leg exercises

Do you want to sculpt strong and toned legs? If yes, these Leg Exercises are for you!

As a woman, leg day is most likely going to be your biggest workout day. That’s because generally speaking, women tend to be stronger in their lower body when compared to their upper body. It’s not the case for everyone, but it will be the case for most. This is good news, because your legs contain some of your largest muscle groups, so this will help you to fast track the metabolism boosting benefits of weightlifting.

Want those benefits? Then these Leg Exercises will help get you there. And if you’re looking for something else, check out our entire exercise database broken down by muscle group here.

The purpose of the exercises on this page is not to be an exhaustive list of all Leg Exercises, it is simply here to offer you some suggestions that you may not have considered in your workout plans already. Use these exercises as an “add on” to your existing plan, or combine them with some exercises from our other muscle group categories to make yourself a full plan.

Leg Exercises Benefits

Building muscle and strength into your legs is arguably the best thing you can do for yourself. Strong legs will help you to improve your performance on all functional movements, both in the gym and in your everyday life. It will enhance your performance in the gym and support your overall balance and stability. With strong legs you can walk, run, jump, lunge and lift better.

Aesthetically, training legs will reward you with a strong, toned and shapely lower body.

What Muscles Make Up Your Legs?

As mentioned above, your legs contain some of your largest muscle groups, this includes your glutes, quads (front thigh muscles responsible for knee extension), hamstrings (back thigh muscles responsible for knee flexion and extension), calves (responsible for ankle plantar flexion), hip abductors and adductors (responsible for moving your hip out to the side and back).

Why Do Leg Exercises?

Unless there is something physically stopping you, Leg Exercises are a must do. You will be missing out on some very powerful moves if you don’t train legs. This is your opportunity to build strength, mass, shape and endurance into your lower body. Strong legs don’t just look stunning, they will also help you to develop more explosive power which can be beneficial both in the gym and in your everyday life.

One of the many unseen benefits of training legs regularly is the increase in metabolism. Remember, these are your largest muscle groups where you can move the most weight. Take advantage of this so that you can build more lean muscle and boost your metabolism.

How Often Should I Do Leg Exercises?

That’s up to you, we recommend at least once per week, keeping in mind that the more you train the faster your results. BUT do not overtrain as this will not benefit you and could lead to injury. You should allow at least one day between Leg Exercises where you are focused on a different muscle group entirely or resting.

What Equipment Is Best For Leg Exercises?

The Queen of Leg Exercises is the Squat, and of course this is performed with a barbell. Generally speaking; barbell exercises get the fastest results, because they allow you to move the most weight. That’s not to say you shouldn’t use dumbbells, cables, machines and bodyweight, all types of equipment have their place. Start with the barbell exercises and work your way down through dumbbells, then onto the assisted/less intense exercises using cables, machines and bodyweight.

What Are The Most Effective Leg Exercises?

Think of all Leg Exercises as part of a bigger picture, because the fact is, there is no one, two or three exercises that act as a magic ingredient. Of course there are many staples that you should include, such as some of the many squat variations, but you should also consider a wider range of different compound and isolation exercises that use both free weights, cables and bodyweight.

How Can I Use These Leg Exercises To My Advantage?

An Added Boost to Your Existing Plan

As with all exercises in our database, you are encouraged to use them to enhance your existing workout, by picking out exercises for the muscle groups you want to grow and adding them to your current routine.

Build Complete Workouts

You may also make yourself a full weekly workout rotation with these exercises, but that will require some critical thinking on your part. We can give you the exercises, there is a lot of information on each individual exercise page for you to work with. But it’s up to you to take that information and use it to build the best workout plans for you. With experience this will get easier.

Building a Workout Basics

When you create a workout plan for yourself, you should start with a general plan of which muscle groups you will train on each day. If you are a beginner, keep it simple with an upper/lower body split. Intermediate and advanced lifters will move to rotate muscle groups or other methods such as push, pull, legs.

Once you know how you will train on each day, choose a key compound exercise to start with. For the sake of simplicity, let’s say you’re planning a lower body or leg workout plan. The most obvious exercise to start with is a Squat, if you don’t want to squat, you can start with a Deadlift or a Lunge. A good weightlifting workout plan always starts with a compound barbell exercise, you should work your way down through freeweight, cable and machine exercises, finishing up on bodyweight exercises all focused on the target muscle group.

Progress

Always make sure that you push yourself out of your comfort zone, as soon as you feel like you are breezing through your workout with ease, it’s time to switch things up. There are 3 things you can do in this instance:

Lift more
Change your rep/set method
Change your plan

Essentially, you should do all 3, but one thing at a time. The most sustainable results come from incremental changes over time.

Consistency

The results we want from weightlifting don’t happen overnight and they don’t happen with one single exercise, workout or strategy. You need to keep showing up and evolving. When you train consistently you get results. There are no shortcuts.

Looking for a full Leg Workout?

We have a Leg Workout category in our Members Zone portal. We also have a wide selection of other plans available in the portal, each plan accompanied by a muscle highlighted image so you know exactly which muscles you’re working with each plan. You can sample some of these plans when you sign up for a Free Members Zone account. All you need to provide is a valid email address so that we can create your secure account. Then just head to “My Zone” and you will find a selection of free plans.

More leg exercises coming soon...

Just so you know, this list of leg exercises is a work in progress and is by no means extensive. We will continue to grow this entire database for you over time, so be sure to check back for updates. Alternatively, you can join our mailing list below and you'll be the first to know about all new content we produce.