Training upper body at home can be effective and you can choose from a lot of options - pull-ups, push-ups, dips, dumbbell work and so on but when it comes to lower body it's hard to find something as promising because the legs need more resistance. Like I've wrote in this post dumbbells are all you need for upper body but the lower limbs are just too tough. There is an African saying:
“Hands are meant to build, legs to destroy."
Now let's see how we can destroy the destroyers at home.
Quad Training At Home
My favorite quad exercise is the hack squat. You might disagree and that's fine but I've never done any other leg exercise that felt as brutal on the front leg - I've tried it all - back squats, front squats, leg press, leg extensions, hip belt squat...etc.
However at home we don't have access to hack squat machine. What we have to do is replicate the movement as much as we can using home equipment. The reason why your quadriceps are working so hard during hack squat is your torso position - the straighter the back the more quadriceps stress and less glute and hamstrings involvement there is.
Mohamed Makkawy loved the Roman Chair Squat
That's where the good and old Roman Chair Squat comes. The exercise was made famous by Vince Gironda and was a favorite Mahamed Makkawy. The equipment is pretty straight forward - it holds your shin as close to vertical as possible which places a lot of stress on the front leg. The exercise is also more knee friendly than the hack squat because your hips can move freely and you can find your groove. In contrast the hack squat machine forces you into a certain position. Anyway my advice is not to buy any Roman Chairs but to make them yourself. Larry Scott or the first Mr. Olympia is selling one for USD 560. Larry, you might be great but USD 560? WTF? Below are examples of homemade Roman chairs. If you come up with your version post a link in the comment section.
Another way to mimic a classic Roman chair for squats would be the so-called Quad Blaster which costs basically nothing because you probably have most of the needed parts lying around.
Example Of a Homemade Roman Chair Station For Squats
/use your imagination to build your own/
Training Hamstrings At Home
Training hamstrings at home is a little tricky but not impossible. I recommend performing leg curls with elastic bands. Follow the below video for more information:
