wall and fashion a foot harness to the other end so you can do cable leg curls. You’ll get more resistance at the top of the movement, but that’s the contracted position you’re concentrating on anyway. Or you can lie facedown on a situp board or inclined flat bench, your head at the high end, hook your feet around a dumbbell and do leg curls. Home trainees have to be like Marines: They have to improvise.
One-leg calf raises. Hold a dumbbell in your right hand and stand on a high calf block or step with your right foot. Hang on to an upright for balance with your free hand. Do as many calf raises as you can’two seconds up, two seconds down’hitting failure around rep 12. Immediately grab a lighter dumbbell’or you may not need any weight at all’and continue to rep out. You should hit failure around rep 10, and the calf burn should be unbearable. Repeat with your left leg.
Seated calf raises. Sit in a chair or on the end of a bench so that when your feet are on a calf block your thighs are parallel to the floor. Hold a dumbbell on its end on each of your lower thighs. PowerBlock selectorized dumbbells and fixed dumbbells have flat ends, so you shouldn’t have a problem keeping them in place. If you have the screw-collar type, you may have to sit them horizontally over your lower thighs. Either way, you’ll probably want to put a towel over your quads for comfort. With the weight in place, rise on your toes to a count of two and lower to a count of two. Don’t pause at the bottom, but do pause for a count at the top to flex your soleus muscles. When you can’t get another rep’around rep 12′lighten the load and continue to rep out, hitting failure around rep 10.
Donkey calf raises (speed reps). You can do these with a partner riding atop your hips’make sure he or she has a good sense of balance’or with a hip belt or dipping belt that allows plates or dumbbells to be suspended from your middle. Bend at the waist so your legs and torso form a 90 degree angle, your upper body parallel to the floor and your lower arms resting on a high bench or table. Your feet should be on a high calf block. Begin doing reps as quickly as you can’about a half second for each phase of every rep. Shoot for 20 to 25 reps, or until the burn and fatigue in your calves are too much. Speed reps help hit the calf fibers in a unique way and make for a searing final pump.
There you have it, a precise leg program that will pack your thighs, hamstrings and calves with new mass’and you can do it in a home gym with nothing but dumbbells and a little ingenuity. You don’t have to squat heavy for low reps to build great legs, but you do have to withstand some pain. Hey, nobody said it was gonna be easy. Just be thankful you don’t have to squat for 10 minutes straight with a heavy barbell digging into your back. Note: You can use the above routine for leg specialization in the programs provided in ‘Bodybuilding for Dumbbells’ in the February ’02 IRONMAN. Simply put the new leg workout in place of the quad, hamstring and calf exercises listed. You may want to decrease sets for a few other exercises in the workout as well to compensate for the extra leg sets.
Editor’s note: For more on PowerBlock selectorized dumbbells, see page 219 of the July ’02 IRONMAN. For more on POF, see page 169. To order equipment, books or videos, call Home Gym Warehouse at 1-800-447-0008 or visit www.home-gym.com. IM
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