5 Reasons You Need Single-leg Strength Training

June 27, 2021

by Cathe Friedrich

How much single-leg strength training do you include in your strength training? If you’re like most people, the strength exercises you do are with both feet planted on the ground. It’s important to stay grounded, but there are some compelling reasons why you should add some single-leg training to your fitness training routine. Doing so could make you a better athlete, improve your functionality, and lower your risk of injury. Let’s look at why single-leg training belongs in your strength training routine.

Improve Balance and Proprioception

Could your balance and proprioception use a tune-up? Training on one leg can help. When you do single-leg exercises, you’re in a less stable position. Therefore, your muscles, brain, and the vestibular system must work harder to keep you from toppling over. When you balance on one leg, these systems, over time, make subtle tweaks that improve your overall balance and stability. You’ll be better able to stabilize with both static and dynamic movements.

Like other physical capabilities, sense of balance declines with age and is a leading contributor to falls and injuries. By adding single-leg work to your routine, you’re age-proofing your body and lowering your risk of injury when you play sports and doing your activities of daily living. One study of healthy adults and athletes found that those who took part in a proprioceptive training program experienced significant improvements in balance. The same can happen to you.

Identify and Correct Strength Imbalances

How would you know if you have strength imbalances? When you train standing on one leg, you can better identify strength imbalances you might not have known you have. Most people have unequal strength in their two legs. For example, if you’re right-handed, your right leg and arm are probably stronger than your left. You’ll quickly discover this when you start working with a single leg at a time. The problem with unequal strength is it leads to muscle imbalances that force certain muscles to work harder to make up for the imbalance. Over time, this can lead to an overuse injury.

Better Core Strength

When you bear weight on one leg only, you recruit more muscles to stabilize your body. The muscles that do this are your core muscles. Recruiting more core muscles and forcing them to work harder can pay off better for core strength and stability. A stronger core brings massive benefits since it stabilizes, helps you generate power, and move with greater coordination. A strong core can even improve your alignment and posture for a more balanced physique.

It’s a Good Change of Pace

Sometimes, it’s helpful to shake things up and challenge your brain and muscles in new ways. Single-leg training does that. Adding a few sets of single-leg exercises is one way to add variety to your routine, bust through plateaus, and spark new muscle adaptations. You work your muscles differently when you train one side at a time and that forces your muscles to adapt in a new way.

Helpful for Injury Rehab

Single-leg exercises are also handy if you have an injury on one side. You may still be able to work the healthy side and get a workout. That comes in handy if you can only safely work one side. Hopefully, you won’t be in that situation but if you are, single-leg training is a way for you to keep moving and preserve strength and muscle mass.

What Kind of Exercises Can You Do?

Two of the best single-leg exercises are single-leg squats and single-leg deadlifts. You can also do single-leg step-ups. The advantage of step-ups is you get some cardiovascular benefits at the same time due to the dynamic nature of the exercise. If your calves could use some work, single-leg calf raises will help you build strength and correct imbalances between the two sides. Some people jump rope on one leg too but be careful, your risk of injury is higher when you jump on one leg.

Before tackling a single-leg exercise, master the exercise with both feet planted on the ground. Doing the one-leg version adds the additional element of balance, so you should have mastered the strength component of the exercise beforehand, so you’re not dealing with too many things at once. The goal is to avoid injury.

How to get started? Replace some of the two-footed squats and deadlifts you do with single-leg versions. Make sure you’re working both sides equally unless you identify a strength imbalance. In this case, focus on the weaker leg more. You might also discover it’s harder to balance on one side than the other. That’s another indication that the weaker side needs more focus.

Some Precautions When Doing Single-Leg Exercises

Don’t use the same resistance when you’re doing a single-leg exercise. You can’t safely handle as much weight and the risk of injury will be higher due to the less stable nature of single-leg exercises. You don’t need to work with as much weight to get the same training benefits when you’re using a single-leg approach.

The Bottom Line

You can work with more weight when you do squats and deadlifts with two feet on the ground and that can lead to greater strength gains and muscle growth, but single-leg work corrects strength imbalances in the lower body and also helps develop better balance and proprioception. Why not include both in your strength-training routine?

References:

Yoo S, Park SK, Yoon S, Lim HS, Ryu J. Comparison of Proprioceptive Training and Muscular Strength Training to Improve Balance Ability of Taekwondo Poomsae Athletes: A Randomized Controlled Trials. J Sports Sci Med. 2018;17(3):445-454. Published 2018 Aug 14.
McCurdy K, O’Kelley E, Kutz M, Langford G, Ernest J, Torres M. Comparison of lower extremity EMG between the 2-leg squat and modified single-leg squat in female athletes. J Sport Rehabil. 2010 Feb;19(1):57-70. doi: 10.1123/jsr.19.1.57. PMID: 20231745.
International Journal of Exercise Science 14(1): 187-201, 2021.
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