One-legged Squats and Lunges

at 2:47 PM

In this section I want to show you two great lower body exercises. One of my favorites is the one-legged squat. With the back leg on a bench or step and the front leg on the floor, make sure your toes are always leading and ahead of your knees. Your back should be straight. To do the exercise bend your front leg and have almost all of your weight on that leg, the back leg is really for balance. Go down until your front quad is parallel to the floor. If you can, hold this position for a couple of seconds and then come up. This is one repetition.

In the first image I have combined the squat with bicep curls. I like to save time and use as many muscle groups as I can in one movement, plus it burns a lot more calories.




In the second image I have combined the one-legged squat with the shoulder press. I have 15 lb dumb bells in each hand (take my word for it!)-

The one-legged squat is really so effective for the lower body muscles, that at first when you start doing this exercise don't even worry about combining it with anything else. Just focus on going down as far as you are comfortable with and then hold the position before coming back up. Make sure your back is straight.

The following image shows the lunge. The difference is that the back leg is on the floor. The lunge targets the quads probably more than the one-legged squat. Whereas the squat also targets the glutes. I like to combine the lunge with either bicep curls or other upper body moves such as the shoulder press. Here I'm showing the lunge with bicep curls. The beauty of this exercise is that it is involves upper and lower body muscles so you burn more calories. If you are new to this exercise, just do the lunge with no weights and try to do 3 sets of 12 to 15 on each leg.

Remember when you are combining any type of lunge or squat with upper body moves you are also engaging your core.