It is not a secret for anyone that weightlifters were born with huge and strong legs. Most professional weightlifters know how important it is to wear jeans, got their legs in them, and in tights, they do not squeeze dozens of folds with a belt. Also, they know how worn down to a nub between their legs. All this disaster is because of the legs size.
In general, weightlifting is a fast-paced sport where the explosive power of the major muscle groups plays a key role. But why do they need even stronger legs, this is not powerlifting, where they are the main indicators of absolute strength? Let’s take a look at 6 reasons why leg strength is really needed.
1. After the standing press was eliminated in 1972, from the weightlifting competition program, the role of the strength of the lower body, and in particular, legs, has increased significantly. Now in weightlifting, according to most experts, the results almost directly depend on leg strength.
2. The trajectory of bar flight is built in such a way that the legs perform a lot of work during each movement. It is important that athletes, in order not to lift the bar to a high height, usually after the power position, make a turnover. Then you need to recover from the squat position, so your legs have to be strong. They, so to speak, do double work every time. Sometimes athletes train at full capacities during the training process for 2-3 sets with the different quantity of reps. This result can be achieved with the legs workout plan.
3. The effort that the athlete develops in the leg muscles is much greater than the weight on the barbell. Various studies, which measured the force with which the weightlifter presses his feet to the floor, showed that at the lift-off and at the power position the weightlifter twice in a short time approaches 150% in a high-speed car. In order to accelerate the 150 kg bar in clean, you need to make an effort to resist about 225 kg. World-class weightlifters often lift over 200 kg above their head. Imagine what the strength of the legs should be!
4. The vertical movement of the barbell upwards is performed by the muscles of the lower extremities. As you need to lift the bar it has to fly vertically. This movement is done mainly due to extension in the knee, hip, and shin joints. The movement in these joints is performed by the strength of the leg muscles. If your legs are weaker than back muscles, you will have an early overextension of the torso back and the barbell will fly forward. Horizontal movements of the bar should be minimized. Both these movements of the torso backward and the fixation of the barbell in front are very traumatic for the joints, ligaments, and muscles. Moreover, it is traumatic not only on heavy weights. Such constant work on the light weights is a call to inflammatory processes in the lower body and knee.
5. In order to be smart, you need to be strong! This is the principle of the strongest training methodology in weightlifting. They believe that strong legs are needed to lift huge numbers on the bar.
Yes, the strongest! It is known that power has several varieties. In weightlifting, it is explosive power. It is the ability of an athlete to exert maximum effort in minimum time. There is really a need to show maximum vision without taking into account and the movement is slightly slower. But these two types of strength in percentage are adjacent. Another issue is strengths such as speed or strength endurance. There, athletes show less strength, but a longer period of time. Such force is effective at high-rep mode, as in weightlifting or Crossfit.
6. Recovery is the key to results. The leg muscles are known to recover from heavy loads faster than the back and upper shoulder girdle muscles. This is because an athlete constantly walking, and active recreation is much faster to start the recovery process in the body. As the legs recover faster, the total amount of work can be done more, which is a key parameter in the training process.
So, if an athlete has strong legs, he will be able to perform more load. Of course, the vast majority of such athletes will be able to lift more weights.
And what do you think: weightlifters need strong legs or not?
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