Leg Days

As you all know I am in the middle of training for my first figure competition. I am still in the "BULKING" stage of my training. Due to the fact that I have a restricted diet because of my food allergies, it's been harder for me to put on mass.

Currently I am on a 3 day on, one day off split.
And it goes a little something like this...Legs, Upper Body Push, Upper Body Pull, followed by a rest day and then back to legs!
As you may have heard, training for your first show is full of trial and error.
You try something and if it doesn't work, you try something else.
When doing uni-lateral leg training I was definitely making huge strength gains, I just wasn't getting the muscle density that I needed. Coach Nick Tumminello changed my programming to bi lateral leg exercises so that I could get the size I needed before I lean out! He knows what he's doing.....it's working.

Thanks to some serious hard work, I have a newly found ASS; which I appreciate greatly :)
My quads, hamstrings and calves have definitely developed as well.

I am lifting HEAVY and sticking to the basics. Bottom line---The basics work. You just have to do them with CORRECT FORM! Here are a few tips for some of my lower body favorites.

When I am Front and Back Squatting I make sure to sit back with my butt rather than thinking that the squat initiates with a knee bend. From my days as a HARDSTYLE kettlebeller I think about driving my heels straight through the floor and envision spreading my heels apart as I lower and lift the weight.

When I am Romanian style Dead lifting, I make sure to keep the bar as close to my legs as possible on the way up and down and I keep a nice flat back.

As I discussed in my previous post...YOUR WARM-UP is the MOST IMPORTANT part of your workout!

I also wanted to share with you a great warm-up for a lower body workout :)



I begin with a kneeling hip flexor stretch for :30 and then I twist into it for another :30. Totaling 1 min on each side. With this I begin to open my hip flexors and engage my stabilizing glute.

I then move to lunges with arms extended overhead. With this exercise I continue to open my hips and activate my glutes but I also get some nice thoracic extension.

Moving on to activate my lateral stabilizers I perform 1 min of exercise on each leg (beginning with an isometric hold and then continuing on to dynamic lunges)

Up next I perform 1 minute of climbers in the upper push up position. I slowly bring my right knee into my chest keeping tension with my left leg and vice versa. All the while engaging the stabilizers of my shoulders, my entire core, glutes and hip flexors.

I flip myself on over and come into a static hip extension. I add in some abduction with alternating hip extensions getting some crazy glute min med activation!!!!

Next comes the tamed down version of a single leg burpee. Here I focus on driving through my heel and getting my whole posterior chain involved (a single leg dead lift of sorts)

I finish up my warm-up with some isometric squat holds(continuing on to dynamic squats) with big time thoracic extension. I want to make sure that the glutes and hips are active along with my erectors and paraspinals being lit up for my squats!

GO AHEAD GIVE IT A TRY :)))