Valentina Lequeux, a fitness coach known for her inspiring workout routines on Instagram, recently shared a comprehensive leg day workout that focuses on building lower body strength. In her post, she mentioned that this particular session was heavy on squats, with fewer accessory moves than usual due to her being on her time of the month, making the workout more challenging. "COMPLETE LEG DAY— ✌🏼LIKE + SHARE. This was a big squat workout, so I didn’t do as much accessory work as usual. I’m also on my TOTM (time of the month) so I’ve been feeling pretty awful to do a hardcore workout," she captioned the post. Here’s a breakdown of Valentina’s key exercises and the benefits they offer for building strength and maintaining overall fitness.
1. She Walks On A Treadmill
In her Instagram video, Lequeux walks on the treadmill to warm up. Walking has a lot of health benefits. The Mayo Clinic states, “Regular brisk walking can help you: Maintain a healthy weight and lose body fat. Prevent or manage various conditions, including heart disease, stroke, high blood pressure, cancer and type 2 diabetes. Improve cardiovascular fitness. Strengthen your bones and muscles.”
2. She Uses Weights
Valentina Lequeux/Instagram
In her Instagram video, Lequeux is seen using weights to workout. ACE Fitness reports that using weights has a lot of benefits. “Using heavy weights increases intramuscular coordination, the number of type II motor units and the amount of muscle fibers engaged within a specific muscle. Have you ever felt your muscles shaking while lifting heavy weights? This is because you are recruiting and activating the larger type II muscle fibers, which are only stimulated to work when a muscle is challenged with heavy resistance or working to fatigue.”
3. She Does Squats
Valentina Lequeux/Instagram
Lequeux is seen doing a lot of squats in her Instagram video. Squats are a great exercise to do. Allina Health stated their benefits in an article. “The squat is one of the all-around best exercises to do for your lower body. It strengthens and tones muscles in your thighs, butt and calves and improves posture, balance, flexibility and inner core strength. Squatting also improves bone mineral density to keep your bones strong.”
4. She Does Hamstring Exercises
Valentina Lequeux/Instagram
Lequeux likes to do hamstring exercises. In her Instagram video, she is seen doing hamstring curls. ACE Physical Therapy & Sports Medicine Institute states that having strong hamstrings is very important. “Strengthening hamstring muscles is critical for many reasons. If the strength is not adequate to handle all of the stresses associated with everyday life, they will be injured. When they are strong enough to handle ‘life,’ they can prevent injuries to the low back, hips and entire lower extremity.”
5. She Works Her Upper Body
Lequeux shared some of her favorite upper body exercises in this Instagram video. She also shared her tips for building a strong upper body in the caption. “To form an hourglass figure you want your shoulders to be broader than your waist and your glutes to be symmetrical with your shoulders. You want to focus on building your upper & lower muscles. And building takes time so don’t worry you’re not going to become the hulk overnight.”
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