Introduction
Unfortunately, a training of the leg muscles is often neglected. But this is also part of a fit and healthy body. In the following some exercises are presented.
Exercises without equipment
- A classic among the training exercises for the leg muscles is the leg press. This exercise is a good alternative to the knee bends and is especially suitable for beginners. Depending on the machine, the exercise is performed sitting or lying down and the shoulders are brought under the rolls.
From the starting position, the legs are stretched and it is pushed off the floor plate. Exhale and make sure that the legs are not completely stretched and remain slightly bent. Afterwards the weight is slowly released without putting it down completely.
This exercise mainly trains the front thigh muscles. Also involved are gluteal muscles, adductors and leg curlers. – A further exercise are lunge steps with the barbell.
The barbell is placed on the neck muscles and is grasped with the hands. The leg to be trained is placed offset with a large lunge. The upper body is lowered by bending the front leg until the knee of the stretched leg almost touches the floor.
Now the leg is stretched again (not extended) and returned to the starting position. When performing with a barbell you need a good sense of balance. The back and torso should remain straight during the entire lunge.
The muscles used are the four-headed thigh muscle and the gluteus muscle. Variations can be incorporated by the step size. With a large step width, the gluteal and leg flexors are particularly stressed, and with a smaller step width, the quadriceps thigh muscle is particularly stressed.
- Leg bending or leg curls sitting is an exercise that is performed lying down on a specific bench. The athlete is lying on a bench with the legs clamped behind two rollers. For the arms there are usually two handles on the bench, which provide a good fixation possibility.
From this starting position the knees are now bent so that the heels come as close as possible to the buttocks. Then the legs are returned to the starting position. The muscles used here are the calf muscles, and mostly all parts of the back of the leg. The foot position can be used to vary the exercise so that different accentuations are created. Tightened feet shift the stress more to the twin calf muscles and stretched feet more to the leg bizeps.
Exercises with equipment
Other leg exercises on the machine or in the gym are calf lifting, sitting or lying, cross lifting and knee bending. – Abduction on the machine: This exercise, performed while sitting, trains the gluteus maximus (the large gluteal muscle). The athlete sits on the machine and has the legs with the shins in front of the pads.
Now the legs are pushed outwards as far as possible and then brought together again without letting the weight go. This exercise strengthens the upper part of the hip and thus also stabilizes the legs. – The training of the adductors also takes place on the machine and works in reverse to abduction in the machine.
Again sitting, the legs are now placed behind the pads, spread wide apart. Now the thighs are brought together against the resistance and then brought back into the starting position in a controlled manner. Here again, the weight is not put off.
The strained muscles, the adductors, are located on the inner side of the thighs and are the primary muscle strain in this exercise. – Another well-known exercise is leg stretching. The starting position is sitting on the corresponding training equipment and the feet are positioned under the padded rollers.
The hands grasp the handles or the seat to fix the thigh. Now the legs are stretched completely until they are in a horizontal position (exhale). Then the legs are bent again and returned to the starting position.
The weight is only put down when all repetitions have been performed. The muscles used in this exercise are the leg extensors, or the front and rear thigh muscles. The more the backrest is tilted backwards, the more the pelvis is tilted backwards. This leads to the thigh muscle of the thigh being stretched more and thus also being stressed more.