W
ashboard abs, sculpted legs, and a perky
posterior are the ultimate summer
accessories, but as any fitness enthusiast will tell
you, they don’t come easy. If you feel like you’ve
been squatting, lunging, hip-thrusting, and crunching on
the regular for months — even years — and still not seeing
results, it’s time to up the intensity.
Regardless of how long you’ve been training, if you always
do three sets of 12 reps using the same weight, workout after
workout, your body will make no effort to build lean muscle,
increase strength, or change the way you look.
If sculpting a six-pack and set of statuesque legs is your
goal, you have to force your muscles to do more work over
time. This not only involves increasing the weights you lift,
but also adding variation to your sets, reps, tempo, and rest
periods to force your body to adapt and reshape.
The following workout not only incorporates some of
my favourite exercises for targeting those common ‘trouble
spots’, but it also uses a variety of intensity techniques to
recruit more muscle fibres and create those strong curves
you’ve been looking for.
The aim is to keep constant tension on the muscles for
longer work periods. You should try to increase
the weight lifted each week, but only as
long as form is not compromised.
Incorporate this workout once
per week into your training split
and let the gains begin!oxygenmagAU Nov/Dec 2017 89
Get strong and curvy with a shakeup to your regular workout
routine that targets three common mid-body trouble spots.
Exercise Sets Reps
1 Dumbbell split-leg squat 4 20 / 15 / 12 / 10
2 Decline dumbbell
hamstring curl4 12 / 12 / 12 / 12 drop 83a Barbell hip-thruster
SUPERSET WITH
3b Seated banded hip
abduction441030 (10 leaning forward, 10
upright, 10 leaning back)
4a Barbell ab rollout
SUPERSET WITH
4b Fitball pass448-1015-20The workout
1
Dumbbell split-leg squat
Target muscles: Quads, glutes, hamstrings, abdominals (stability)
Set-up: Hold a pair of dumbbells in each hand. Extend one leg
behind you and place the foot, laces down, on to a flat bench.
Action: Bend both knees, keeping your weight over your front leg.
To rise, press your weight through the heel of the front foot and
return to the start position. Perform all reps on one side before
switching legs.Tip: Keeping the
dumbbells angled
slightly downward
will make it easier to
balance. If stability
is still an issue, try
performing these in
the Smith Machine
instead.Presented By http://www.upsprotein.com.au
4 SETS | 20, 15, 12, 10Jan/Feb 2018