leg recovery time

[leonidas33]

my legs are skinny and need a lot of work to catch up with upper body... i worked them yesterday and today I am not sore at all? ok to work them again? one hinderance is achy knees... this tends to prevent me from working them really hard... any advice?

 

[fallingeggs]

give at least a day in between. it may take you a while to get the weight up to where they get a good, full workout.

as for your knee, just warm up good and make sure you are doing the squat with perfect (or near to) form. not warming up and bad form are probably the most common ways to make the knees hurt.

 

[leonidas33]

thanks fallingeggs!

 

[H_T_]

practice your squats with no weight at home for several weeks, until you can do them comfortably. a lot of Oly. lifters were only allowed to use a broomstick until they perfected their form...

 

[timtim]

my legs are skinny and need a lot of work to catch up with upper body... i worked them yesterday and today I am not sore at all? ok to work them again? one hinderance is achy knees... this tends to prevent me from working them really hard... any advice?

at least 48 hours between workouts and then the intensity needs to be changed drastically.

 

[needtogetaas]

I work them 3 times a week.

 

[timtim]

I work them 3 times a week.

is that the star program?

ive seen that before. each day has different goals. also, these are not bb'ing workouts, they are power, correct?

 

[needtogetaas]

is that the star program?

ive seen that before. each day has different goals. also, these are not bb'ing workouts, they are power, correct?

yes I am a power lifter...sorry should have said this....but if you are trying to bulk then the star is a good program to use...its great for people just starting working out to

 

[fortunatesun]

About your knees, you can try low impact plyometric exercises. A high impact choice like depth jumps may only aggreivate the problem.
After your normal leg workout try something like jump squats with just the bar, or squating down w/o the bar and from that position see how many times you can jump while breaking parallel the entire set.. Burpees also, and tabata squats of which there are vids over at crossfit.com.
The idea behind this is that explosive movement forces your muscle to expand and contract in a different way than anaerobic exercise. This provides a safe way to strengthen the ligaments and connective tissue around your joints that are used during your leg workout.

 

[Hybridtheory2o]

Yeh the good ol broomstick never fails. I just started training legs about a month and a half ago because i negelcted them unfortunately. But i practice my form a lot and i warm up with just the bar and what not because to me doing squats for the first time felt VERY awkward. I kept thinking i was going to fall over haha. So practice practice practice your squat form because its easy to mess up on when you are new. I still dont squat that much yet because im not as comfortable as id like to be.

 

[fortunatesun]

I still dont squat that much yet because im not as comfortable as id like to be.

The best cure is just to do squats, lots of them. it doesn't matter how much weight you move, so long as you're moving it. Just go with something you're comfortable with, maybe work up to a couple sets of triples occaisionally so you gain central nervous system experience with a heavier load.