“HEY BEN, HOW DO I BUILD BIG QUADS?”
– I get this question multiple times a day…
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HERE’S WHAT TO DO:
Before we begin, it’s vital to know that you don’t “need” to squat to build big legs.
What you do NEED is pelvic and spinal stability. Guess what’s great for functional pelvic and spinal stability?
You guessed it. Squats and lunges.
If you don’t have a stable pelvis, you will never build muscle to your full potential.
You’ll get hurt well before you ever have a chance.
So, are squats necessary to build great legs? Yes, but not for the reason that most people think.
Think of it this way, when I’m standing up straight, my body is most stable because of the stacking of bones.
The further I bend, i.e., deviate my center of mass into a squat, deadlift or lunge, etc., the less my body can just passively rely on bones and now has to actively use muscles to stabilize joints.
The more time you spend at these structurally unstable positions, like the bottom of a squat or lunge, the more your muscles adapt and become able to produce stability.
In stating this, your limitation to building great strong legs, is not your ability to work hard, but your ability 3 to generate stability. The body will down regulate, i.e., turn down, your ability to contract muscle if it senses instability.
When muscles decrease contraction due to instability and yet you have heavy load on your body, your body is left with no choice but to use ligaments, tendons, bones, and joints to stabilize. Bad news.
You can also see why people that avoid deeper squats for fear of knee pain are in fact contributing directly to the problem. Most knee pain comes from unstable hips and feet. Not the knee itself or the exercises you choose.
Stability does NOT come from standing on an unstable surface. That’s more of a party trick. Stability comes from challenging the body in positions of instability.
Positions of instability are the positions in any exercise that aren’t dependent on structure, such as bones or joints. This is important to know.
HERE’S HOW THIS WORKS:
The best program in the world is only as good as your ability to execute it. Focus 100% of your attention over the next 30 days on PERFECT execution, and maximizing the skill of creating stability.
I define stability as the ability to NOT move.
Your ability to build bigger legs will be a 1-1 correlation with your ability to master the skill of executing the squat and lunge with rock-like stability of the spine and pelvis.
The leg extension and hack squat are there to improve your contractile ability of the quads in isolation, squats and lunges will focus on the integration of this new contractile ability into the core movements to avoid joint imbalances and injuries.
Your frequency will be very high in this program, so volume will be very low. Do not do more. Place your attention and effort into putting more focus and effort into every single rep and set.
Aim to make every rep perfect and every inch more challenging to the muscle; never simply completing reps and sets.
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