Tone Your Legs

The significance of legs are often overlooked until a problem arises. Legs carry the whole weight of the human body and are of utmost importance. While working on your upper body do not ignore the legs or minimize their importance. The glutes are equally important along with the leg muscles to give grace and strength to the lower body.

The 3 main groups of leg muscles are the hamstrings, calves and quadriceps. Each set of these muscles need to be exercised to keep them supple and lean and also given strength workouts to gain power.

Leg press, leg extensions, dumbbell lunges and squats exercise the quadriceps.

Squatting with a weight on your shoulders to increase muscle strength. The trick is to have a weight that is neither too heavy or too light and carry out the squat properly, stopping movement while at the lowest position of the squat, pausing halfway through rising up and then repeating the cycle.. It should give an adequate load for the leg muscles and the weight can be progressively be increased as days pass and muscles are able to bear more weight. Hamstrings are also required to be given adequate workouts to take load stress. Hamstrings are trained using leg curl machine, lying leg curls by lying face down and lifting weights up. Still legged dead lifts also help strengthen hamstrings.

Calves are the next group of muscles of the leg which need to be strengthened using standing calf raise, leg press, calf extensions and standing one legged calf raise.  These are simple exercises one can do at home  by standing on the toes and raising oneself with only the calf muscles.

The glutes are equally important. One legged barbell squats will strengthen and tone up the glutes. Stand on only one leg with the other placed on a chair or a bench behind. Hold up barbells across your shoulders and bend the leg you are standing on to a squat position, going as low as you can and then slowly raising yourself up. Alternate the legs to attain symmetrical development. Spacing out the legs will also exercise hamstrings and quadriceps.

Have you ever tried jogging with a weight on your shoulder? If you do not have the time to go jogging outside you can do it in your home, jogging in one spot with weights on shoulders. You can vary this exercise by raising the thighs to right angles to the body in front and then bending the leg at the knee so that your heel touches the back of the thigh.  Another way to gain supple leg muscles is lie down on your back and cycle your legs in the air which also helps abdominal muscles.

Another great way to exercise those leg muscles is to climb stairs. Try climbing resting weight of your legs only on the front of the foot.  Vary this routine by trying to climb two stairs at a time. Varying the speed will give a cardio workout too.  Rotate these exercises with exercises for other parts of the body so that muscles get rest in between.

Finally the most classical form of leg exercise is running/jogging.  Take some time out of your day to put in about 30 minutes for a workout.  It will strengthen your legs while at the same time  improve your stamina and strengthen the blood pumping ability of your heart.