Leg Exercise Progressions

There is no need for a list of the "10 Best Leg Exercises" when you understand how to select, progress, and regress exercises to fit your current abilities and optimize progress toward your goals. A sample program and an AI Program Generator are also included in the course. This course is built from a comprehensive systematic research review to ensure unparalleled accuracy, and research is also used to bust several common leg exercise myths:

• Are deeper squats better?
• Does hip anatomy affect foot placement?
• Unstable loads or unstable surfaces?
• Are unstable surfaces appropriate for power goals?

Course Introduction

This course discusses variations, progressions, and regressions of leg exercises for increasing lower body strength. More sophisticated leg workouts and leg day routines can be created with multiple variations of squats, split squats, lateral lunges, single leg exercises, bodyweight leg exercises, etc. Note that bridge progressions for glutes, deadlifts for hips, and reactive drills for foot placement, are covered in separate courses. Further, the optimal number of sets/exercise , exercises/session , and sessions/week , are also covered in separate courses.

This course features more functional movement patterns for improving leg strength than the leg presses, hack squats, leg curls (seated leg curls and prone hamstring curls), leg extensions (knee extensions), and/or other machines found in a gym setting that claim to "target" the glutes, hips muscles, or calf muscles. Further, this course includes detailed cueing, including foot placement during a squat (e.g. hips or feet shoulder width), how to tell the correct distance between the right and left foot during a reverse lunge, what to do with the left leg when doing a right leg single leg deadlift touchdown, or the optimal starting position for the hips during a dumbbell front squat. This course will provide a variety of ideas and concepts to use on leg day, during the leg workout portion of your routine, or during leg day home workouts.

Additionally, this course covers the functional anatomy of leg exercises for lower body strength, including the contribution of the hip muscles (e.g. glutes a.k.a. gluteus maximus and gluteus medius), knee muscles (e.g. quadriceps), ankle muscles (e.g. gastrocnemius and soleus), and core muscles (e.g. erector spinae, obliques, hip flexors, etc.). More advanced anatomical considerations include the contribution of core subsystems (e.g. deep longitudinal subsystem ), the use of lower body strength exercises during neuromuscular re-education (a.k.a. integration exercises), and the potential of over-active hip flexors or calf muscles to restrict motion and decrease performance. Further, this course is built from a systematic research review, it is pre-approved for credits toward the Certified Personal Trainer (CPT) Certification, and pre-approved for continuing education credits for movement professionals (personal trainers, fitness instructors, physical therapists, athletic trainers, massage therapists, chiropractors, occupational therapists, etc.).

We hope this course inspires the inclusion of leg exercises for all goals in fitness, performance, and physical rehabilitation. For example, workouts for increasing glute and hamstring hypertrophy for physique athletes, routines to increase single-leg strength for powerlifters and field sport athletes, and the creation of home exercise programs for maintaining mobility, core strength, and reconditioning after lower extremity injury in a clinical setting.

Sample Lower Body Program for an Athlete

Routine 1 (4-8 weeks)

Goal: Lower Body Hypertrophy (Strength/Stability Supersets)

Acute Variables:

• Load: Moderate (75-90% 1-RM)/Light (60-75% 1-RM)
• Reps/set: 6-12/6-12
• Sets/exercise (or circuits): 1-5 circuits
• Rest between exercises: 60 seconds
• Rest between Circuits: 1-3 minutes (alternatively, can be performed in a circuit)
• Training time: 20 – 60 minutes (excluding warm-up).

Strength/Stability Super-sets Routine:

• Strength: Deadlift with Posterior Pull
• Stability: Transverse Plane Wobble Lunge
• Active Rest (Corrective, mobility not appropriate): Tibialis Posterior Activation

Routine 2 (4-8 weeks)

Acute Variables:

• Goal: Lower Body Max Strength/Power (Post-activation Potentiation Circuits)
• Load: (Heavy > 85% of 1-RM) (Light < 30% of 1-RM
• Reps/set: (1-5)(3-10)
• Sets/exercise (circuits): 2-6 circuits
• Rest between exercises: 1-2 minutes (note, exercise performed in circuit)
• Training Time: 20 – 45 minutes (excluding warm-up).

Max Strength Circuit Routine:

• Max Strength: Back Squat
• Active Rest (Core): Ball Plank
• Power: Depth Jump
• Active Rest (corrective/mobility not appropriate): Tibialis Anterior Activation