Leg extensions. Worth it or worthless

[neufox47]

15-20 years ago somebody did a pretty big study looking at max deadlift #'s fro D1 wrestlers. There was no correlation with winning. My theory on this is that once you're strong "enough," more time spent developing max strength only reduces your capacity to recover from other kinds of training.

Walter Jones, the Hall of fame left tackle, trained in the offseason by pushing his Escalade up a hill. That was it.

I agree with you and think it is more just diminished returns from weightlifting beyond a certain point where it just doesn’t matter. And people with really good fast twitch muscle characteristics typically don’t have freakish strength. I’ve told this story before but I got a chance to be a work out partner for a NFL practice squad player. I was stronger than him at basically every lift and I only weighed 15lbs more than him. But he was so much quicker, faster, could jump higher, etc. we were like different species.

Personally, my experience is that there is no athletic advantage to being able to do 3-4 reps with 500lbs vs 3-4 reps with 400 lbs. The time and CNS exhaustion spent on getting to 500 would likely be better spent on conditioning, movement quality, etc.

I also agree with your “strong enough” statement. I think that is also why you don’t see many pro athletes continue to work on progressive overload of lifts like squat and deadlift (and basically no one in pro sports is benching much and literally no one except freaks are doing heavy military presses). Deadlifting 3x body weight gives few if any advantages over 2.5x. However training for 3x comes with a statistically significant risk of catastrophic injury.

[XavierD]

Yeah but squatting 500lb is more fun

NFL players are pretty much all bench pressing FWIW.

[Hopeless Sinner]

Ended up doing 6 sessions of full leg blasters in the previous 2 weeks. Can confirm it's worth the pain!!!

[Dantheman]

First turns of the year last Sat/Sun. Conditions were a mix of dense grabby upside-down pow, crud, wind buff, firm groomers, man-made ice, natural ice, bumps and a few modest airs, all in overcast super flat light. Legs felt great with no DOMS and felt super "on it" overall. That was despite taking the previous 3 weeks off from training due to a major illness.

[Dantheman]

I must be doing something right.

http://youtube.com/shorts/29qECh-7PbA

[mr_pretzel]

Beauty!

[EWG]

I must be doing something right.

http://youtube.com/shorts/29qECh-7PbA

Yeah man!!!

[bennymac]

clearly worth it!

[gaijin]

You know, "Taking ten foot cliffs like moguls." used to be a tag-line amongst comp skiers in reference to skiers who got their shit together.

So, I would say-- you're taking ten foot cliffs like moguls.

That's dope shit right there. And-- you've got your shit together.

Now-- don't hit a tree with this explosion of fluidity below your feet.

[2FUNKY]

Nice line DTM!

[XXX-er]

I personally think they’re worthless. About 3 years ago a good trainer buddy of mine and another trainer were talking leg workouts. They both know I pretty much train specifically geared towards skiing. One trainer competes in strong man competitions and trains for strength training. The other is more of a sports specific trainer and trains for a wide variety of sports. They both feel that unless coming off an injury and need to encourage mobility etc that overall the leg extension is worthless to a degree. Since I have stopped doing them I have noticed better gains in strength and mass in my legs and hips. That is probably due to the fact that I now do more squat reps as well as hack squat reps and other complex movements.
So what’s your take?

I think YMMV but after an ACL reconstruction I've had trouble getting the knee muscles to fire and various leg machines weren't doing it, there always seemed to be a hitch at the bottom of the stroke and the knee was weak but the operation felt good

Gyms/ resturants/ bars are covid-closed up here so couldn't go to the gym but what seems to be working is fill a mop bucket up with weight ( vise/ hammers/ wrenches) at home and do single knee bends so the knee stays completely loaded thru 15 reps, IME it gots to be single leg or the good knee just compensates for the recovering knee

[fool]

Crushing it, DTM!

[Dantheman]

Thanks guys! I'm 4 months from 40 and I feel incredibly lucky to still be skiing like this.

[DarthMarkus]

Thanks guys! I'm 4 months from 40 and I feel incredibly lucky to still be skiing like this.

I aspire to still be dropping cliffs when I'm 40! Awesome work, you're an inspiration.

Sent from my Redmi Note 8 Pro using Tapatalk

[2FUNKY]

Thanks guys! I'm 4 months from 40 and I feel incredibly lucky to still be skiing like this.

You’re just a pup man. I turned 51 last November. Life threw me a massive curve ball so my fitness it not where I want it or normally have it. With that said, stay on course, seems like you won’t have a problem there and you’ll be killing into well into your older age. Hell I still have no issues keeping up with really really good skiers in their 30’s or younger. It’s pretty fun just crushing a line and blowing by a guy much younger and see the look on their face in the lift line when they realize my age.
ACH, who just lurks now, has me by 9yrs and that dude absolutely rips!
I just don’t drop big stuff anymore as the margin for error is so small and big crashes really take a toll.

[TAFKALVS]

You’re just a pup man. I turned 51 last November. Life threw me a massive curve ball so my fitness it not where I want it or normally have it. With that said, stay on course, seems like you won’t have a problem there and you’ll be killing into well into your older age. Hell I still have no issues keeping up with really really good skiers in their 30’s or younger. It’s pretty fun just crushing a line and blowing by a guy much younger and see the look on their face in the lift line when they realize my age.
ACH, who just lurks now, has me by 9yrs and that dude absolutely rips!
I just don’t drop big stuff anymore as the margin for error is so small and big crashes really take a toll.

You rip dude. Hope I'm skiing like that in a while.

[2FUNKY]

You rip dude. Hope I'm skiing like that in a while.

Thanks mang. Gotta keep up with you whipper snappers.

[thefortrees]

Thanks mang. Gotta keep up with you whipper snappers.

Got this pic of 2funky at alpental a couple years back:

[2FUNKY]

Lol!

[Dantheman]

You’re just a pup man. I turned 51 last November. Life threw me a massive curve ball so my fitness it not where I want it or normally have it. With that said, stay on course, seems like you won’t have a problem there and you’ll be killing into well into your older age.

I am, and that's the goal. Injuries definitely become increasingly consequential. I lost all of 2020 to a head injury so getting back to this point feels especially good.

[klauss]

Dtm's line is basically the skin track to the top, but I guess you "old" guys avoid the fall line Definitely a nice rip

Haven't read the thread yet but glad to see leg extensions are working for people. My patellar tendonitis says no

[jackstraw]

Got this pic of 2funky at alpental a couple years back:

Damn! I know 2funky. We met in Taos way back. Yeah, you rip man!

[muted reborn]

You’re just a pup man. I turned 51 last November. Life threw me a massive curve ball so my fitness it not where I want it or normally have it. With that said, stay on course, seems like you won’t have a problem there and you’ll be killing into well into your older age.

[XXX-er]

IME the 30 something guys were all working real jobs, pianting white picket fences and taking care of yard apes

so when they are on day 2 and yer on day 60 its a big difference, but the blown ACL has been a game changer

[Self Jupiter]

Great to see ya gettin after it post injury, DTM!