Tweetmy left knee hates heavy squats- there is no way around that, its military related injury. But nothing looks more ridiculous than guys we all see in the gym with a built upper body and jack shit for wheels.

What i want is your personal suggestions on the best routes to take to explode my outer sweep that do not include heavy squat sets.

thanks FG!

TweetAgreed about the wraps and make sure you warm your legs up thoroughly man.Rep out on some leg ext's prior to your heavy lifting.In addition,leg extensions are not only for shaping the leg can can be utilized for mass as well.You can get a great outer quad workout on leg ext's by doing them with you toes pointed in throughout the motion.

As also suggested,hack's can be utilized and take some stress off you and the leg press machine can also be used in place is squats are a complete no-go.

Here's a few tips that might be useful........

Stance How far apart you position your feet affects muscle recruitment. While multijoint movements work the quads, hams and glutes, the leg press in particular shifts some emphasis to the teardrop, and a narrow stance on the hack squat better targets the outer quads (sweep).

Foot Position On a single-joint move such as the leg extension, turning your feet inward more strongly activates the muscle fibers of the outer quads. Turn your feet outward to focus on the teardrop (inner quad).

Pre-Exhaust Start the workout with a single-joint pre-exhaust move for the quads before doing a multijoint exercise. This allows you to fatigue the target area (quads) with the leg extension so it can be further fatigued on the compound exercise, turning it into the weak link: When you reach muscle failure, it will be the quads that have failed, not another contributing muscle group. Ultimately, this method forces your quads to work overtime while reducing the emphasis on the other major muscle groups involved in the compound exercise.


Partial Reps Doing very heavy half-squats in which you descend only halfway instead of using a full range of motion, in this case on the hack squat, puts more stress on the quads (which are more active over the top half of the movement). Because you're limiting your training to an area that's particularly strong over the range of motion (well above the so-called sticking point), you can really overload the area where you have the greatest strength. And since you're doing sets of just six reps for this exercise, you can pile on the weight.


You undoubtedly focus some chest workouts on the upper or lower pecs for optimal overall development, and it should be no different with your leg workouts. Get in the habit of making a few subtle changes to your leg routine to fine-tune areas you want to build or bring up. Bringing up your lower quads will have you seeing tears of joy.