My new article on Return of Kings is about the pistol squat, a bodyweight exercise for the legs, and the third in my series of how to do various advanced calisthenics.

Training the leg muscles is a necessity for anybody who wants to do any sort of physical endeavor-simply put, you’re going to be standing on your legs throughout whatever sport it is you’re playing, and stronger legs means you’re going to run faster and jump higher (thanks to Google Analytics, I’ve seen that my paraplegic athlete readership is pretty low).

Beyond actually training the skills needed in your sport (ie: running, jumping, pivots, etc.), the best way to increase the performance of your legs is progressive resistance training-this will increase your muscular power, which will aid any rapid, explosive movement you’re performing: such as sprinting, vertical leaps, and kicking.

The most obvious resistance training is that of the barbell squat and its numerous variations: beyond the basic back squat, there’s the front, the overhead, high and low bar squats, and a julienne more. Those will be discussed in another article, but today I will bring to you the second article in my series on progressive calisthenics-the squat progression, with the end goal being the mastery of the one legged “pistol” squat.

The reasons I advocate learning the pistol squat before doing barbell squats are the exact same reasons I gave for teaching you the one-armed pushups before I write any articles on weighted lifts-the pistol squats will provide a base of muscular strength and prepare the fitness novice for more demanding lifts in the future, they have almost no risk of injury, and they train the body to move unilaterally, an unusual movement that can only make you stronger when you lift actual weights.

You can read it here