STYLETHREAD -- LET'S TALK SHOP!

woo hoo! Those are my fave ;) I did them twice a week combined w/ other leg exercises including:

leg extention

leg curl

leg press

hack squats (subbed these for the smith lunges once a week for the last few weeks)

calf raise

I always did low weight high reps. 20 on each leg 4 sets, but now I do 15 reps 3 sets...I'm trimming down on my old routine ;)

I did eventually increase my weight as I went along, just by a couple pounds. Just adjusting to what my muscles could handle. The weight should just be heavy enough so it is hard to get throught the last three reps. I used low weight - high reps for definition in my legs (and arse:)) Didn't want bulk.

oh yes, squats on the smith machine are great! Are you doing supersets? (two exercises back to back in one set, then rest) Usually they say to do supersets w/ different muscle groups. Like I do leg curls and leg extentions supersets together. From my understanding, you don't want to overwork the same muscle group by doing squats and lunges supersets together.

Hack squats are done on this machine that is on a incline and it has weight on the shoulders (as would the smith machine) but you are standing on an incline tilted back at like 30 degrees sort of laying on the machine...it's great!