An exercise bike gives you the ability to exercise without impacting on your joints. A recumbent style bike with a seat and back rest is especially beneficial for people who suffer from lower back pain. When it comes to benefits to the body, riding a bike improves cardiovascular health and aerobic capacity. If you are specifically aiming for tighter legs and a toned butt, the bike might be just what you've been looking for.
Type of Exercise
Riding an exercise bike is a form of cardiovascular exercise. It is performed in a repetitive motion for an extended period of time and its main purpose is to burn calories. However, when you push the pedals around on a bike, you bend your hip, knee and ankle joints. This in turn works several major muscles in the legs and butt, so the bike can in fact help tighten these areas.
Major Muscles Involved with Cycling
Hip flexion takes place when you move your thigh toward your stomach and hip extension is the opposite motion where you push your thigh backwards. When you flex your hips during biking, you work the large quadriceps muscles on the front of the thighs. During hip extension, you work the hamstrings and glutes, which are the butt muscles. Knee flexion takes place when you bend your knee and move your heel backward. In similar fashion to hip extension, it works the hamstrings. Knee extension takes place when you straighten your leg and it works the quadriceps. Plantar flexion takes place when you point your toes down during pedaling. Dorsiflexion takes place when you point your toes back toward your shin. These motions work the calves on the back of the lower legs and the tibialis anterior on the front of the shins.
Resistance on Bike
Riding the bike with little resistance will contribute to tighter muscles, but you can boost your progress by making an alteration during your workouts. Regardless of the type, all exercise bikes come equipped with a resistance adjustment. By turning it up, you will increase the workload on your legs and butt. Look for the appropriate button on the console. On some bikes you will have to turn a knob clockwise to increase the resistance.
Proper Form
To achieve success with your leg and butt tightening plan, you have to execute proper form while riding. Before you start pedaling, for example, adjust the seat properly. Your knees should be just short of full extension when you turn the cranks around. During your workouts, keep your abs tight, look straight ahead and keep your shoulders lifted. Push forcefully with your legs, focus on contracting your muscles, and keep your upper body as stable as possible. Leaning forward and placing your weight on the handlebars will take work away from your lower body muscles.
Additional Benefit of Muscle
Any time you build muscle, no matter how little the gain, you increase your resting metabolic rate. For example, by gaining even 1 lb. of muscle through bike riding, you can burn up to 50 extra calories on a daily basis. This in turn will allow you to burn more fat while at rest.
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