Whether you want to get stronger to make your daily movements easier or to become a better athlete, you need to strengthen your leg muscles. Walking up the stairs, shopping, hiking, running, playing tennis, and playing soccer are examples of how we rely on our legs to get to places, complete tasks, and perform in sports.
The good news is that you don’t need any machines or equipment to tone these muscles, and you can do these exercises anywhere (such as at home, at a park, in your work office, in a hotel room, or at the gym).
Calisthenics exercises, which use only your body weight and gravity for resistance, are great for strengthening your legs. Resistance bands or dumbbells can be added to these exercises, but no equipment is necessary. Perform the calisthenics exercises discussed below to build leg strength.
Squats
Squats are simple to perform, but proper form is crucial to get all of the benefits from this great exercise. If your knees come past your toes, you’ll put too much strain on your knees (think of sitting back rather than bending the knees). If you go too fast, you probably won’t go low enough to fully engage the leg muscles (you want to lower until your legs form a 90-degree angle with your upper legs parallel to the floor). If you don’t keep your back straight you won’t be improving your posture with the squats, which is one of the benefits of the exercise (to help with this, look straight ahead rather than looking down).
Squats primarily target the quadriceps. They also strengthen your hamstrings, glutes, and abdominals. Numerous squatting exercises can be part of your calisthenics workout. Put your feet wider for sumo squats to work your inner thighs, or challenge your leg strength by seeing how long you can do a wall sit in a full squat position. Include some movement by doing a lateral squat walk (keep your feet a good distance apart as you step side to side to fully work your leg muscles) or a monster squat walk (push your legs out with each step to work your hips as you move forward and backward).
Do box jumps to test your explosive power. Use a bench, an elevated step, or a plyo box in the gym to perform this exercise. Jump onto the box, landing in a squat position. Make sure to use your arms to help propel you up. As an added challenge, land in a squat position on the way down to the ground (as well as on the way up).
Elevate one foot on a bench or chair for Bulgarian split squats. This exercise improves your balance and core strength in addition to working your leg muscles. You want to go straight down and not lean forward with each squat. Another single-leg squatting exercise that challenges your balance is pistol squats. Raise one foot off the ground with the leg straight out in front. It is important to fully push your hips back when lowering into the squat so your knee doesn’t come forward.
Lunges
Like squats, lunges are excellent for strengthening the quads. They also work the glutes and back muscles and improve flexibility. Your front leg and back leg should form a 90-degree angle at the bottom position. You can place your hands on your hips if you need to for balance. Take a big step forward for forwarding lunges (to target the quads) or a big step back for reverse lunges (to target the hamstrings and glutes).
Add movement to this exercise with walking lunges. Make sure to hold the lunge position for a couple of seconds before taking your next step forward. Challenge yourself by doing walking lunges up a hill.
Give your thighs a workout by doing side lunges. It may be more difficult to lower your leg to a 90-degree angle in a side lunge, but it will become easier with regular practice. To work your core, perform lunges with rotation by placing one hand on the ground, raising one arm high, and looking at the raised hand. Do lunge jumps for cardio and to improve your balance.
Jumping Exercises
You can perform many calisthenics jumping exercises to build leg strength. These include jumping jacks for your calves, tuck jumps (lifting knees to chest) for your quads, and butt kick jumps for your hamstrings. Burpees is a full-body calisthenics exercise, incorporating a pushup, a squat, and a jump.
Skipping rope also provides a full-body workout and strengthens your calves. Challenge how far you can jump by doing the long jump exercise.
Exercises in Plank
Planking is excellent for the core, and there are numerous exercises you can do in a plank position that work your leg muscles as well. A popular one is mountain climbers. In high plank, kick your knees forward (alternating sides), going as fast as you can while maintaining proper plank form. Make sure your hips don’t lift as you kick your knees.
To work your obliques, do cross-body mountain climbers by kicking your knee to your opposite elbow. The Spiderman plank crunch also tones the legs. In either low or high plank, move your knee to the outside and toward your elbow.
You can do single-leg kickbacks in a low or high plank position to strengthen your quads and hamstrings.
Exercises on Your Back
Simply pull out a mat or lie on your carpet, and you can perform many calisthenics leg exercises on your back. Target your hamstrings with the single-leg glute bridge. Keep the raised leg straight, drive up with your hips, and squeeze your glutes at the top position. In a bridge position, you can do calf raises to target your calves.
Work your quads with flutter kicks. Raise your feet slightly off the floor and kick as fast as you can while staying in control of the movement. Single-leg raises to strengthen your quads and hamstrings.
To fully activate your leg muscles, don’t touch your foot on the floor on the way down.