Thigh troubles......

[werhardt]

My thighs are kind of big for my body frame, so I wanted a exercise program to shrink my thighs and tone them up. These are the exercises I do for my legs. I also try to do 30 mins on the treadmill too. I would like to take cardio class, but I don’t have the time since I am mother and I need devote my other time to helping my son with his homework. Let me know if you have any ideas for me.

This is what I have been doing.
Leg ext – 2 sets of 20 (20 lbs)
Hamstrings – 2 sets of 20 (20lbs)
Inner thigh – 2 sets of 20 (50 lbs)
Outer thigh – 2 sets of 20 (60 lbs)
Thanks!

[5kgLifter]

Since you wish to shrink your thighs, because you feel they are too large/muscular (?), it would be best to not concentrate on weight training, but to concentrate on cardio that will increase the amount of slow twitch fibres you have, similar to a marathon runner. Normally, weight training slims the legs because women's muscles get denser, as opposed to bigger, but it may be that you want to give the cardio route a go, which will still make use of leg muscle as well, but not necessarily increase the fast twitch muscle fibre ratio in your legs.

[Lazylifter]

Your quads are the muscles probably adding the most "Bulk" as they are the biggest so just keep the weight low when working these and therefore also keep the weights low for you hamstrings.

I would try just doing lunges and squats either under just your own bodyweight or with light weights. That way you'l be keeping everything balanced and also working your core a bit too.

I know I sound like a stuck record.... but seriously 20reps? Why not just do 10 with the same weight. life is too short!

[cntrygrl_z28]

I would start with 30-60 minutes of cardio then up the weight by 15 lbs. instead of 2 sets of 20, do 3 sets of 15..

[werhardt]

You don't sound like a broken record, I guess I feel the more reps the more that my thighs would shrink down. All I want to do is just firm them up (to make them look smooth) and make my thighs smaller. I guess I get torn on what I should do. I do 30 minutes of the treadmill on an incline between 1.5 to 2.

So, do you think just doing lunges and squats would do the trick? How many of the squats and lunges i can do?

[Lazylifter]

You might want to try "Explosive" squats and lunges.

Thats where you jump up as high as you can, in the case of lunges swap legs over. I read an article about a figure champion and she said that explosive squats and lunges and squatting with a light weight was all she did for her legs. But she might not have been telling the truth

Believe me you do not want to do more than 3 sets of ten of these, also make sure you warm up really well. They really burn

[Trusylver]

I agree with 5kgLifter, you need to be hitting the cardio but diet is also a big factor, whatever your workout program consists of. If you are eating calories under your maintenance you shouldn't be able to gain muscle size but you should be able to become stronger (through more efficient recruitment of motor units) and more toned.

the rep and set ranges for an exercise depend on the goal

for strength the rep range is 2-6, power 4-8, hypertrophy 6-20, endurance 15-30, the speed and weigh selected for the exercise also has an effect.

Hypertrophy is the increase in muscle fibre size, Hyperplasia can occur in some instances which is the longitudinal splitting of fibres.