Beginner’s squats for strong shapely legs

Exercise is one of the essential things humans need for quality of life. It keeps the blood pumping the heart and lungs active, the tendons and joints pliable. Yet for many, even doing the basic exercises is difficult, either because of an injury, a sedentary lifestyle or long periods of underusing certain muscle groups. But these are not reasons to avoid exercises or to think you ‘can’t do it.”

Today, from good friend Tem from Potentia Personal Training will show you the first in a series of beginner’s squats. These are great for developing lower body strength, leg strength, stability, balance, and endurance. Because you will use a chair in this exercise, you only have to move your body through half of a full squat motion. It is a great way to help you find and maintain your balance throughout the movement, and also helps protect any injured or weak area you may have by allowing your arms to take some of your body weight off your legs.

Chair squats are great for improving your daily functional movement, liking getting up and down from a chair, in and out of the car, bending down to pick something up or tie a shoe, and so on. These are functional movements we do every day which rely on our quad muscles and our balance. Once you get these down you can move on to the next level of beginner’s squats which we’ll present in another video article.

The chair squat

Take a seat on your chair so that only your butt is on it and your feet are flat on the floor directly under your knees. Sit up tall and be sure to pull your navel toward your spine and keep shoulders even and relaxed.

Bend forward until your chest is over your knees. You want to feel the weight in your heels. Once you feel stable push down through your heel and stand up.

To return to the seated position, bend your knees and lower your bottom back diagonally down into the chair. Trust that the chair will be there when you sit so that you won’t keep looking over your shoulder.

Reps and sets

Follow along with Tema as she does 10 chair squats. See if you can do three sets of 10 at once time or spread out through the day. In a week or two you will notice a big difference in your leg strength, endurance, and functional ability to bend and squat and sit and lift.

Next week, another version of beginner’s squats that is just a bit more difficult for even more improved strength and fuller range of motion.

Need stronger arms? Click here beginner’s push-ups!