OMG, you guys, I can't believe this. I was posting a month or two ago about how confusing and frustrating it was for my weights to change so much from machine to machine. Well, today my usual leg press machine was just pissing me off. As my weights have gotten higher, I haven't been able to to adjust the machine so that it doesn't kill my knees at the bottom of the rep. Anyhow, today I was upping my weights and I'd just had it. So I go over to a different leg press machine....

I start with 165, my weight on the first one, and it's like lifting paper. So I go to 225. No sweat. 255 - not bad, I did two sets here and thought it might not be enough to hit failure in 5 sets. Then I noticed that there were only two more plates left ..

I had to try it.

285

Getting it off the floor to start was pure murder, but once I had it up, I did a whole set. (Ok, it was a set of 6, but hey!) I maxed the stack!

Woo Hoo!!!! (and OMG am I going to hurt tomorrow!)

Cheers,

Friday

Certain machines have smoother bearing, or are newer so the slide action is easier and true.

Older machine, especially those that aren't greased regularly, tend to grind and make the exercise harder.

Maxed it out, eh? Way to go!

Now you can do SINGLE LEG PRESSES! LOL. There's always a way ...

Whoooowho Friday well done! I thought I was doing good at 165lb leg press when we got a new machine at the gym. I am doing legs tonight so you have inspired me to go a little higher. "Girls can do anything"

Akiwican

Thanks for the huzzahs, you two. I knew I would eventually max a few stacks, esp on lower body, I just had no idea it would happen so soon. I thought it would happen with calf press or adductors/abductors first though because I'm only about 4 plates away there. Just shows how much variance you get from one machine to another. There's even a machine that calculates your resistance electronically based on one rep and then gives you a higher negative weight. On that one, my leg press is 325 on the positive. Go figure.

Cheers,

Friday

I upped my leg press weights to 180lbs tonight. 6 sets of 10 reps! A big tough looking guy came on the machine after me and he did one set and had to LOWER it to 160lbs! Guess you cant judge a book by its cover!

Akiwican

Woo Hoo! Don't you just love it when that happens? It's especially fun when someone gives you a 'look' that generally translates to "hey, fat lady, get off my machine" and then they choke on the weight you have set.

Oh, and if you can do 6 sets of 10, it's time to up it again.

Congrats!

Friday

Fridays, do you have a trainer or are you just lifting on your own? the reason I ask is, I am not sure what your ultimate goal is, but if you are going for a slimmer shapelier you. I would not recommend going heavy on abductur/adductor machine. Those particular muscles get huge pretty easily. If your going for a slimmer look. Your legs will expand outwardly giving you the big inner thigh/thunder thigh/saddlebag look. Unless you want huge and muscular legs. I am currently in a Personal trainer program at the local college. We have worked with several women, and the look was very important for these women. Most of them wanted slimer, toned, muscular legs, and no one wanted huge legs. So it might be better low weight, and really high reps. You can still deplete, and get a hell of a burn. You could try century-sets.i.e. 1 set-100 reps. at a slow tempo 2 seconds concentric, 3 seconds eccentric. with a one second pause at the top of the movement. Leg press is not bad going heavy like you do, since the quads would look great, and you can develop the gluteaus maximus which improves the lift/roundness of the buttucks. (the baby got back look...nice!)