The following details my primary leg workout from this past Saturday morning at Kirkland Gold’s Gym. As of this workout I was officially three weeks out from the Olympia. Perhaps it was the impending competition, but this workout straight up destroyed my legs. The workout was programmed by John Meadows, but I made a couple modifications. Here is the workout…
Lying Leg Curls
Set 1 x 15 reps with 50lbs
Set 2 x 12 reps with 65lbs
Set 3 x 10 reps with 80lbs
Set 4 x 8 reps with 140lbs
Set 5 x 8 reps with 140lbs
Set 6 x 8 reps with 140lbs
*The goal here today was to perform a few warm-up sets and then proceed with 3 pretty heavy sets of 8 reps rest pause style. This means you will allow the weight to rest on the stack briefly before engaging your hamstrings and curling up forcefully.
Leg Press
At this point in my contest prep I shouldn’t be going super-heavy, but I felt really good on this today and set a PR on this particular leg press. Unfortunately it meant the plates kept falling off so I strapped them on with a Slingshot Band and a resistance band, lol.
Set 1 x 20 reps with 2 plates/side
Set 2 x 20 reps with 3 plates/side
Set 3 x 20 reps with 4 plates/side
Set 4 x 15 reps (low foot placement) with 5 plates/side
Set 5 x 15 reps (low foot placement) with 6 plates/side
Set 6 x 12 reps (medium foot placement) with 7 plates/side
Set 7 x 12 reps (medium foot placement) with 8 plates/side
Set 8 x 8 reps (higher foot placement) with 9 plates/side
Set 9 x 8 reps (higher foot placement) with 10 plates/side
Set 10 x 8 reps (higher foot placement) with 10 plates/side
*The key here is to work up in weight until you get to something that will make for a tough set of 15 reps. At that point perform 2 sets of 15 with a low and narrow foot placement. Note: keep going up in weight each set. Your next two sets will be for 12 reps with your feet about 1-2 inches higher, but still narrow. The last two sets will be with your feet higher still by an inch or two and toes pointed slightly outward for sets of 8 reps. I felt so good I added one extra set of 8 reps.
Here is a video:
[youtube=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BFWlFZKgnlk]
Superset: Hip Thrusters/Glute Bridges & Walking Lunges
John called for Bulgarian Split Squats here, but they can jack up my lower back when I use weight due to my hips not remaining perfectly square throughout the movement. Therefore, to target the same muscle groups I choose to superset Hip Thrusters with Walking Lunges and it proved to be fun!
Hip Thrusters x 15 reps with 135lbs
Immediately followed by…
Walking Lunges x 10 steps each foot with bodyweight only
*The key on the Hip Thrusters is to hold the contraction for a full 3 second count at the top while flexing your glutes and hamstrings as hard as possible. Do this on the first 10 reps and then finish the set by pumping out the final 5 reps. Your glutes should be on fire as you immediately go to walking lunges. Ensure the eccentric on the lunges is very slow and controlled, pausing at the bottom before taking your next step. Perform this superset for 3 rounds.
Reverse Banded Hack Squats
John called for Barbell Back Squats, but I opted for Hack Squats instead – FYI.
Set 1 x 8 reps with 2 plates/side
Set 2 x 8 reps with 3 plates/side
Set 3 x 8 reps with 4 plates/side
Set 4 x 8 reps with 5 plates/side
*Simply perform sets of 8 reps going up in weight until you can barely get all 8.
That concluded my primary leg workout. Despite the simplicity, this workout actually trashed my legs – enjoy!
Train hard!
Mark