guy wanting to reduce upper outter thigh and have a square butt

[Ofthefire]

Hey everyone, this has been bugging me alot for some time so I figured I'd start a thread. First of all this is about my' thighs/hips/ass and I'm a guy I've been hesitating to talk about this at my' gym because it's kinda akward for me as I'm guessing it might be for alot of guys lol Yet I think that this is one of those subjects that just isn't covered satisfactorily for men. I've been clicking around online looking for information but nearly all of it is for women and if I find anything for guys it's pretty darned general.... and not very specific or helpful to me of course..

My' situation is that I've noticed that my' upper outer thighs flare out too wide compared to the lower portion of my' legs, which to me looks more womanly than masculine.. Alot of the guys I wanna look like don't seem to have this issue/feature. Instead their' outer upper thigh musculature is minimal and their' glutes have a depth to it and more of a square shaped fullness.. Anyway here I've attached two side by side comparisons - a good example of me in a pair of tight fitting wranglers comapred to someone else with the kind of ass I want to have wearing them too. One pic features my' outer thighs as-is and the other is with the sides photoshopped/airbrushed out for effect

I've got alot of questions as to how those muscles became so dense and why the back part of my' legs and my' glutes don't really have size... and I'm guessing it might be due to a combination of being overweight for years and how I stand, walk around etc effecting which muscles are used most to support me. I'm currently 240lbs at 5'11. So there's quite a bit of fat to lose, which afterward will effect the shape of things to a degree. -

Anyone have some insight/ideas?

Anyway thanks for reading - I appreciate it.

P.s Unhelpful smart"ass" comments, rudness, fire-starting or insipid attempts to appear "more clever than thou" or whatever aren't welcome... there's too much of that and other antisocial crap on this site anyway.

[iuliamaddie]

i think it's just a matter of your jeans being too tight, pulled too high up. srs

[Ofthefire]

i think it's just a matter of your jeans being too tight, pulled too high up. srs

Thanks- I don't normally wear jeans that tight or that high up, I did that so things would be more visible. But I'd like to eventually be able to do so and look like the fella in the pic next to mine if I wanted to.

[Segugio]

I want to help, but I'm not sure what you mean by "upper outer thigh". From that angle I don't see any overdevelopment, but you do give the appearance of anterior tilt, which would account for disproportionate size in the quadriceps (front) compared to the hamstrings (back).

[Ofthefire]

I want to help, but I'm not sure what you mean by "upper outer thigh". From that angle I don't see any overdevelopment, but you do give the appearance of anterior tilt, which would account for disproportionate size in the quadriceps (front) compared to the hamstrings (back).

Look at both pictures and compare my' side in the comparison in both pictures, one has the area I'm talking about airbrushed off and the other is original. This is the outer sides of the legs which face away and flare out. Basically consider the silhoutte of the thighs/hips, women have a one where the hips flare outward, men's tends to go straight up/down.. Mine flare's out but it's mostly muscle and not fat.

As for the anterior tilt, I positioned myself that way for the photo, when I relax it doesn't look much different or dramatically change.. this isn't how I normally go about walking or anything like that and isn't an adaptation due to training... Actually if anything my' posture "or tilt" is more inward than anything else. I've once had someone joke to me at job I had years ago that "I didn't have an ass" lol.. And I guess it's sorta true, I don't have depth..but my' ass is wide and the muscles on the sides flare out..

I've thought about maybe figuring out how to train other muscle groups to offset that size.... or maybe I could strengthen the correct musculature and rely on that instead to support my' frame - thereby causing a kind of atrophy or "lessening" of the problem areas and increasing the muscles I'd rather have instead.

The other guy has depth to his' backside in general whereas mine is flat... and I figure because of that his' motor recruitment for the posterior chain "if I got that correct" must be different if those muscles are developed that way for him... he's got thighs that don't flare out so his' walking pattern, the way his' legs bare a load must be different than mine.. When I stand to a still for example I tend to lock my' knees out, sometimes creating a knocked-knee effect/look... not sure if that's desired or the cause of my' scenario but I've noticed some guys don't seem to do that... I don't ever remember those guys being overweight.. the guy I'm comparing myself to in the photo isn't either. So maybe there's a correlation?

I have to wonder if I always had this shape, if it's genetic or a combination of that and improperly training squats or hell, maybe squats in general develop said area this way? I did some research a while back and ran into an article either by or related to vince gironda on why he chose to teach/do sissy squats instead, stating that regular back squats "whatever that means" creates a large rear end and upper thighs...

Some quotes from that article:


" The reason that Vince Gironda called the squat a sissy squat is because he would make sissies out of weightlifters when they would come in and do squats. Weightlifting squats are not basically a leg exercise. Certainly, you get big thighs but you ruin the proportion between your thighs, hips, abdomen, and lower back. As Vince had said, weightlifting squats do many things that you don’t want your body to be accustomed to like increase the size of your stomach because you push it out, widen your lower back, and get a big rear-end. Vince said he could tell an eastern bodybuilder when he came into his gym by the size of his rear-end. Vince would always warn people, and I have advocated this and told people at the Powerhouse Gym people, when I owned it, once you develop your glutes, you can never reduce them. They are the densest muscles in your body. People used to laugh at me, but many years later they now say they wish they would have listened.

Look at all the modern-day squatters who call themselves bodybuilders. They have rear-ends that proportionately are bigger than their legs. They look horrible. They walk like ducks. That’s the first thing I noticed at the YMCA. I want to warn all you bodybuilders. If you start to do squats, you will get a large rear-end that will never, never go away. I’d like a weightlifter to duplicate this. I saw Vince Gironda on a hack-slide/hack-squat machine that he invented. He went up on his toes with heels together, both knees would be pointed towards opposite walls (like a frog). I saw the man crank out 8 sets of 8 reps with 15 seconds of rest in between. I think the bar was around 225 pounds. Now that is strong! Most people do weightlifting squats because it’s easy to do. It’s much easier to bend over and use a group of muscles. When you isolate the thigh in hack slide versus a squat, you have one muscle lifting 225 pounds versus five (5) muscles lifting 400, which is a cheating exercise to begin with. "



Anyone here know if there's something to this?

[jayareohh924]

Start squatting. you either need to add muscle, or reduce fat. you cant spot reduce fat unfortunately.

[Ofthefire]

Start squatting. you either need to add muscle, or reduce fat. you cant spot reduce fat unfortunately.

I don't think you really read through things - Also That's just it, the area I'm having problems with is mostly muscle, in fact its very dense.. I haven't squatted regularly in a long time and this area of my' overall physique is quite muscular as it is. To be more specific look at the attached pic

Based on that photo I'd say the muscle I'm referring to is the vastus lateralis. I'm wanting to reduce that and add depth to my' backside - look at the photos attached in the original post. I'm on the left, the pic I'm comparing myself to is on the right.

[jayareohh924]

I don't think you really read through things - Also That's just it, the area I'm having problems with is mostly muscle, in fact its very dense.. I haven't squatted regularly in a long time and this area of my' overall physique is quite muscular as it is. To be more specific look at the attached pic

Based on that photo I'd say the muscle I'm referring to is the vastus lateralis. I'm wanting to reduce that and add depth to my' backside - look at the photos attached in the original post. I'm on the left, the pic I'm comparing myself to is on the right.

This is what im refering to.

[Ofthefire]

This is what im refering to.

The article I quoted seems to suggest that squatting can actually create/worsen the problem I'm talking about. I'm just not sure if the author of that article is talking about rippetoe styled squats or some other kind of squat... Because I'm currently reading starting strength by mark rippetoe to perfect my' form. I just don't want to squat for a year or whatever and end up in an even worse situation.

[Xuaxace]

My vastus lateralis is a strong point of mine and I have non of the issues you are referring to. I would be Willi g to say it is just fat that you need to lose

[jayareohh924]

The article I quoted seems to suggest that squatting can actually create/worsen the problem I'm talking about. I'm just not sure if the author of that article is talking about rippetoe styled squats or some other kind of squat... Because I'm currently reading starting strength by mark rippetoe to perfect my' form. I just don't want to squat for a year or whatever and end up in an even worse situation.

I'm not exactly sure youre able to decrease muscle. I mean, i know you will loose muscle mass on a significant cut, but you cant just spot reduce it to your thighs. you would lose mass all over your body with that, and it would actually decrease the "depth" even more. With almost any leg exercise, youre pretty much going to hit your whole leg.

[Segugio]

If you have an overdeveloped lateralis and underdeveloped glutes, you have anterior tilt. You're correct in the presumption that you're not adequately activating the posterior chain.

There's more to it than building the glutes; you have to change the way you walk and the way you lift.

1. Glute activation exercises: Supine hip extension, abductor machine (lean forward are far as you can with your hips still touching the back pad)

2. Working in hip extension: Sumo deadlifts, leg press with high foot position, quadruped hip extension (butt blaster)

3. Self myofascial release: take a lacrosse ball (or baseball, if you can take it) to the overactive muscle. You want to lay on it, rotate until you find a nice painful spot, and stay there until it loosens. This should be done every day, before every workout. Another option is foam rolling the entire quadriceps.

4. Stretch the hip flexors and quadriceps: prone cobra, standing quadriceps stretch (opposite hand and foot)