I Don't Want Thunder Thighs, or a Big Butt...

Copyright (c) 2008 Anderson Training Systems

I saw the craziest thing the other day, and if I would have had my phone with me I might have been tempted to take a photo.

I saw a lady at the grocery store her, upper body was ripped, shredded, whatever you want to call it. She had awesome definition in her arms and shoulders, a very angular clean jaw line, in top shape, fitness competitor type shape, you could help but notice that this gal had put in some serious work on her physique.

Then I walked around the corner of the vegetable platform, and much to my surprise the lady had the 'bottom half' of someone who weight 2x as much as her upper body would indicate.

My first though was how sad, and frustrating it must be for this lady, to be in such great shape up top but have a bottom 1/2 severely lagging.

Sad but there is answer and it's not what you think.

I will get to the solution to this lady's problem in a moment; but first let's address the real problem.

More women than I care to count have come to me carrying the myth of the title of this blog.

'I Don't Want Thunder Thighs, or a Big Ass'

Generally my reply to this myth is, 'Neither do I'.

I am not sure exactly where this myth started, but boy is so deeply embedded in the female mindset that I am sure that it won't be absolved anytime soon.

Unfortunately, one of the ancillary results has been that, this myth has generated a terrible untruth that many women now believe or even worse have turned into a full blown phobia.

1. They are deathly afraid of doing any type of strength training with their legs; and they are convinced that any amount of strength training will result in them having a leg circumference equal to that of professional male body builder, who is eating 10,000 calories per day, taking in 2,000-4,000 mg of steroids per week, and on specific mass building routine.

I promise strength training your legs won't make them look and feel like they are 30 inch in diameter and do nothing be incessantly rub together.

Knowone wants that.

I have found that giving examples is the quickest way to help people understand things.

I will give you an example of one of my female client's recent experiences of lifting heavy in reference to thigh and hip measurement.

This particular client has been deadlifting during the last 3 weeks of her training cycle:

The numbers:

Her deadlift training numbers have increased by a little approximately 20lbs.

Going from 135lbs to around 155lbs. (these this a weight that many women would find 'heavy')

During that same 3 week period she has:

Reduced her thigh circumference by 2" each thigh

And reduced her hip/butt measurement by: 1 3/4"

The Truth:

If read or speak with any of the cutting edge physique coaches, one of their primary cornerstones of any fat loss program is going to be:

lower repetition and high load resistance training exercise.

The plain and simple reason for this is that it forces the body to keep muscle on the body, a very good thing since muscle = metabolism.

The proper methodology would be something to similar to the below is the protocol for my, Big Iron Burn (BIB) Method

Big Iron

1-2 core multi-joint movements performed with heavier weight less reps

Burn

2-4 - Supportive movement performed in a rapid succession burn circuit for multiple cycles.

Paired with Smoke Session-Interval training

This is a rough outline of the programming protocol that I use 100% of my fat loss clients.

What light weight and high repetition lifting will ultimately result any turning into a 'skinny fat' who won't have the slender, lean athletic lower body that looks great in any kind of clothing.

The alternative is low weight high repetition training which will usually result in muscle wasting, decreased metabolism, and you walking around looking like you you have a bag full of chewed bubble gum on your legs.

Because all your muscle will be gone, and you be left with fat and skin, where muscle one used to be.

So hopefully this helps you see the picture a little more clearly and will allow you to accept and embrace that strength training your lower body is actually a very good thing.

No let's get out there and do some squats, deadlifts, and heavy lunges and cure that phobia.

So you can have legs that look lean, toned, athletic; and look great in everything from a little black dress to a pair of 'skinny jeans'