Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson is great at sharing his workouts on his social media accounts, and he’s been at it again with a brutal dumbbell leg finisher.
In the recent post, you could see his quads contracting so hard they looked like they were going to pop out of his legs, and the former wrestler had to take a moment to compose himself afterwards.
That’s no surprise when you look at the detail of the circuit he was performing. It would be painful to some of the best athletes around.
He signed off the post with this: “It’s a bitch. Give it a shot. Have fun.”
The Finisher
Johnson’s finisher was a circuit of four exercises, all performed back-to-back with no rest in between.
The exercises are leg press, hack squat, chain lunges and dumbbell sumo squat.
Sumo squats were performed with a 100lb dumbbell. He spent three seconds in the negative phase of the movement and included a one-second pause at the bottom of the lift.
The Rock did a total of five sets.
The Rock’s Pointers For Dumbbell Sumo Squats
The Rock didn’t give much away on the other movements but shared his top tips for performing dumbbell sumo squats.
He said you should try to focus on not letting the dumbbell touch the floor, try to hold the dumbbell in your fingertips to improve grip strength and lean forward slightly
Balance is key and you want to try and keep your chest upright throughout the movement.
Eccentric Contractions
One reason the Rock is taking his time over the lowering portion of the sumo squats (taking three seconds to be exact), is because it increases the amount of time spent in an eccentric contraction.
Eccentric contractions feature a lengthening of the muscle.
One recent study suggested such contractions have a greater impact on strength than concentric contractions - a shortening of the muscle produced during the lifting phase of the squat when you stand back up.
They found it has benefits in terms of muscle size as well, leading to greater increases in the thickness of muscle fibres.
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