Its fat.
Well alot of it is fat, just lose some weight.
I registered to post in this thread, having lurked for a few months.
It’s quite interesting reading this, because I used to have the same problem. When I was a kid I did a lot of sprinting, and my legs were always way out of proportion with the rest of my body, especially the quads. Now, I’m not saying I was freakishly, Tom Platz huge, just compared to my upper body. I had a kind of phobia about lower body training because I used to get a lot of comments about it which put me off doing stuff like squats.
Anyway, I was out clothes shopping today for some new jeans, and I have the same waist and quad measurements (about an inch smaller at the hips though), and I had no problem. As long as you avoid the skinny type, or slim fit style jeans. I tried a pair of those on, and I don’t see how you could even walk in them properly with normal sized legs.
Clothes are available that will fit, but admittedly, I’m sorry to have to agree with the OP, he is right that his hip measurement is out of proportion with the waist.
[quote]DJS wrote:
BenceJones wrote:
I know I will catch heat from this thread, but sometimes I feel squats are just the wrong exercise for people who activate the glutes so much. I believe Gironda was against back squats for this very reason.
ehh… front squats?[/quote]
Yep. My thighs have become a lot more proportional to my ass since I took up front squats instead of back squats.
[quote]Bill Roberts wrote:
Clothes are available that will fit, but admittedly, I’m sorry to have to agree with the OP, he is right that his hip measurement is out of proportion with the waist.[/quote]
So his hip measurement should be smaller than his waist or is it to radical to have ~7.5" more on the hips than a waist?
Just trying to understand what you mean…
My legs/ass is big too man. Being 5’8 and a 1/2 doesnt help AT ALL either. I gotta buy a 38inch waist sized jeans so that i can raise my knee’s comfortrably in jeans…if I wear a 36 waist jeans seriosuly it just looks funny on me very tight on the upper thighs/ass region. I actually have a space between the jeans and my back where my ass is because it sticks out and is TIGHT but the waist is too big. At the same time the jeans are too long so I gotta get them hemmed. I only have 2 pairs of jeans that fit me nicely…it’s kinda hard to find something that looks nice.
[quote]Bill Roberts wrote:
Clothes are available that will fit, but admittedly, I’m sorry to have to agree with the OP, he is right that his hip measurement is out of proportion with the waist.[/quote]
What is an acceptable hip to waist ratio?
[quote]rasturai wrote:
My legs/ass is big too man. Being 5’8 and a 1/2 doesnt help AT ALL either. I gotta buy a 38inch waist sized jeans so that i can raise my knee’s comfortrably in jeans…if I wear a 36 waist jeans seriosuly it just looks funny on me very tight on the upper thighs/ass region. I actually have a space between the jeans and my back where my ass is because it sticks out and is TIGHT but the waist is too big. At the same time the jeans are too long so I gotta get them hemmed. I only have 2 pairs of jeans that fit me nicely…it’s kinda hard to find something that looks nice.[/quote]
Same problem here. Squats = Big thighs + big ass. It’s that simple really. All I do nowadays is hit my upper body with a tad more intensity then I used too. That worked nicely to add some mass on my frame to balance things out a bit.
[quote]Professor X wrote:
HolyMacaroni wrote:
Professor X wrote:
This is a bodybuilding forum. Either work on building your upper body up to match your Coleman-esque legs and ass (which are apparently so big that pants are out of the question).
Last I measured my quads they were 30" (may be a little bigger now) yet I don’t seem to have all of these problems with clothes. Maybe some of you should try shopping in the ADULT MALE section of the store.
yeah yeah, easy to say when all you wear are pj’s and scrubs all day
HEY!..I wear UA shorts also.
But you’re right…my closet isn’t exactly pimped out. I did just buy a suit though, but most of the time, I am in shorts, scrubs or sweat pants.[/quote]
UA?
I am the opposite. Big fat gut, skinny bird legs. Working on it though…not gonna stop til I get me some 30’s like Prof X.
[quote]BenceJones wrote:
In the past I have focused on powerlifting and in the process I built up some pretty big legs and a fucking huge squatting ass that I don’t find aesthetically pleasing in relation to my upper body development. Also finding pants that fit is really getting to be a bother.
I guess it is is pretty easy for me to build size in my legs, and my glutes do activate a lot in any squatting movement.
I am now more interested in a building a more aesthetically pleasing physique.
Has anyone had luck in shrinking these muscles down a bit while continuing to build upper body size? I don’t want to say I am done squatting and deadlifting forever because I love these lifts. In regards to deadlifting I will likely switch to rack pulls during this time. Reason being is that I do tend to feel regular deads in the glutes as well.
Thoughts?[/quote]
Glad to hear I’m not the only glute dominate one on this site. So yes, there is hope for you.
Stop back-squats and switch to front squats or Smith squats. Back squats and deads work almost the same muscle groups so doing both means two big movements that build glutes.
So dropping back squats may be all that is needed. But if not, stop deads as well. I’m assuming you are doing rack pulls for back? If they work, great. If not, there are a lot of other back movements that don’t hit the glutes as much. Try something else.
[quote]Bamma wrote:
Professor X wrote:
HolyMacaroni wrote:
Professor X wrote:
This is a bodybuilding forum. Either work on building your upper body up to match your Coleman-esque legs and ass (which are apparently so big that pants are out of the question).
Last I measured my quads they were 30" (may be a little bigger now) yet I don’t seem to have all of these problems with clothes. Maybe some of you should try shopping in the ADULT MALE section of the store.
yeah yeah, easy to say when all you wear are pj’s and scrubs all day
HEY!..I wear UA shorts also.
But you’re right…my closet isn’t exactly pimped out. I did just buy a suit though, but most of the time, I am in shorts, scrubs or sweat pants.
UA?[/quote]
Under Armour. I should be a spokesman for the fucking company.
Glad to see some people agree with me here instead of disrespect due to the date I started posting on this site.
Well, on going and getting specific information I learn I was wrong.
Now, on what is “acceptable,” that would be hard to say as differing people will have differing tolerance and opinions.
I had had the view that a good proportion was waist size of about 0.85 to 0.9 times the hip size. I had the impression, without having done the calculation, that the OP’s value was well outside this. I failed to actually calculate it, instead using the shortcut that I am fairly borderline in this regard, but even so when my hip size is an inch less than this (which is when overweight by at least 20 lb), my waist is up to 36" or more, so it seemed his condition was worse than mine. However, I should not have relied on a shortcut. I normally don’t. There is no excuse in this case, just a moment of stupidity.
In fact, actually calculating his value gives 82%, using the middle value of what he gave for hip size.
That obviously is not far out of the range I had in mind.
Going further, how valid was the range I had in mind?
It turns out that the Grecian Ideal – these being proportions of heroic figures in sculpture, thus certainly considered aesthetic at the time by the artists and generally considered aesthetic today, though not the same as in high level bb’ing, to be sure – has the ideal waist/hip ratio at… 82%.
I was wrong, and apologize. Thank you for following up on it, thus causing me to look at it as closely as I should have in the first place.
[quote]Professor X wrote:
This is a bodybuilding forum. Either work on building your upper body up to match your Coleman-esque legs and ass (which are apparently so big that pants are out of the question).
Last I measured my quads they were 30" (may be a little bigger now) yet I don’t seem to have all of these problems with clothes. Maybe some of you should try shopping in the ADULT MALE section of the store.[/quote]
You apparently don’t have this problem. But I totally understand his issue. It is difficult finding nice dress pants or even jeans that fit a small waist but a big ass/legs. Either you get baggies and use a belt or the waist fits and the legs and seat are so tight you can’t move and you package gets crushed.
So unless you are sagging most pants are difficult to fit if you have a small waist and big butt and legs.
I have the big arse problem as well. Girls seem to like it (at least the ones that chat to me do), but blokes rip it out of me. Mum says it isn’t a good look either.
Think I may move onto front squats. Feel bad dropping back squats, as everyone goes on about how great they are, but may be better for me.
[quote]Bill Roberts wrote:
Well, on going and getting specific information I learn I was wrong.
Now, on what is “acceptable,” that would be hard to say as differing people will have differing tolerance and opinions.
I had had the view that a good proportion was waist size of about 0.85 to 0.9 times the hip size. I had the impression, without having done the calculation, that the OP’s value was well outside this. I failed to actually calculate it, instead using the shortcut that I am fairly borderline in this regard, but even so when my hip size is an inch less than this (which is when overweight by at least 20 lb), my waist is up to 36" or more, so it seemed his condition was worse than mine. However, I should not have relied on a shortcut. I normally don’t. There is no excuse in this case, just a moment of stupidity.
In fact, actually calculating his value gives 82%, using the middle value of what he gave for hip size.
That obviously is not far out of the range I had in mind.
Going further, how valid was the range I had in mind?
It turns out that the Grecian Ideal – these being proportions of heroic figures in sculpture, thus certainly considered aesthetic at the time by the artists and generally considered aesthetic today, though not the same as in high level bb’ing, to be sure – has the ideal waist/hip ratio at… 82%.
I was wrong, and apologize. Thank you for following up on it, thus causing me to look at it as closely as I should have in the first place.[/quote]
Like I said, build your upper body up.
Damn you guys make this easy.
[quote]Bamma wrote:
HEY!..I wear UA shorts also.
But you’re right…my closet isn’t exactly pimped out. I did just buy a suit though, but most of the time, I am in shorts, scrubs or sweat pants.
UA?[/quote]
don’t worry, ima send him some nike dryfit UA shorts so he can rep the crimson tide as well.
Trust me, I work damn hard on the upper body.
There is such a thing as having much less than ideal bone structure. I have the rib cage and clavicles structure of a 140 lb geek, but the hip structure of a 200 lb running back. Strictly referring to the size of the bones.
With hard work, I’ve gone from the utterly appalling situation of having a 29" waist with over 40" hips in not-lean condition (about 150 lb), which is actually in the feminine range for hip/waist ratio and was utterly disastrous, to 33"/38.5" when in Bowflex-ad condition (and also reasonable proportion when fatter.)
You bring up the good point also of relation to chest size.
I didn’t measure my chest before starting training at age 30. However, I know that size small shirts fit reasonably loosely. As a guess, 35" then. So that was a horrific chest/hip ratio, say 0.88 or worse. I have improved it to 1.16, which is not terrible. Well it would be terrible for a competitive bb’er, but not terrible in general.
The worse the structural imbalances in the first place, the harder to (largely) overcome them.
Now in my case, yes, it was not avoiding squats or deadlifts that did it, but rather the waist being thickened considerably by, I presume, deadlifts, and upper body training improving the upper body to where now it is in proportion to the hips. But I can readily relate to another person that could just naturally have an ass-heavy build and their solution may not be entirely that of relying solely on upper body improvement.
[quote]BenceJones wrote:
Glad to see some people agree with me here instead of disrespect due to the date I started posting on this site.
[/quote]
With 27’ quads I would expect it to be pretty hard to find jeans and trousers to fit in the UK. My waist is about 34’, quads probably about 26’ and hips around 40’ all at 5"6’ and I find it a bloody nightmare. If I find a pair of jeans that fit well I wear the crap out of the for 3-4 years, but it takes so long to find a decent pair that I can’t be bothered to try most of the time cos I’ve got to tr on like 20 pairs.
I wear tailor made suits for work, so trousers don’t present a problem.
A lot of my problem is down to carrying more bodyfat on my legs and arse. I’m like a bloody woman! My proportions were a lot better when I wa in comp shape.