A leg workout for women has a plethora of benefits. A strong lower body gives you functional strength.
This strength helps you in your daily life, weight lifting and prevents injuries.
Your legs practically carry you your entire life. It is only fair that we invest back into such a valuable asset.
Apart from this, working out your lower body can help sculpt your legs giving your body symmetry.
This leg workout for women can be done at home or at the gym. All you need is a pair of dumbbells. If you don’t have dumbbells at home, you can get creative and use household items like water bottles.
This workout routine is in-depth. It contains the three most effective exercises for your lower body.
From squats to deadlifts to lunges and a combination of them; it’s safe to say this leg workout for women is everything you need to strengthen your lower body.
Leg Workout For Women
This leg workout for women ensures that every muscle group in your lower body is strained and sore by the time you are done.
It utilizes the three key exercises for a lower body: squats, deadlifts, and lunges.
Not only this, but it combines these exercises together into one to give you an added burn. Not only will you cover time quicker with these movements, but you’ll also be working these major muscle groups in-depth.
You can do this leg workout for women at home as well. The movements do not require much space and you only need a pair of dumbbells.
If you don’t have dumbbells present, you can always make your own with water bottles, milk jugs, or canned food.
Curtsy Lunge
Muscles worked: Quadriceps, glutes, gluteus medius, and hip abductors.
Sets: 3
Reps: 10 to 12
Step-by-step:
- Start with your feet hip-width apart
- Drop your arms down to your sides
- Now, do a sideways lunge. Push your right knee downwards while taking your right foot behind your left foot
- Keep your arms down to the sides
- Next, come back to starting position and push your left knee downwards while taking your left knee behind your right knee
- This is one repetition
Dumbbell Deadlift To Squat
Muscles worked: Quadriceps, glutes, hamstrings, calves, hip abductors, and core muscles
Sets: 3
Reps: 8 to 10
Step-by-step:
- Start with a shoulder-width apart stance
- Next, get into a deadlift position
- Hold the dumbbell by your sides with your palms facing outwards
- Now, bend your knees and hips to lower your torso down
- Make sure that your back is kept straight as you go down
- Go down until the dumbbells are at shin level
- Next, return to a standing position
- Lower yourself down to squat
- Hold for a moment before standing up and transitioning to a deadlift for another rep
Dumbbell Squat To Lunge
Muscles worked: Quadriceps, glutes, back muscles, hamstring and calves
Sets: 3
Reps: 6 to 8
Step-by-step:
- Start with a shoulder-width apart stance
- Hold a dumbbell with both hands
- Keeping your back straight, lower yourself down
- Return to starting position and do another squat before transition to a lunge
- After doing two squats, from your standing position, take a step back with your left leg
- Now push your knee to the ground till it is just off the floor
- Next, stand back up and repeat with the opposite leg
- 2 squats and 2 lunges together equal 1 repetition
Dumbbell Sumo Squat
Muscles worked: Quadriceps, hamstrings, glutes, adductors, and lower back
Sets: 3
Reps: 6 to 8
Step-by-step:
- Start with a stance that is wider than shoulder-width and your feet need to be pointed outwards
- Grab a dumbbell with both hands
- Now, lower yourself down into a squat
- Make sure to push out your chest and engage your shoulder blade
- Keep your head straight and eyes forward
- Lower yourself till the dumbbell is just off the floor
Dumbbell Deadlift
Muscles worked: Quadriceps, hamstrings, gluteus maximus, lower back, and core
Sets: 3
Reps: 8 to 10
Step-by-step:
- Start with a hip-width apart stance
- Now, hold a dumbbell in each hand
- Lower yourself down by bracing your core
- Make sure that your back is kept straight to prevent injuries
- Lower the dumbbells down until they are at shin level
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[ux_products]What Muscles Does A Lower Body Workout For Women Work?
The primary muscles that are used in a lower body workout are glutes, hamstring and quadriceps, and calves.
You also take support from erector spinae, a group of muscles and tendons running along your spine. Because this routine has deadlifts, lunges, and squats; you are also taking support from your back, core, and abductors.
What are the benefits of a leg workout for women?
- Increases functional strength
- It helps to make the core stronger
- Overall body strength increases
- Strengthens joints and promotes bone health
- Provides stability to the body
- It helps sculpt legs, thighs, and butt
- You burn more fat than other workouts
Makes you stronger:
Leg workouts for women start by increasing your functional strength. This strength is needed for basic movements like walking, standing, sitting, or lifting.
Your lower body has bigger muscles as compared to the rest of the body. These muscles support you during other workouts and sports as well. Almost all physical sports that you play require a strong lower body.
Therefore, a leg workout is essential to build lower body strength. This lower body strength then supports your core and back. All your muscle groups are interconnected and support one another.
Squats and deadlifts also work out your hips, one of the most injury-prone areas as you grow older. On the other hand, lunges and squats work your knees. This can help prevent an ACL, a common ligament in athletes.
All in all, a leg workout for women builds strength in key areas that prevent injury, help you lift harder, and increase your functional strength.
Good for joints and bones
A leg workout for women is necessary if you want to fight off sarcopenia. This syndrome is when you start to lose muscle mass. While age may be one of the significant contributors to sarcopenia, it is also common in physically inactive people.
One of the best ways to prevent and manage sarcopenia is by exercising. Lower body workouts stimulate hormones that help promote muscle mass.
Osteoporosis is another deadly condition; this condition attacks your bones. Just like your muscles, bone tissues are also alive. Meaning, your bone tissues can also get stronger through workouts.
Exercises that work against gravity, like resistance and weight exercises, are optimal for rejuvenating bone health.
Burn more fat
A leg workout for women will help you burn calories both during and post-workout. During your leg workout, muscles like gluteus maximus, quadriceps, and hamstring are being used. These muscles are pretty big and require more calories to function. The bigger the muscle, the more energy is needed to strain it and to recover.
Another reason is that these muscles are the farthest away from your heart. Therefore, your heart has to pump harder to send blood to it. This factor also contributes to more calories being burned.
Lastly, the after-burn of your workout continues burning calories. Your body starts the recovering process and burns more calories to return to its initial resting rate. Research has shown that your after-burn is the highest right after your workout and can even last up to 38 hours.
Create aesthetics
A lower body workout for women can help build strength, prevent joint and bone disorders, and burn fat. But that’s not all. A lower body workout for women is imperative to tone and sculpt your lower body.
This includes your thighs, calves, and glutes – including the gluteus maximus. These areas play a key role in toing your lower body.
Symmetry is aesthetic. While many individuals pay attention to their arms, chest, back and core; legs are often neglected. This blind eye can lead to the displeasing chicken leg syndrome.
Think about it, you invest time, sweat and dedication into fitness only to have an off-balanced body. A lower body workout can help prevent this.
Key Takeaway
This workout strains all the key areas of your legs from your quads to glutes to calves.
You can make this leg workout for women more intense by increasing the reps and weight of the dumbbells.
All in all, it’s an effective routine to build mass, tone your lower body, and to strengthen your overall body.
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