My legs are weak and don't get stronger.. help!

RWD, dude, you just said you are making ****ty gains on your legs doing 11-15 sets, but you are making huge gains with 3 sets on your other body parts. You answered your own question.

Here's a few suggestions:
1) Lower the number of sets/exercises for your legs. Try to keep the number of sets between 6-8 using 1 or 2 exercises total (i.e. Squats and Stiff legged dead lifts)
(paired with)
2) Using a more moderate rep range like 6-8/8-10...or if you really like pyramid sets (10, 8, 6, 4)

3) Since you work legs twice a week, make one a high weight day while the other is a med/high rep day

or finally...
4) Use different movements between the 2 days you work legs...
-day 1- squats/stiff legged deads...etc
-day 2- front squats/split squats/lunges...etc
 
realworksuks said:
I'm actually eating around 5,000 calories per day Mreik, maybe even more than a big dude like you :p

Phate: if you would have read my whole post you would have seen that I am doing around 15 sets for legs... if you count deadlifts as legs, if not around 11.

I REALLY don't want to go back to a full body workout... my gains have been huuuuge in all of my other muscles with this split, so I want to stick with it.

I can't imagine I would be making the same gains without this much attention to each muscle group.

I am pretty sure I am not overtraining... I think you have to workout pretty damn intensely to overtrain... 4 days a week ... i've seen people do a lot more than that. Plus I feel great ALL THE TIME!

Mreik... I am definitely going to take your suggestion and scrap the lunges and add in the extensions... lunges are hard as hell.... they are great on the glutes and quads, though.

I think I will give a go at more volume as well.... do you think that two days a week will be enough days to do high volume training? Or should I add in a third leg day per week?

Oh, and why stop the pyramid? Just go light weight/high volume for four sets each exercise or something?
Click to expand...

Wow you are eating a hell of a lot, 4500 is my max.. 2 days/wk is plenty, I wouldn't go any higher than that. Just warm up, and go balls to the wall for 2 sets and believe me you'll improve. With 5k calories, you could do any leg exercises and grow, just give it some time.. Gains are made with consistency.
 
LeiYunFat said:
Way more accessory lifts. More ab work at the end, more unilateral work, more back work.

Rule #1.) Your lower back isn't strong enough.
Rule #2.) Your lower back still isn't strong enough :D

Do all the stuff you hate to do. If you hate front squats enough to where you only back squat, front squat.

Hate RDL's? Do them more.

Rotate the exercises you do. For instance, don't DL for 10 weeks straight, do a handful of weeks with rack pulls, then with snatch grip deads, etc...
Click to expand...

Ok, let me dissect this post...

More accessory lifts... I already do lat pull downs, shrugs, rowing, bent over rows, etc.

What you mean by do more accessory lifts is basically strengthen your back right?

I have never heard the term "unilateral work" can you explain what you mean by that?

And I don't know what RDL's, rack pulls, or snatch grip deadlifts are...:eek: I will see if I can find that out.
 
xtonymarsx said:
RWD, dude, you just said you are making ****ty gains on your legs doing 11-15 sets, but you are making huge gains with 3 sets on your other body parts. You answered your own question.

Here's a few suggestions:
1) Lower the number of sets/exercises for your legs. Try to keep the number of sets between 6-8 using 1 or 2 exercises total (i.e. Squats and Stiff legged dead lifts)
(paired with)
2) Using a more moderate rep range like 6-8/8-10...or if you really like pyramid sets (10, 8, 6, 4)

3) Since you work legs twice a week, make one a high weight day while the other is a med/high rep day

or finally...
4) Use different movements between the 2 days you work legs...
-day 1- squats/stiff legged deads...etc
-day 2- front squats/split squats/lunges...etc
Click to expand...

I never said I do 3 sets for my other body parts... did I? If I did say that I didn't mean too.

I see no reason why lowering the number of sets would give me better progress...

I like your suggestion of switching up the reps and weights...

Also I really like your last suggestion about having two different leg day routines... I'll have to come up with something.
 
The only reason I would have more than one leg routine is if I found too many exercises or two different ways of training that I couldn't put into the same day. IMO find a routine that works, then worry about developing another.
 
realworksuks said:
Ok, let me dissect this post...

More accessory lifts... I already do lat pull downs, shrugs, rowing, bent over rows, etc.
Click to expand...

Actually, I messed up. Accessory lifts are different than supplemental lifts. I thought they were the same thing, they are not. THe point is though, you need to train the same muscle groups many different ways, with many different exercises.

The rules are more about low back work. Good mornings, reverse hyperextensions, back extensions, Glute-ham raises, cable pull-throughs, anything else where you're pulling off the ground...




What you mean by do more accessory lifts is basically strengthen your back right?
Click to expand...

I mean strengthen the muscle group using a variety of different exercises. For instance, a lot of the same muscles that are involved in a back squat are involved in a front squat. But they are not all emphasized the same way. This is good, especially if your weakness is in your quads. In a deadlift, the back and hams need to work a great deal. So to train those muscles, you do good mornings. Different leverages, different stablization, different just about everything.

I have never heard the term "unilateral work" can you explain what you mean by that?
Click to expand...

Single leg work. Bulgarian squats, step ups, lunges, single leg ham curls, pistols, etc.

And I don't know what RDL's, rack pulls, or snatch grip deadlifts are...:eek: I will see if I can find that out.
Click to expand...

They are all basically variations of the deadlift movement. RDL's emphasize the hamstrings. Rack pulls are deadlifts with the bar raise off the ground, so they have a decreased ROM. They help you practice locking out and are less taxing than regular deads. Snatch grip pulls are the opposite of a rack pull. You spread your grip wider and increase your ROM. This is used to help your strength off the floor. It also kills your grip.

elitefts.com

Read the articles. If you continue on this path, you're going to have to go through a looot of real work. Cause that's what this is-- just real, hard, work. Doin the **** you HATE to do. And you better believe that it sucks :D
 
LeiYunFat said:
Actually, I messed up. Accessory lifts are different than supplemental lifts. I thought they were the same thing, they are not. THe point is though, you need to train the same muscle groups many different ways, with many different exercises.

The rules are more about low back work. Good mornings, reverse hyperextensions, back extensions, Glute-ham raises, cable pull-throughs, anything else where you're pulling off the ground...

I mean strengthen the muscle group using a variety of different exercises. For instance, a lot of the same muscles that are involved in a back squat are involved in a front squat. But they are not all emphasized the same way. This is good, especially if your weakness is in your quads. In a deadlift, the back and hams need to work a great deal. So to train those muscles, you do good mornings. Different leverages, different stablization, different just about everything.

Single leg work. Bulgarian squats, step ups, lunges, single leg ham curls, pistols, etc.

They are all basically variations of the deadlift movement. RDL's emphasize the hamstrings. Rack pulls are deadlifts with the bar raise off the ground, so they have a decreased ROM. They help you practice locking out and are less taxing than regular deads. Snatch grip pulls are the opposite of a rack pull. You spread your grip wider and increase your ROM. This is used to help your strength off the floor. It also kills your grip.

elitefts.com

Read the articles. If you continue on this path, you're going to have to go through a looot of real work. Cause that's what this is-- just real, hard, work. Doin the **** you HATE to do. And you better believe that it sucks :D
Click to expand...

oiy, your a really smart dude. I can't comprehend most of what your saying:bncry:

reading your post makes me want to split up my lower body day, though. It usually takes me around 1.5 hours with warm ups and stretches included, and to get more back work in there would take a long ass time.

We don't have a free squat bar in the gym, so I am not sure how many of the exercises you listed I could do (I honestly don't know what most are, I tried to look most up), the glute ham raises I use to do back in middle school and high school, but my college gym doesn't have the necessary equipment.

Speaking of back work, when I do my rowing I can never feel my back working... why would this be?

But anyway, to summarize your post, to get stronger legs I have to get a stronger LOWER back, and to do this I need to work it in many different ways. right?

Why just lower back?

Thanks !

EDIT: Oh, and by the way, are there any particularly excellent articles on the site you listed? There's so many I don't know where to start!
 
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realworksuks said:
oiy, your a really smart dude. I can't comprehend most of what your saying:bncry:
Click to expand...

It's good you don't, since you're a beginner. I would be more worried if you knew all this but were still stuck in the same situation, so don't sweat it.

reading your post makes me want to split up my lower body day, though. It usually takes me around 1.5 hours with warm ups and stretches included, and to get more back work in there would take a long ass time.
Click to expand...

If you don't have anything better to do, why? Try writing out your split, we can probably help you streamline it if it's taking too long.

We don't have a free squat bar in the gym, so I am not sure how many of the exercises you listed I could do (I honestly don't know what most are, I tried to look most up), the glute ham raises I use to do back in middle school and high school, but my college gym doesn't have the necessary equipment.
Click to expand...

There are two components to a GHR. Hip flexion, and knee flexion. Doing a hip flexion exercise like good mornings or deadlifts will take care of one component. Leg curls will take care of the other.

Speaking of back work, when I do my rowing I can never feel my back working... why would this be?
Click to expand...

It could be a lot of things. Wrong angle is the first that comes to mind. What kind of rows? Cable, bent over, dumbell? Now that I think of it, actually, I hardly ever feel my back "working" in terms of burning...but pulling is pulling. If you're pulling, you're using your back. Just keep doing it.

But anyway, to summarize your post, to get stronger legs I have to get a stronger LOWER back, and to do this I need to work it in many different ways. right?



Why just lower back?

Thanks !
Click to expand...

Well, the thing about the lower back is, hardly anyone has one that's very strong. So right there it's already set up as an imbalance to cause weakness. And the thing with a lot of lower back exercises like good mornings is, they also blast the hamstrings. So stronger back=>stronger hams=>stronger legs.

It's always good to continue strengthening your back, no matter what your weakness will be 10 years down the road. So questions like "How do I get stronger legs?" Are kind of too general. The answer will be to work them harder/better. This kind of questioning is just going to go in circles.

Instead, a good way to gauge your leg strength is to measure your squat and deadlift. If you're putting up more weight, your legs are stronger. So think in terms of, "what do I need to do to bring up my squat and deadlift?" The answer will be "eliminate your weakness". The thing is knowing to recognize your weakness.


EDIT: Oh, and by the way, are there any particularly excellent articles on the site you listed? There's so many I don't know where to start!
Click to expand...

Just keep reading. If it totally goes over your head, try another one :D.

Personally I didn't "get" what I was reading at Elite until reading a bunch here and on T-nation.com, and watching EliteFTS's videos on Youtube. But that isn't to say you shouldn't read it. Just keep reading, if you have any questions on what you're reading just shoot us some questions.
 
I would like to do good mornings... we don't have a free squat rack though, how should I do them? dumbells? Use one of those bent bicep curl bars?

My split is this:

Upper day
Bench press (usually 4-5 sets with warm up)
incline dumbell bench press (2 sets at most)
pec fly's (2 sets at most)
shoulder work (side raises, front raises, and a variation of the two, all in succession but only doing 15 times total for each arm, so 5,5,5, etc.)
Military press (3 sets usually)
Shrugs (4 sets)
chin ups (2 sets)
bicep curls on the bench (2 sets)
skull crushers (triceps, 2 sets)
tricep raises? (2 sets)
wrist curls (3 sets)

phew, the upper body day is my easy day.

Lower body day:
Squat (4 sets)
Deadlift (4 sets)
split squats (3 sets)
cable rows (4 sets)
lat pull downs or pullups or a combo (3 sets)
bent over rows (3 sets)
leg press (3-4 sets)
calf raises on the smith machine (3 sets)
hamstring curls (3 sets)
anterior deltoid row machine (2-3 sets... I realized today that this shouldn't go here really, but it works the lats and back too... so I dunno)
rowing machine (horizontal bar, 2-3 sets)
Weighted Crunches (4-5 sets)

Sometimes I do one set on the inner/outer thigh machine.. and I am going to add in the leg raises for more quad work, and I want to get the good mornings in there.

So I am not sure, I think it'd be cool to split my lower body day into two days, do just legs one day and then do back and lats the next...

thoughts?

Thanks so much for everything!
 
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Don't just throw GMs and some other quad movement in there haphazardly. It looks to me like you've got just a bunch of exercises thrown in there. Have you thought about alternating your squat and deadlift as your main lower body movements? Work up to 5 RM or 3RM and then use the Bulgarian squats as a unilateral movement and then finish it up with a posterior chain movement like pull throughs?

Go look at the Defranco has his set up.

You could easily do this-
Work up to a 3RM on your front squat/deadlift/back squat/zercher over 6-8 sets
Bulgarian squat/1 leg leg press/bb step up 3-4X12-16 steps
RDL/back ext/rev hyper/pull throughs 3-5X8-15
some abs

I think your upper day looks weird

Why don't you have 1 paired pressing and pulling movement (5-6 sets)
1 paired assistant pressing and pulling movement (3 sets)
Run a circuit with 1 movement front anterior delts, rear delts, biceps, and triceps at 2 setsX12-20 reps

On your
 
evolution said:
Don't just throw GMs and some other quad movement in there haphazardly. It looks to me like you've got just a bunch of exercises thrown in there. Have you thought about alternating your squat and deadlift as your main lower body movements? Work up to 5 RM or 3RM and then use the Bulgarian squats as a unilateral movement and then finish it up with a posterior chain movement like pull throughs?

Go look at the Defranco has his set up.

You could easily do this-
Work up to a 3RM on your front squat/deadlift/back squat/zercher over 6-8 sets
Bulgarian squat/1 leg leg press/bb step up 3-4X12-16 steps
RDL/back ext/rev hyper/pull throughs 3-5X8-15
some abs

I think your upper day looks weird

Why don't you have 1 paired pressing and pulling movement (5-6 sets)
1 paired assistant pressing and pulling movement (3 sets)
Run a circuit with 1 movement front anterior delts, rear delts, biceps, and triceps at 2 setsX12-20 reps

On your
Click to expand...

I see.. good info.

I am guessing by paired pressing and pulling movement you mean for a particular muscle group? Or do you just mean in general?

How could I get a push/pull in there? I am pressing on everthing except biceps and wrist curls.. maybe some of the front raises or something would be considered pulling, I don't know.

I do run circuits with my biceps and triceps, I alternate them for four sets.
 
Karky said:
there's your problem right there.
You simply can't squat correctly on the smith machine.
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It's funny you would mention that because I made that assumption right before I went to the gym today.

I threw out the squat and took a variety of everyone's suggestions and changed my routine... here is what I did, in this order.

Leg extensions and leg curls circuit 3 sets of 20 (higher volume, slower reps)

Cable pull throughs 3 sets of 10, I actually did this inbetween my leg extensions and curls, so it was part of the circuit... more on this later.

Deadlifts 3 sets of 10

Leg Press 3 sets of 20-25 (slow reps, taking about 45-60 seconds per set)

Seated cable rows, I alternated this with leg press, 4 sets of 10

Lat Pull down/split squat/oblique machine/weighted crunches circuit 3 sets of ten for the first 2, 4 on the oblique machine, and 5 on the crunches.

Also I mixed in two more sets of the cable pullthroughs because I really loved that lift and had never done it before.

It took me 1.5 hours still but this was a really good workout! I felt my quads a lot more during the extensions than I did when I use to squat... the cable crossovers felt great! And the deadlifts were awesome.. everything felt really good. I threw out a few of the lifts I was doing before... took out the bent over rows and squats... I forgot to do calf raises but I meant too.

I was wiped out after this workout, though, my heart rate was high throughout the whole workout...

so I took some suggestions from everybody and changed my routine... so now I think we should look at it again cuz it probably still sucks... hah.
 
So what are you planning now?

I think on your old routine you didn't have enough volume for the legs. Sure, it's a lot of exercises, but if you take out the lat stuff and rear delt stuff, that's only like 4 or 5 exercises for your legs.

I think your upper day is set up poorly. You might see better gains from taking all those lat and rear delt exercises on day 2 and putting them with day 1. So it would look more like this

bench
chin
shoulder press
row
shoulder raise
then your arm/pec fly circut
shrugs
ab work

Personally that's a lot of exercises and I wouldn't do so many. But that's just me, you said your recovery is good so there you go.

Your newer lower day looked okay. But your exercise order was off. And you need more unilateral work.
3.)Leg extensions and leg curls circuit 3 sets of 20 (higher volume, slower reps)

4.)Cable pull throughs 3 sets of 10, I actually did this inbetween my leg extensions and curls, so it was part of the circuit... more on this later.

1.) Deadlifts 3 sets of 10

2.)Leg Press 3 sets of 20-25 (slow reps, taking about 45-60 seconds per set)

Seated cable rows, I alternated this with leg press, 4 sets of 10

5.)Lat Pull down/split squat/oblique machine/weighted crunches circuit 3 sets of ten for the first 2, 4 on the oblique machine, and 5 on the crunches.
Click to expand...
 
Let's slow down for a bit, you've been on a ketogenic diet since you started your legs and are complaining about making slow progress? And you just started eating 5kkcal? Give it more time before you change everything up and use weapons that don't need to be utilized yet.
 
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