The Leg Press

This is a quickie..I know I have to follow up with the Unstable Training thing...it will happen soon enough. But, I had to comment on a conversation that I had with a coach recently. He is a cycling coach...kind of an old school maverick. He advocates a machine based training approach for the legs....loves the leg press (disagree) 'cuz you can "push alot of weight". He wants his triathlete to get stronger (agree) because they really need to "ride the #@$%! out of the bike".

OK...gotcha coach. We both agree that the athlete needs to get stronger through resistance training. Why the leg press? Given the clients history of low back pain and the unilateral use of the legs with cycling, the leg press is what you don't want to use.

I can't in good conscience find any reason to use it for the following reasons: 1) Per Dr Stuart McGill it produces way too much spinal compression forces on the lumbar spine. 2) The leg press robs the key stabilizers of the hips, spine, knee and ankle of work. Getting these stabilizers to work functionally would be beneficial to this athlete during the run, bike and daily life activities. 3) The leg press is not a big bang for your buck exercise which is so important when strength training time is precious and brief...typical of a triathlete. I could go on and on but I said I would make it brief and it's getting longer:)

Solution? Master the use of your body weight in multiple planes of movement...via variations of lunges and squats. Once that occurs then add resistance...free weights, weight vest, bands, etc. I'll video some variations that most trainees have seen but you never know.