HOW I ADDED 4 INCHES TO MY LEGS
Musclemag has always known Scott Abel to be one of the truly great trainers and coaches in the
bodybuilding world. For years, his methods have produced some of the finest physiques to grace
the stage. His academic background is second to none in this industry, having won very
prestigious academic scholarships along with earning his degrees. After twenty plus years in the
iron game he has an impressive resume including the development of Innervation Training
Methodology used around the world today. As a testament to his knowledge base is his own
incredible physique. Now well over forty years of age his physique is that of a pro bodybuilder
half his age. Not only do Scott’s credentials speak volumes, and his physique speak volumes,
but knowing he made substantial gains after coming back from a crippling back injury real proves
him as the master trainer of our time. When we heard Scott added an incredible four inches to
his thigh development, we had to get the story from him. Here’s what he had to say.
I have been a fan of bodybuilding for some twenty five years. Now, as an expert, I have an even
keener eye to what makes a great physique great. True bodybuilders invest in their workouts the
intensity required to build legs in concert and in
symmetry with the rest of their physique. This is a
difficult process, because real leg training requires real intensity, and well developed quads are a
sign that the owner is a hard working trainer in the gym, and probably knows how to train
correctly. Too many wannabe weekend warriors and bar goer bodybuilders avoid leg training
because the legs are easy to hide and seldom seen, and truth be told, just too damn hard to
develop. But real bodybuilders respect the importance of the whole package and buckle down
week after week, year after year to construct a decent set of quads. Now it’s not just quad
development that is important but also the deep deep cuts of the quads that nail the crucial
difference between going to the gym, and “working out.” In the early days of my training I loved to
hate quad training. It took so much out of me I had to psyche up for every leg workout. Over the
course of years I learned to love leg training and recognized the importance of having great
quads in order to have a great physique. Nothing is more disappointing than seeing a competitor
with a potentially great physique strip down backstage to reveal less than average thigh
development, but it happens all the time. For me, the most disappointed I got in training was
when I badly herniated two discs in my lower back that required surgery. For a few months
before surgery I was limited to one legged extensions, and abductor/adductor movements for
thighs, and that was about it. After a very complicated surgery I spent a fee weeks bed ridden
and then a couple more learning to walk again. At this point quad development was the furthest
thing from my mind. But, as I got better and got back to training I made gains far surpassing my
previous best. I added another 4 inches of development to already good thigh mass. If I learned
anything it’s that Innervation Training is the key to growth and that anyone can always improve a
weak body part if they apply the knowledge and they have the will.
For those of you out there getting no where with your quad workouts I can recommend the
following.
TRAIN THE THIGHS, NOT THE EGO
No where does ego training play a bigger role than when people train the thighs. Believe me
seeing how much you can squat or leg press is a complete waste of gym time. More important to
your training psyche should be to execute your reps and sets with proper technique and for the
proper number of reps. Now, that says a great deal. Where is technique sacrificed more for the
sake of weight and ego than in training the legs? Doing half squats or quarter squats for a few
reps will do nothing to build the quads, and the only person you are impressing is yourself. The
same goes with partial leg presses. The other squatting mistake is what I term hip squats. That’s
when the trainee initiates the squat by bending at the hips first instead of the knees. The squat
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then looks more like a modified good morning movement or power lifting squat. This is just as
detrimental to leg training as the half squat, because in this case you will develop bigger muscles
but it will be bigger hips and glutes rather than quads which will destroy your symmetry, and
make your quads look even smaller. So the point here is to “train the muscle and not the
movement.”
TRAIN THE MUSCLE, NOT THE MOVEMENT
When you train any muscle you need to mentally lock in to the muscles you are training and not
the movements you utilize to train them. A squat is not a squat. A half squat or quarter squat is
useless and the same applies to leg press or other compound movements for the legs. To get
the most development from these movements, get down as far as you can into what we call the
“pocket” and push your way back to the beginning. Your legs should be no further than shoulder
width apart and even that is pushing it. And your squat depth must break parallel by several
inches down as far as you can go.
Now, in my case, because of my back I can no longer do regular squats, but the techniques of
Innervation Training showed me the way, and you can do this too and never experience back
pain again from squatting. As a matter of fact if you are getting back pain from squatting you are
using 1.) Too much weight and 2.) Not the best technique. For myself I can no longer push the
loads this way. So how did I squat and still gain four inches of new mass to my thighs? I now do
front squats. Front squats put the force to the anterior plane of the body and in that position it is
much easier to bend at the knees first and keep the back straight. But it doesn’t stop there. I
raise my heels on twenty five pound plates, to further shift the weight on my quads and to make
balance and issue insuring that I must use proper technique which automatically prevents me
from massaging my ego instead of squatting for greater thigh development. Try this technique
and you will for sure add mass to your thighs, and really notice the development of outer thigh
sweep. Take a look at Olympic weight lifters. The clean and jerk makes them squat deep in a
front squat position. Check out their outer thigh sweep. It’s incredible. In their training they do
many reps of many sets having to squat that low, and their weight lifting shoes elevate the heels.
I just took that to the next level.
You will know you are training the muscle, not the movement when you start to pay less attention
to external cues, like how much weight is on the bar, and you start paying more attention to
internal cues like oxygen debt.
OXYGEN DEBT
The time it takes your breathing to return to normal after a set is termed oxygen debt. It more
correctly helps you to ascertain how close you came to your maximum workload capacity. This is
what you should be assessing in your workouts for maximum development. The longer it takes
your breathing to return to normal after doing a set, the greater is the oxygen debt which means
the greater demand you have put on the working muscles. Provided your conditioning is sound,
use oxygen debt as a gauge to your maximum performance levels and forget about how much
weight you lift. (You are not a weight lifter!)
SINGLE LIMB MOVEMENTS
When doing leg press for quads consider doing one legged press instead of the traditional leg
press. This allows you for greater concentration on each thigh and prevents the lower back from
rolling forward. Because of the removal of two of my discs I have to do only one legged press but
I suggest to you that it is better than two legged press because more stress can be applied for
each leg individually (this is known as bilateral deficit), and you are less likely to stress or injure
the lower back in this movement. This is also what makes alternate lunges such a great
movement as well. And please, I am talking about alternate lunges floor to floor, not on a box,
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and not those stupid walking lunges that have taken over the common sense of most trainers out
there.
PEAK CONTRACTION MOVEMENTS
Movements like leg extensions and the many variations of hamstring curls are known in
Innervation Training terms as single joint movements, or more commonly known as isolation
movements. When doing such exercises always employ the technique of peak contractions. By
this I mean start the movement in the fully stretched position and then flex the weight up to the
fully contracted position. When you get to the position of full contraction flex the muscle you are
working as hard as you can, and then lower slowly. Not only does this demand more intensity
and more fiber recruitment, but it will force you to do the movement properly which ensures “you
train the muscle not the movement”. If you cannot lower the weight slowly it is too much weight
and the same applies if you can’t force a peak contraction. Again, this moves your concentration
away from external cues, like weight and reps, toward internal cues like load and quality of
contraction and full repetitions.
A lot of people double split leg workouts into hamstrings in one session and front quads in
another. While this is a viable method, you cannot truly isolate the one set of muscles from the
other. To make these wicked gains on my legs I employed an Innervation Training technique that
a lot of athletes are now doing to force new growth to weak body parts. I double split my leg
workouts but not according to the muscle anatomy but according to intensity. My back is still a
threat for injury so I developed this technique in keeping with the Innervation Training System,
and you can try it as well. I train legs hard in the morning and easy in the afternoon on leg day.
Notice I said hard and easy rather than heavy and light. You see hard and easy implies internal
cues like intensity, whereas heavy and light imply external cues, like how much weight you use. I
make sure to train each movement to failure in the a.m., but train easier and not to failure with
less weight, and easier movements in the afternoon. I truly believe this is one of the main
reasons I added four new inches to my quads this year. Other guys who have tried this principle
to other body parts are also reporting incredible gains after a few months. My workouts vary
considerably but a sample workout may look like this:
Exercise Sets Reps
Front squats 6-7 8-12
One legged press 4 10-15
One legged curls 4 10-15
Leg extensions 4 10-15
Hack squats 3 12-15
Afternoon
Seated leg curls 3-4 8-15 easy
Horizontal machine leg press 3 10-15 easy
Abductor/adductor superset 3 10-15 easy
Now that is a lot of volume and a lot of sets. The afternoon workout separates the men from the
boys so to speak. One of the main pieces of research I used to develop Innervation Training
proved that angle of contraction was as important as or more important than intensity for
maximum fiber recruitment. By using proper angles of execution and technique with maximum
intensity in the morning combined with different angles, proper technique, but low intensity in the
afternoon, I can get the best of multi-angle movements, and multi-joint movements without
overtraining. This is a sample of the many workouts I used to make incredible leg gains, and the
philosophy behind doing so. Keep in mind I train this way with two less discs in my back than
everyone else has. Next time you are looking for an excuse for your lack of leg development
remember that.
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The other necessary implement to making gains for any body part is the correct use of the best
supplements, and proper nutrition.
I’ve written many articles for Musclemag on proper nutrition so consult these previous issues or
my website for specifics. To gain mass you need a good amount of high quality protein and in the
right amounts. In a growth phase you will need 2 grams of protein per kilogram of bodyweight
and 4-6 grams of carbs per kilogram of bodyweight. If you are going to supplement either one,
then protein is the smart choice and
Nitro-Tech by Muscletech is the smartest choice.
NITRO-TECH
By now everyone knows that whey protein is the most viable and most easily assimilated protein.
It scores a biological value of 106, the standard being the egg at 100. Though whey protein
makes good sense as a supplementary protein source, Nitro-Tech by Muscletech is vastly
superior to regular whey proteins. In one study Nitro-Tech was proven to be 24 times more
effective than regular whey for building muscle mass. One of the chief reasons for this has to be
its unique delivery system that ensures the muscles receive the high quality protein quickly and
efficiently. It is so efficient that in another study Nitro-Tech subjects, on average gained 9 pounds
in only six weeks. That’s over one pound per week of pure muscle mass from taking Nitro-Tech.
My own clients tend to make even better gains, probably bec ause of the combination of
Innervation Training with Nitro-Tech supplementation. Often they find themselves moving up a
weight class from contest to contest from adding substantial muscle mass and weight. My clients
aren’t the only ones. In the same study that I just referred to, one subject gained almost 15
pounds of lean mass and added an amazing 60 pounds to his bench press and 90 pounds to his
squat weight. He managed to do this all within the course of the six weeks study and the whole
time he lost body fat. Yes, Nitro-Tech is an absolute must if you want to make serious muscle
gains, and to add quality leg mass.
Myself, I am partial to the usual flavors of chocolate, vanilla, and strawberry. Having these three
flavors gives tremendous variety to my diet, which is an added bonus.
Training the way I do, my results are not typical, and Nitro-Tech and other Muscletech
supplements play a huge role in my progress to date. My size gains and the quality of the pumps
I get are substantially better since using the Muscletech products. And I have 4 added inches of
leg growth to prove it.
CELL-TECH
Along with a good whey protein supplement, hard training athletes now know of the benefits of
creatine supplementation for building quality muscle and adding strength and endurance to your
workouts, which help to further build more muscle. Once again, Cell-tech by Muscletech is far
superior to regular creatine and there are over 35 studies to prove its cutting edge ingredients,
and some of these studies show Cell-Tech to be over 19 times better than regular creatine for
building quality mass. One study showed subjects gained over 9 pounds of lean mass in 8
weeks. The same study revealed that another Cell Tech subject gained over 17 pounds of mass
in just 8 short weeks, while another added 50 pounds to his max bench also in 8 weeks. My own
experience with Cell-tech has been even more dramatic. The first time I ever used it I gained 15
pounds in the first week. With that gain came incredible pumps and strength increases which I
still notice to this day. Most of my clients find that they make the best gains the longer they stay
on Cell-Tech and when they take it right after training and that’s what I recommend. For serious
athletes Cell-Tech supplementation should be considered as important as protein intake in order
to make serious and lasting gains in quality muscle.
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As far as making great gains on your quads, I recommend strongly to leave the ego out of your
training, and do high volume of sets and keep the reps relatively high. Utilize the mantra I stated
above to train the muscle, not the ego, and to train the muscle, not the movement. When you
understand that, and the other principles I mention above you will be on your way to making great
gains in the mass. Don’t forget the importance of the Nitro-Tech, Cell-Tech stack to help you
accomplish this goal. Follow the advice above and soon you will have killer thighs, and people
will ask you how you made such incredible gains. Innervation Training System and Muscletech
supplements make all the difference from the run of the mill workout approach.
