A huge amount of people are training all their muscles (body parts), but very often they are forgetting about their legs. That makes the disproportion in their body and gives it a funny look. When the top of the athlete’s body is big but has skinny legs it looks ridiculous. Also, a big part of the people is just struggling to gain legs muscle. So, we want to provide you all the necessary information about how to get big legs including all leg muscles like hips and calf muscle. Also, as always we will repeat a few things you need to know about nutrition, rest and supplements to get the best result!
We will go in the next order:
Diet
We talk about diet a lot in every article. Probably you already know that food is more important than a workout, and it is more difficult to eat so much though. Of course, you will never gain muscles without exercise, but you neither will gain them without a proper diet. Anyway, we want you to have at least a basic understanding of how to eat and how to organize your diet.
So, what you need to know is that your body needs fuel and building material to work properly and build new muscles faster. The main 3 things you need are Protein, Carbohydrates, and Fats, and also eat a proper amount of it.
Proteins: This is your building material and the proper amount for gaining muscle will be about 1.5 g of protein per 1 kg of your body weight, or 0.7 g for 1 lb.
Carbohydrates: So this is fuel for your body and will give you energy. For muscle growth, you need about 5g of carbohydrates per 1 kg or about 2.3 g per 1 lb of your body weight.
Fats: Don’t avoid the fats, they are responsible for a lot of valuable processes in your body (1), just limit the intake of fats per day. Also, fats are quite high in calories so, be careful. We recommend you to try to stay in the range of 1 g for 1 kg, or 0.5 g for 1 lb of your body weight when you are trying to gain muscle. Here you can find more details about the diet for muscle gain here.
Exercises
In first point of view, it seems that the legs are very simple in their structure: the front part of the thigh (quadriceps), the back part (biceps), buttocks and calf muscles. In real life it includes much more stabilizers muscles, calfs and more.
Load progression with regular increase in the weights, reps, sets and decreaseing ofr the rest time. This is the way to increasing your muscle mass. So, we will take as an example on of the main exercises, squats with barbell.
| Exercise/Week 1 | Weight in kg/lb | Sets | Reps | Rest in min |
| Barbell Squats | 40/90 | 3 | 15 | 2 |
Exercise/Week 2
| Barbell Squats | 40/90 | 3 | 15 | 2 |
Exercise/Week 3
| Barbell Squats | 40/90 | 4 | 15 | 2 |
Exercise/Week 4
| Barbell Squats | 45/100 | 4 | 15 | 2 |
Exercise/Week 5
| Barbell Squats | 45/100 | 4 | 15 | 1,5 |
Exercise/Week 6
| Barbell Squats | 50/110 | 4 | 15 | 1,5 |
As you possibly see, almost every exercise we are increasing, weight, amount of sets and making shorter rest time. This is called progressive overload, but you should remember that you need to choose the correct weight for yourself. So, the thing is that you need to have pressure in your muscles about 30-40 seconds and also, you should not be able to do any rep after this period. Usually, one rep takes about 2-3 seconds if you have the correct technique of your exercise.
Barbell squats
So, as you possibly have seen before we mention barbell squats. It is one of the most effective exercises for the big leg muscles. But, be careful don’t take big weight in the beginning and your muscles should adapt to the weight, also technique must be correct. In another way, you can get trauma and hurt yourself.
Legs should be shoulder-width apart, then slightly start to squat and try to hold your back straight. Try to squat as deep as it is possible and after starting to raise back holding your back straight.
Barbell lunges
If your goal is to grow your hips, use barbell lunges as the main exercise that is better than squats to grow your hips. You also can use dumbbells for this exercise, just use what is more comfortable for you. Take your weight careful, you need to stabilize your body during the exercise and feel the balance. If the weight will be too big, you will not be able to perform this exercise correctly.
So, take the barbell and put it on your shoulders. Step forward with your left leg and your right leg should practically touch the surface of the floor. Push off with your left foot and return tho the starting position. Repeat the same squat with the right leg and continue.
Straight legs deadlift
Stand in front of the bar with your feet under the bar. Take your pelvis back and grab the bar a little wider than your shoulders. Raise the bar and straighten your back. Bend over while pushing the pelvis back and hold the deflection in the lower back. The bar rises and falls only in a vertical plane. Hands are almost relaxed and play only the role of ropes, to the edges of which the bar is attached. Having reached the lower point of the exercise, keeping the lower back deflection constant, move the pelvis forward and raise the body.
Machine leg extension
It is an isolating exercise that is designed to work out quadriceps. This exercise will help you to make your quadriceps bigger. Set yours weight, depending on your level of training. Also, choose the weight so that you could make 3-4 sets 15-20 times each. Usually heavy weights are not used in this exercise, as it is risk to get trauma.
Seated Leg Curls
Thick, deeply traced biceps of the hips give a spectacular view for the legs of every bodybuilder. An athlete should bring the heel to the hip by reducing the biceps of the thigh and lowers the leg to its original position. This exercise is performed by both beginners and those who have been engaged in bodybuilding for a long time. Also, there are few variations of this exercise, for example when you sit, lay or even stand.
Calf press
Very often athletes just forget about that muscle and it makes your legs look funny. When you have strong and massive calfs your legs will looks monstrous! Calf raises are usually done in a seated position. It can also be executed by using a weights, for example barbell.
Supplements:
As we already told you, supplements can be a good support for you because of following reasons. You need to eat a proper amount of protein and carbs to make your evolve (or grow). We will repeat it every time, just because there are no other way. Without calorie surplus and the proper amount nutrients, you will have stagnation and will not grow.
As you see in the point Diet, you need to eat quite a big amount of food and very often it is really challenging to have 5-6 meals per day with meat, rice etc. So, the supplements can be a nice supporter and make it much easier for you. Whey protein is a really good supporter if you can eat enough amount of carbohydrates, but if you can’t, mass gainer will be a perfect supplement for you.
For increasing your strength and stamina, there is another nice supplement and it is creatine monohydrate. It is the strongest supplement for increasing your strength, and you will basically start to feel the strength increase in the first week of using it.
Bottom line
So, you have learned about the main exercises on how to build legs. Performing all these exercises, you will get strong, embossed legs as a result. The main thing is that during the exercises you feel the working muscles, so then it will be efficiently. Follow the technique of performing one or another exercise. When working with heavy weight, be sure to bring a partner who will be able to support and help you. Good luck to you!
