maratoolLying Leg Curl Machine
How to do the lying leg curl machine
- Lie face down on a leg curl machine and place your heels under the roller pad.
- Grasp the grips with your hands for support and slowly curl your ankles up towards your back.
- Hold for a moment and then return to starting position.
- Repeat.
Muscles worked
The prime movers are the hamstrings, which extend the hip and bend the knee, frequently at both joints in the same repetition.
Every exercise for:Hamstrings
How this movement works
Everything happens at one joint. That gives you direct control over where the tension sits; the trade-off is that the muscle gets no help, so the load that feels hard here is a fraction of what a multi-joint version of the pattern would take. Slow, complete repetitions beat heavy ones.
It is filed under strength: produce force against resistance for a countable number of repetitions, and progress the resistance over time.
What you need
The machine fixes the path, removing the balance demand and letting you train close to failure without a spotter. The cost is the stabilising work a free weight would have made you do.
Every exercise using:Machine
These train the hamstrings too, using equipment this one does not:
- Muscle Snatchbarbell
- Natural Glute Ham Raisebody only
- One-Arm Kettlebell Cleankettlebell
- Stiff-Legged Dumbbell Deadliftdumbbell
- Ball Leg Curlexercise ball
Illustration: Everkinetic — CC BY-SA 4.0 — license. Modified versions are shared under the same license. Full attribution →
ⓘ Informational only — not a substitute for professional fitness or medical advice.