And that's why squat is anything but at the top and why I have to
break out my red marker to put it in the worst of the worst.
What's up, guys, Jeff Cavaliere, Athleanx.com. What you see behind me is a bunch of different
quad exercises, many of which you either do right now or you did in the past. However,
after today, you may want to get rid of a few of them. Because what I'm going to do is going
to help you by ranking them from the worst to the best, to show you the only ones that you need to
focus on to get the gains that you're after. And so as with every other video in this series,
when we're ranking these exercises, we have to have some common criteria so we can rank
them effectively. And when we're talking about quads, I am speaking about exercises that do
the best at building specifically the quads and not just overall leg development. So,
we're looking for exercises that: a) can create hypertrophy and muscle growth;
b) are capable of being overloaded and progressively overloaded in one or three ways;
and then finally c) the ability to do the exercise safely. Because no matter how much
you want to get bigger legs, if you break your legs down in the process, it's not worth it.
And so, I kick this list off at the bottom in the Worst of the Worst Category when we're
talking about the Sissy Squat. And maybe some of you have never even seen the exercise before,
and that's probably a good thing. But ironically, while this could be a knee shredder, it could also
be a good patellar tendon accommodation exercise. In other words, you can build up the strength of
your tendons, but you have to approach it in a completely different way than most people
who do the exercise. Meaning slowly and with an unweighted, deliberate progression. Oftentimes
people will throw a plate across their chest and use this as a hypertrophy exercise. Let's face it,
guys, that's never going to create the hypertrophy you're looking for. And for that reason,
all the others, it s going to get the big red X in the Worst of the Worst Category.
And that brings me to the next and the Worst of the Worst Category, this time we're talking about
the Squat. But hold off, we're not talking about just any squat, we're talking about the Smith
Machine Squat. And there's a very good reason why you shouldn't even be wasting your time,
because this is not the way to squat. We understand that the best path for the bar on a
squat is vertical but doing it on a Smith Machine is going to force your verticality to happen in
a way that you don't want it to. In other words, biomechanically, we're all a little bit different.
Some have longer femurs, some have longer tibia, some have longer torsos than others.
The way we get down to the bottom of the squat and maintain a vertical position requires a little bit
of movement at each of these joints and areas of the body at different times. Doing it on a
Smith Machine requires us all to sort of bend at the same place at the same time, causing a
disruption in normal biomechanics. This belongs in the Worst of the Worst. Just avoid them.
And so, with that, we now work our way up into the Better Category. And here we're talking about good
solid exercise choices, just not the Best of the Best. And I'll point out the reasons why. And we
start off with the Dumbbell Drop Squat. And this is actually one of my favorite ways to do a squat,
especially for beginners. Why? Because it takes away all the guesswork. If you simply hold the
dumbbell by its end and let it go where it wants to go, which is straight down,
it's going to actually biomechanically fix the amount of hip flexion and knee flexion that you
need to contribute to the exercise to do it properly. So, think of it as somewhat of an
automatic form fixture for the exercise. The issue, however, is load. There's not a whole
hell of a lot of load that you can handle with a dumbbell like this, but there is something
that's going to replace it at a much later time in this list. For now, we just give it the blue
circle for the first and the Better Category. And so along that same vein, instead of having
that dumbbell down between your legs, you can just lift it up and put it right about here and
do a Goblet Squat, and it's up next in our Better Category. But there are some limitations here too,
mostly that people will likely fatigue more in the thoracic spine, the capability of holding
that upright posture long before their quads ever do. But do realize this you can build muscle even
at higher rep ranges as long as you're taking that exercise to failure. So even if you do
a heavy goblet squat, let's say 100 pounds and you could do 25 repetitions to failure,
you've got an option for building your quads. But you're going to be ultimately limited by how much
weight you can put on the exercise. We're going to have to consider it just a good exercise and not
the best yet, and therefore it's going to fall into the category with the big blue circle.
And so, we talk about those lighter loads being capable of driving muscle growth. Well,
there's actually instances where the incredibly light loads can still drive growth through
incredibly high volume. And that's where Heavy Resistance Bike or Hill Riding steps in as an
amazing quad builder. If you just watch the Tour de France, you'll see that even guys are somewhat
slight upper body development will have pretty massive lower bodies and quads in particular
because the extremely high volumes that they get from a lot of miles racked up leads to
that overall volume driving new muscle growth. Now, don't get me wrong, if you're just going to
do a few miles at the end of your workout and not really rack up a higher total,
this likely won't do much for you. But if you do, make sure you crank up the resistance, because
with that you're going to start to crank up the size of those thighs. And that's why it's going
to get a blue circle in the Better Category. And so the next exercise here might startle some of
you guys because given my rocky relationship with it, you might have thought that I'd belonged with
one of these big red Xs through it, but it's not the case. We're talking about the Leg Extension.
And yes, it's in my better category. Why? Well, by my own criteria, if you're looking for an exercise
that can create hypertrophy, specifically in the quads, and is capable of being overloaded,
well, it would have to fall here. Except I still have my issues with the exercise from an overall
safety standpoint. Let me explain. Though it is an exercise that doesn't bother everybody,
people that have existing knee issues are going to potentially find this exercise troublesome.
Because it places a lot of force and tension on the patella at the top of the leg extension,
and anybody that has patellar tracking issues are going to feel the repercussions of that. But more
so, people that have tendinitis issues in either the patellar tendon or the quadriceps tendon are
going to find this exercise very aggravating because it's very easy to exceed the capacity
of the tendon in terms of the load that it can handle when there's already a problem.
Look, we're doing the exercise to create hypertrophy, so all of us are likely putting
enough weight on it to do that. However, when you realize that tendons already in duress can
typically only handle about one fifth of the load that somebody would usually put on a 10
to 12 rep leg extension, you sort of see why you're barking up the wrong tree. Now,
that's not to say that it's not unlike the Sissy Squat that I mentioned in the beginning. You can
use the exercise for tendon accommodation, but you're going to have to be prepared to back those
weights way down and in doing so, probably take away any of those benefits that you were looking
for in terms of new size in your legs. So, for that, guys, it is a good exercise for some,
definitely not all. It's going to be limited to just the blue circle in the Better Category.
And so now I get to break out my yellow marker as we move our way up into the Better Still Category.
I want to start with one of the popular exercises here just to kind of address it right off the bat.
We're talking about the Leg Press. And this is once again one of those exercises. I think there's
far better options, but I'm not going to discredit its ability to help you to grow bigger quads.
However, there's a few things you need to do and make sure you do right. And that is, first and
foremost, lower your feet on the platform. Because as they get a little bit lower, you're going
to get a little bit more knee flexion, which is going to help you to target those quads a little
bit more effectively. But a few things I want you to not do. For the love of God, stop pushing into
your legs with your hands because all you're doing is taking away the work from the quads. And also,
by driving yourself back into the pad, you're just using leverage to get that weight up. So, though
you might be impressed by loading all those plates on the end of the machine, your quads might only
be about half as impressed because that might be about the amount of weight that they're lifting.
Now, on the bright side, let's face it, you still are handling quite a bit of weight, even if it is
just half. But you have to remember the depth of your legs as you bring them down to your chest.
If I simply turn myself over, what would this look like if I was doing a squat? If you're
down to depth, then good for you. But most of us cut this way short turning what would be a full
squat into a corner squat and again, at those reduced loads, it's not going to do a hell of
a lot for you. That being said, done properly, we can give it the first in the yellow circles
here of the Better Still Category. Next up in the better still category,
we move to one of those kind of overlooked or forgotten exercises for the quads,
but not here. We have the Dumbbell Step Up because I look at this as one of the more functional quad
exercises. But more than that, it does a really good job of effectively hitting the quads. As
long as you maintain that upright posture when you perform the exercise, you might also find
this exercise to be a little challenging because either you don't have grip strength to be able to
handle a heavy amount of weight or the balance to maintain your body position in space as you
do the exercise. But if you do have the ability to overcome these minor limitations, what you're
also getting is a good eccentric overload on the quads as you slowly lower yourself down on every
repetition. There's a good combination of a lot of good things going on here. And for that reason,
I like the Dumbbell Step Up and I want you guys to try it. If you've forgotten about
it and haven't done it for a while. Continuing our way up here in the Better
Still Category, we have another one of those unconventional or sometimes forgotten exercises,
but definitely not one to be overlooked. If you're looking for bigger quads, it's the Sled Push or
Pull. Now look, it's one of those similar to the resistance bike that you don't oftentimes think
about as a good quad builder. But anybody that does the exercise, as most competitive athletes
will, they would readily tell you how effective this exercise is. Not just for building up the
size of their quads, but for increasing their overall athleticism. So how does it work? Well,
you've got that absence of the eccentric load, just like you did on the bike, that's actually
going to work in your favor, because it increases your ability to do more volume on the exercise.
Again, a good fit for athletes out there who are trying to become stronger in a more functional
way. That being said, you can certainly load up a weight here on this exercise and you can do
it one of two different ways. You can either do it in a retro walk fashion where you're getting
good terminal knee extension on every single repetition, or you could turn yourself around
into the traditional forward Sled Push. In this case, you're getting the additional
benefit of getting good biomechanics and reinforcement of the proper way to move
your knee over your toe as is required for normal knee flexion. Again, making it useful
for not just people that have knee pain, but also any athlete who's looking to avoid it long term.
And I say athlete, but honestly, guys it s good for everyone. That's why it gets the next yellow
circle here in the Better Still Category. And so, while the leg extension might be an
effective way to get that terminal knee extension, what if there's a way to get additional support
from the muscles that actually prefer to support the Quads. We're talking about the hamstrings,
the glutes and even the low back. Well, there is there's actually two ways to do it. In this case,
it's the Dumbbell Spanish Squat or the TKE Split Squat. In the Dumbbell Spanish Squat,
we're getting a chance to load up the exercise depending upon the weight that we hold in our
hands. But throw that band around your knees and you get that added resistance to terminal knee
extension. Again, the same effect that we're going for in the leg extension but done in a closed
chain manner with your feet on the floor and tying all those muscle groups together, making it for me
a preferred exercise. If you don't believe me, try a few reps of this, your quads will be on fire.
If you'd rather do this in a more unilateral way than just put the band around one leg and
drop yourself back into this split stance for the TKE Split Squat. The benefit here is that
you can focus your effort a little bit more on one leg at a time to drive up the hypertrophy in
a place that you might be lacking. But the bottom line here is guys getting terminal knee extension
and resisting it is great. Doing it this way as opposed to on a fixed machine I think is
better and therefore it gets the Better Still ranking here with our final yellow circle.
And so with that, I now get to break out my green marker as we work our way,
almost all the way to the top with our Almost Best Category. And the first exercise I want to point
out here is the Hack Squat. And not only is this the one that sort of shines whenever we do any
kind of EMG studies, but it's just a pretty effective quad targeting exercise. However,
you might be saying to yourself, Jeff, it looks pretty damn similar to the Smith Machine Squat
you put all the way down at the bottom of the list because it's just a machine that
rides up and down on two straight rails. Well, at first glance, maybe, but not actually when
we look at the exercise more closely. We already talked about if you tried to force yourself into
going straight up and down on the angle, Smith Machine is going to look really damn
awkward and not be really kind to your body. But even if you did think about putting your feet
out in front of you to mirror the angle of the Smith Machine, look what's happening down on your
ankles. Because this is where all the difference matters. This is where we put the science back in
strength because these details matter. You're in ankle plantar flexion as you reach your feet out
further and further away from your body, not into the dorsiflexion that's going to help the rest of
the biomechanics of your knee to get into the proper squat position. So, what we get on the
Hack Swap machine is we get the foot pad being able to angle ourselves to mirror the angle of
our body and create that dorsiflexion needed to create a more normal squat. Now the second issue
kind of comes down to the name itself, and that is it s not really a squat. Just like you shouldn't
really be trying to squat on a Smith Machine Squat. And that's what people do. If you had
the normal straight up and down Smith Machine and you try to do a normal straight up and down squat,
I told you before, it's going to fight the mechanics of your body the Hack Squat,
it doesn't even give you that opportunity. It's creating a squat variation by encouraging
your feet to be out in front of you. By angling your body and giving you some additional support
with the pad behind your back and the pad being across your shoulders to bear the weight on your
shoulders rather than your neck. All these things are basically creating a defined squat variation
that is much more kind to your body and not pretending to be something that it isn't. And for
that reason, guys, you do get that EMG benefit of increased quad activation, and this gets the first
green circle in are Almost Best Category. Next up in the almost best category is honestly
one of my favorite exercises. We're talking about the Dumbbell Bulgarian Split Squat.
And I understand that most people don't really love the exercise, but it's really effective at
hitting those quads. And some of the benefits here are that you can target one leg at a time if you
have a muscular imbalances, but you also get to do it without having to bear the weight across your
back. And you can still handle some very heavy loads on the exercise. Speaking of the back,
we get some additional protection here if you have any issues with yours, because we
get less of that posterior pelvic tilt at the bottom of the exercise by being able to keep
one leg up behind us. For all those reasons and more, this exercise belongs where it is,
but remember to keep that upright torso so you can keep the focus of your effort on your quads.
For me, though, this is definitely always going to be in my Almost Best Category.
And so, for those of you who are worried that I would throw the squat to the Worst Category at the
beginning of the video, you can rest easy because the back squat is back as one of our Almost Best.
But a particular kind of back squat, we're talking about the high bar variation. When you put the bar
up high on your upper traps, what you get is a more vertical positioning of your body as you
descend into the squat, that causes the quads to be more engaged. Obviously, as a leg exercise,
this is the king of all leg exercises, there's no dispute. But when it comes to targeting the quads,
though, this is a little bit more effective at doing that. We actually have some better options
in our Best of the Best Category. But you can't overlook the squat. The high bar is going to be
the variation I prefer here, and that's why it belongs in the Almost Best Category.
And so, while I showed my favorites and put in the dumbbell Bulgarian Split Squat as one of
my all-time favorites, I have to share some room here for the Dumbbell or Barbell Reverse Lunge.
The great thing is you can certainly load this exercise as long as you're not afraid
to do so. If your balance is in question and that is what's holding you back from loading
up the exercise more, remember to step not just back, but back and out to maintain a
wider base of support and eliminate any balance challenge that might be introduced by doing the
exercise. The key is that by having a more upright posture here and stepping backwards,
we can keep any of those knee pains that come from maybe the forward lunge away and keep the
benefits directed predominantly at those quads. While at the same time having the added benefit
of knowing you're making me happy by doing it. The dumbbell or Barbell Reverse Lunge is the last and
our Almost Best Category, and deservedly so. And so with that, we finally make our way all
the way up to the top of the list. The Best of the Best. And what do we have? We've got
two candidates here. But you know what, guys? I'm going to give it a tie. Because I want to
give the green startup both of these exercises because we're going to do the same thing in a
little bit different way. Let's start with the Front Squat. The Front Squat is going to be the
premier variation of the squat when you re trying to build up bigger quads specifically. Because the
front carriage of the bar is going to place the load more effectively onto the quads and a little
bit more away from the glutes and hamstrings. That being said, some people might find it
somewhat difficult to get into position to do the exercise because they don't have proper
wrist mobility. But there's always a way around that. Whether you resort to a cross arms setup
or to simply use straps to take away some of the requirements of the wrist extension that you don't
have. It's really, really easy to find some way to do this comfortably. However, it still has the
limitations we talked about with the Goblet Squat, where we're going to have to have good thoracic
mobility and extension. And if that's a problem for you, then that's when I opt for the option
number two, and that is the Belt Squat. The Belt Squat is and always will be one of
the absolute best ways to target the quads. And remember, the purpose of this list was to come
up with the best quads specific exercises. And what's great about the exercise is it's going to
take the same mimicking of that natural squat position that we get from the Drop Squat. Way
back when, when I said was such a great way to biomechanically teach you how to do the
exercise properly. This takes care of that, if you have a good Belt Squat Machine. And by that,
I mean one that allows you to get that center of mass into its most natural position to perform
the lift. And when we're talking about in terms of the weight that you can carry here
and actually load up, it's pretty similar to your back squat. The issue is that people just
don't oftentimes use the exercise to its fullest capacity, and they opt to use it as sort of a
relief exercise when their low back might be humming from doing too many back squats.
Don't overlook the viability of the Belt Squat when it comes to building bigger quads. And if
you don't have access to that machine, you certainly do have access to a barbell or you
can opt for the Front Squat. Either one of these guys, you can't go wrong. The Best of the Best
when it comes to building bigger thighs. And so just like that, guys, you've now got
the exercises that are going to help you to build up the size on those thighs and more importantly,
some of the ones you might want to kind of shift your focus away from. Guys when it comes to
ranking the exercises, we haven't stopped just here at the quads. We've also done the glutes,
the chest, the upper chest, you name it, it's all included in this series. You re going to
want to check them all out. If you're looking for a full program, you can find them over at
Athleanx.com. All right guys, make sure you click Subscribe, turn on your Notifications
so you never miss a video when you put one out. All right guys, see you soon.