One Incredible Exercise For Stronger Legs (for 50+)

In this episode, Farnham’s leading over-50’s physiotherapist, Will Harlow, reveals one great exercise that can be used to build stronger legs in people over fifty.

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**Any information in this video should not be used as a substitute for individual medical advice. Please seek advice from your local healthcare professional before taking action on the information in this video.**

If you’re over 50 and looking for a great exercise for stronger legs and better balance I’m going to show you one of my favorite exercises today if you don’t know who I am my name is will harow and I’m the over 50s specialist physio here at HT physio INF farum and

Today I’m going to be showing you one of my favorite exercises to build stronger legs which is perfect for people over the age of 50 now I’ve got many exercises for stronger legs which I like to give out but this one I’ve field covers so many different bases that I

Wanted to make a specific video on it and the exercise we’re going to be talking about today is called the reverse lunge so the reverse lunge is a great exercise because it involves strengthening of the quads which are the muscles at the front of the thigh it involves the glutes which are the

Muscles at the back of the hip and it also involves the smaller muscles down in the lower leg as well now this exercise is not suitable for everyone but I do feel that this exercise is more gentle on the knees than an exercise called the forward lunge which looks

Like that so the forward lunge is when you’re stepping forward and you’re putting pressure down through this front leg now the problem with the forward lunge before I show you the right one the forward lunge puts a lot of stress through the kneecap at the front so many

Of my clients over 50 find that when they’re doing a forward lunch they get a lot of searing pain going through the kneecap so the forward lunge even though it’s a good exercise it’s not my favorite ones for people aged 50 plus so I prefer the reverse lunge instead so

I’m going to show you how to do the reverse lunge one of the best things about this is it isn’t just a strength exercise it’s a balance exercise too it looks something like this so we’re going to start with the right leg it’s going to go back the toes going down on the

Floor the knee goes down towards the floor and then you step back so I’ll show you on the other side it looks like this so we start at a nice stable point on the floor and then we’re working backwards from there so as we go back what we’re doing is we’re working our

Quads our thigh muscles and we’re also working the glutes on both sides but in different ways so it’s a fabulous exercise for people who want stronger glutes and it’s a great exercise for people who want stronger quads now what I find when I do this exercise is there

A lot less stress on the kneecap here I can barely feel any tension on the kneecap I can feel more stress on the thigh at the back but not on the knee okay so I find this a much safer exercise than the forward lunge now I love the reverse lunge because obviously

It strengthens the legs but it also works the core because you have to keep good core stability to keep the technique good and one of the other things I like about it is it works your balance obviously as we step back we’re on one leg and then we’re just on the

Toes of this one so there’s a lot of side to side movement and your job is to try and control that so that you don’t topple down now if I’m giving this to someone to do at home what I like them to do is to work to sets of about 10

Possibly 15 or 20 in a row and if they find that that gives them a nice working ache then great but if you want something a bit tougher you can add load to the movement now if you see people doing this in the gym sometimes they will use a barbell across their

Shoulders but many people just want to be able to do this at home and you don’t need a barbell for that you can use small weights which you can hold in your hand so I’ve got some ankle weights here just because this is all we’ve got in

The office at the moment but these are going to be perfect for the job so you’d hold them in both hands and nothing changes we’re going to go back and then forward so step back and forward and our knee is not making contact with the ground okay I’m stopping about 4 in

Short of the ground there cuz you don’t want your kneecap to be touching the floor and you’ll notice I’m doing this exercise wearing trainers that’s important because if you’re doing it Barefoot you can do it but you’re going to end up with a sore toe at the back as

You do this and especially if you’re doing it on firm floor so I like to do this in trainers nice cushion trainers work best and if you want to make it harder you can use one of these so as I said this exercise not suitable for everyone but for many people it’s a

Great exercise to build stronger legs get checked out by your healthc care professional if you’re not sure but for most people doing this a few times per week for a set to fatigue is enough to build some strength and balance anyway that’s all I’ve got for you today I hope

That has made sense if you want to get more from me after this video please do uh hit like on the video subscribe to the channel and grab a copy of my book which you can find using the links below and I’ll look forward to seeing you on the next video