Is it true that working your legs affects your chest?
I’m trying to build up my chest, and having a slow time of it. I almost never work my legs, and a friend of mine thinks that might be my problem. He said that when you don’t work your legs you are failing to use a major group of muscles, which in turn means there is less testosterone in your body, or something like that.
Any truth there?
Yep. Heavy squats and deadlifts send a surge of testosterone through your body that’s way too much for just your legs to handle. It goes everywhere.
Also, you’re not going to go very fast with your chest if you don’t work your back as much, and you have a better chance of injuring yourself.
Lastly, you need to eat more than you would to maintain if you want to build muscle.
Ultra hit it right on the head. One thing to watch out for is that your leg muscles are among the largest and use A LOT of oxygen. So if you haven’t worked them you can rapidly wind yourself. I have asthma and doing the squats or similar weights can tear the air right out of me if I don’t space it correctly.
Heh.
Another agreement here. When you work your legs, you are working half your body. You will see a noticeable improvement in your upper body if you start working your legs with intensity. Your legs are half your body. There really isn’t a lot of muscle isolation there like their is in your upper body. Working legs might not do much for your legs, but it will do a lot for everything else.
Also, keep in mind that when you do heavy squats, your midsection (and to a lesser degree your upper body) is doing a lot of work to balance the bar, so it’s not just a leg benefit.
If you’ve never done squats before, it’s a good idea to find a local powerlifter to walk you through the motion, cause while it’s great if done right, it can really mess you up if done wrong.
I also agree.
Start light so you can get a feel for the proper form; squat only the bar if you have to.
thanks much guys. I started doing lower body yesterday, I’m going to work it into my regular routine. But, while I’ve got you here…
Any good lifts or exercises for building forearms?
Deadlifts, chinups, and rows are all excellent for the forearms.
Wrist Curls are also good. From the usual sitting position or standing with a bar behind your ass. I dont do any wrist excercises exclusively. I do alot of back work (Rows, Pulldowns etc.) and my forearms are burning by the time I’m done with them.
Glad to see you starting to work on legs. Theres nothing more silly than seeing barrel chested guys with skinny chicken legs in the gym.