Skipping Leg Day

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About

Skipping Leg Day refers to the negligence of lower body workouts in a weight lifting routine, which is often associated with out-of-proportion "curlbro" bodybuilders who prioritize upper body aesthetics over functional strength.

Origin

On February 11th, 2004, the earliest known use of the phrase “skip leg day” was posted in the Cycle Forums^[1] by member texmex who urged others to not skip the leg workout in a discussion thread about the importance of lower body workouts.

Spread

On April 17th, 2004, Steroidology Forums^[4] member Golden Muscle brought up his distaste for training legs in a thread titled “I dread leg day.” On August 21st, 2006, Body Building Forums^[5] member jando submitted a thread titled “why you shouldn’t skip legs,” in which he argued that delayed onset muscle soreness is increased after skipping leg training for one week. On June 19th, 2007, Body Building Forums^[6] member philbryant12345 submitted a thread titled "Every time you skip leg day, you lose a chunk of your brain," in which he asked others to share "leg day motivation methods." On May 17th, 2008, Straight Health Forums^[7] member ken posted a thread titled "Why do you guys hate doing legs so much?", claiming he knew many men who skipped leg day in favor of upper body workouts. On April 23rd, 2010, Body Building Forums^[8] member Italian.Muscle submitted a thread questioning why "some brahs skip legs." On July 22nd, 2012, Body Building Forums^[9] member Based Princess submitted a photo of a man at the gym with the caption “Friends don’t let friends skip leg day” (shown below) in a post titled “The worst case of chicken legs I have ever seen." In the following two years, the thread garnered 300 replies.

On January 3rd, 2013, College Humor^[3] ran a compilation of photographs featuring men with big upper bodies and small legs in a post titled “6 People Who Skipped Leg Day.” On May 4th, the "Don't Skip Leg Day" Facebook^[2] page was launched, garnering upwards of 37,500 likes in the next 10 months. On July 18th, the BroScienceLife YouTube channel posted a video titled "How to Skip Leg Day," in which host Dom Mazzetti demonstrates various excuses commonly used to avoid working legs at the gym (shown below). In the first eight months, the video gained over 1.7 million views and 1,800 comments.

On August 18th, Redditor BearSkinTrenchCoat submitted a photograph of a top-heavy Batman stuffed toy in an /r/funny post^[10] titled “Looks like Batman skips leg day” (shown below, left), accumulating more than 7,800 up votes and 80 comments prior to being archived. On February 26th, 2014, Redditor Davidstan submitted an edited screenshot from the video game Pokemon in a post titled “Never Skip Leg Day,” in which the player grows a pair of enormous legs (shown below, right). Within one week, the post received upwards of 1,100 up votes and 10 comments on the /r/twitchplayspokemon subreddit.^[11]