By now you should have already heard of the great benefits of working out your legs so I won't waste any time explaining why these exercises are made for you. 

Leg presses - I'm talking about the 45 degree free-weight machine. The bench press equivalent for the lower body. This exercise works most of your major leg muscles throughout the lift and requires great effort. The strongest muscles in your body are put in action for this lift and you should be getting pumped to see the weights go up! Keep your heels flat against the platform and keep your body straight and and push evenly with both feet. Remember to breathe in when the weight is going down and breathe when the weight is going up. Don't lock your knees if it hurts. Ideally, you want a weight that you can do sets of 10-15 reps. Do 6 sets! 1 warm-up set, 4 hard sets, 1 set where you put more weight and do less reps OR less weight and more reps.          NOTE: When you are done with your set , DO NOT stand up too soon afterwards because the blood loss from the rush out of your head will make you dizzy or you might black out and faint.

Leg curling - It's like bicep curling but the legs. This the machine where you are lying down on your belly and the back of your ankles go under the rolling pads. Your back upper leg muscles curl the weight up towards your buttocks in this leg exercise. This muscle gives you the nice round thighs in the back if you keep at it long enough. 3-4 sets of 8-12 reps is good. Don't swing the weight and lift in a CONTROLLED motion. 

Hip Adductor - This is the muscle on our inner thigh closer to your groin. I'm sure you've seen the exercises for this before. It's the machine in the gym that many females love using. It's the one where your legs are in a spread position at resting and then you try to touch your knees together and swinging your knees shut in a sweeping butterfly motion. The exercise is meant to be heavy. Put a lot of weight (not so much that you're simply swinging and using momentum to lift the weight). Lift in a controlled manner and don't bang your knees. Do 3 sets of 10-15 reps. As always, breathe out when you're exerting force and breathe in when the weight is coming back down. The fun part about this exercise is at the end of your workout when you try to walk home but your legs feel swollen and stiff in that area giving you the spread-legged wrestler walk. The exercise is great for rounding out your upper legs and giving strength and tone in your upper legs and strength in a fuller range of motion. Do  this over time and you will literally feel your legs getting in shape!

Hip Abductor - Not to be mistaken for the previous exercise, this is the hip AB-ductor. This is the exact opposite of the last exercise. Your hip abductor muscles are the muscles on the side of your buttocks and upper legs. You start with your knees and ankles touching and then you lift the weight by forcing your legs to spread apart. You will feel the outside muscles of upper legs and buttocks contract and stiffen.  This exercise works out the core strength of your upper legs and overall lower body. Do 3 sets of 10-15 reps each. Try to use consistent control and exert even force with both legs. Avoid using momentum to swing the pads out.

Calf Press - This is usually the machine where you sit down and a free weight is placed on a bar between your knees. It's very simple, you just push up with your calf so that your heels lift up. Pause at top while squeezing your calves to let the burn set in for a bit. At the top of the lift, you should be squeezing your calves as if to flex and show off your calf muscles. Great exercise and it feels great when you finally stop. You're aiming for 8-15 reps and you can do anywhere from 3-6 sets depending on how conditioned you are. Make sure that you exert even force with both calves so that it's not just one calf lifting most of the weight.

You'll usually feel like your legs are swollen and stuffed together right after a workout. The following day or two, you'll be really really sore at first, but it should be funny when you realize how handicapped you have become. Workout hard and these exercises will make you stronger and bigger over your WHOLE BODY! I've seen people break out of bench press ruts and plateau's with leg exercises and I've actually done it myself. These are fun leg exercises and they will improve your size and strength. I've made sure to avoid the painful ones that make you hate working out your legs, the rest is up to you.

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