At one stage or another, almost everybody who uses the gym has gone online in a bid to search out the workout program of their favorite celebrities. After all, if you're trying to learn how to build muscle you'll probably find it easier if your favorite movie star is teaching you, right? That's the theory many fitness enthusiasts have and one of the public figures who is usually at the forefront of this trend is wrestler and actor Dwayne Johnson.
This trend has grown in popularity over the last ten years and, naturally, many celebrities have caught onto the fact that there is a good business opportunity here. This is why you'll often find personalities regularly releasing fitness dvd's which cash in on the 'next big thing' in fitness. As you'll discover, however, the superior workouts tend to come from those who purely train because they enjoy training.
The Rock leg workout is something which is particularly eye catching.
One of the reasons for this is that Dwayne Johnson has achieved an impressive transformation in the last year. While his workout routine is something which anybody can do, of course, those results have also been achieved because of a strict diet and putting proven hypertrophy principles in place before hitting the gym.
Of course, two of the major factors behind the huge results are the intensity of each session and the nature of the exercises being performed. While sticking to old, proven movements such as Squats and Leg Curls, you will be able to adopt new techniques such as keeping minimal rest periods between sets, therefore increasing your fat loss results and stamina simultaneously.
Today's plan consists of just five exercises, which are as follows.
* Five sets of Box Squats, with 25 reps per set.
* Leg Press - 4 sets of 25, 20, 18 and 16 repetitions followed by a burnout set of 25.
* Four sets of Lunges performed on a Smith Machine, with eight repetitions per leg.
* The Lying Leg Curl machine gets four sets of pyramid training with reps of 12, 10, 8 and 6. Again, this is immediately followed up with a burnout set of a further twelve.
* And finally, the Standing Calf Raise rounds out the session with six sets of 16 repetitions followed by a burnout of 20 after the final set.
You may be looking at the routine and thinking it's a fairly standard workout and in truth you would be correct. The trick is to monitor your intensity level during the session, keeping rest times down to as little as 30 seconds in between each set and 60 seconds as you switch between exercises.
As well as the fat loss benefits of keeping down your rest periods, you will also notice two old principles of hypertrophy are at play here. Those are the pyramid technique and burnout sets.
Pyramid training involves gradually lowering your target reps with each set you perform, allowing you to steadily increase the resistance level as you progress through each set and cover a wide variety of rep ranges. This means you will literally work every fiber in the muscle being targeted.
This works quite well with the burnout principle. Burnout sets are designed to clear out any remaining energy in the targeted body part following the last set. They get their name from the feeling of burning generated in the tissue by taking it to absolute failure. To use this technique simply lower the weight after your final set and push out up to 25 repetitions at this lower resistance. The only rest between your final set ending and your burnout set beginning is the amount of time it takes you to lower the resistance.
While it sticks to the basics, The Rock leg workout is by no means basic in it's execution. It shows that the trick to building the body your trying to achieve lies not in the exercises you perform but in the way you perform them. If most men are honest with the gym they'll admit that they don't hit their lower body with the same intensity they show when training the 'ego muscles', such as chest and biceps. Losing that bad habit is key to making the most of your potential on lower body workouts like this.
This trend has grown in popularity over the last ten years and, naturally, many celebrities have caught onto the fact that there is a good business opportunity here. This is why you'll often find personalities regularly releasing fitness dvd's which cash in on the 'next big thing' in fitness. As you'll discover, however, the superior workouts tend to come from those who purely train because they enjoy training.
The Rock leg workout is something which is particularly eye catching.
One of the reasons for this is that Dwayne Johnson has achieved an impressive transformation in the last year. While his workout routine is something which anybody can do, of course, those results have also been achieved because of a strict diet and putting proven hypertrophy principles in place before hitting the gym.
Of course, two of the major factors behind the huge results are the intensity of each session and the nature of the exercises being performed. While sticking to old, proven movements such as Squats and Leg Curls, you will be able to adopt new techniques such as keeping minimal rest periods between sets, therefore increasing your fat loss results and stamina simultaneously.
Today's plan consists of just five exercises, which are as follows.
* Five sets of Box Squats, with 25 reps per set.
* Leg Press - 4 sets of 25, 20, 18 and 16 repetitions followed by a burnout set of 25.
* Four sets of Lunges performed on a Smith Machine, with eight repetitions per leg.
* The Lying Leg Curl machine gets four sets of pyramid training with reps of 12, 10, 8 and 6. Again, this is immediately followed up with a burnout set of a further twelve.
* And finally, the Standing Calf Raise rounds out the session with six sets of 16 repetitions followed by a burnout of 20 after the final set.
You may be looking at the routine and thinking it's a fairly standard workout and in truth you would be correct. The trick is to monitor your intensity level during the session, keeping rest times down to as little as 30 seconds in between each set and 60 seconds as you switch between exercises.
As well as the fat loss benefits of keeping down your rest periods, you will also notice two old principles of hypertrophy are at play here. Those are the pyramid technique and burnout sets.
Pyramid training involves gradually lowering your target reps with each set you perform, allowing you to steadily increase the resistance level as you progress through each set and cover a wide variety of rep ranges. This means you will literally work every fiber in the muscle being targeted.
This works quite well with the burnout principle. Burnout sets are designed to clear out any remaining energy in the targeted body part following the last set. They get their name from the feeling of burning generated in the tissue by taking it to absolute failure. To use this technique simply lower the weight after your final set and push out up to 25 repetitions at this lower resistance. The only rest between your final set ending and your burnout set beginning is the amount of time it takes you to lower the resistance.
While it sticks to the basics, The Rock leg workout is by no means basic in it's execution. It shows that the trick to building the body your trying to achieve lies not in the exercises you perform but in the way you perform them. If most men are honest with the gym they'll admit that they don't hit their lower body with the same intensity they show when training the 'ego muscles', such as chest and biceps. Losing that bad habit is key to making the most of your potential on lower body workouts like this.
About the Author:
Your next move: Discover how to build muscle with expert personal trainer Russ Howe PTI. Today's session, the rock leg workout, is just one of tons available on his exclusive fitness site.
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