If I told you there was one exercise you could do to totally transform your body, what would you think? What if I told you that if you were really looking to put on muscle at the fastest rate possible, this exercise absolutely must be a mainstay in your program? And then what would you say if I said that probably at least 50% of the people who are going to the gym are either not doing this exercise, or not doing it sufficiently enough to get benefits from it?

I bet you'd want to know more.

So many people today go into the gym and have one of two goal - muscle building or fat loss. If they want fat loss, they head straight for the cardio section. If they want muscle building, they head over and perform a chest workout, an arms - otherwise known as ‘guns' workout, or perform a full body session with maybe 2 leg exercises and 10 upper body movements.

Unfortunately, both people have forgotten about one very critical movement - squats. And I don't just mean any squats, we're talking heavy, bum to the floor, squats. If you do these, you'll grow (if in a caloric surplus) and lose fat (if in a caloric deficit). It's really that simple. Here's why.

Increased Testosterone

What's the single most influential (assuming you're natural of course) hormone that affects your ability to build muscle? Testosterone. This male sex hormone is responsible for making men look like men and women look like women. How many women (again, assuming natural women here) do you see walking around with massive muscles? Chances are, not many. They don't have the testosterone levels necessary to build muscle to this extent.

When you lift as heavy of a weight as possible, you're going to send a much higher surge of testosterone throughout the body than if you would have lifted lightly. Now, what's (or what should be) the strongest muscles in the body? Your quads and hamstrings. These are both primarily targeted when you do squats. By using this exercise at a max weight, the testosterone shooting through your blood will be at an all time high.

This testosterone then will act upon all the other smaller muscles and they'll grow as a result. So, if you think you need to do 10 sets of bicep curls to build better biceps, you may want to rethink.

Now if you're a women and thinking this is definitely not what you want. Relax, like mentioned above, you don't have the testosterone in you to produce these kind of muscles. BUT, you will still greatly benefit from the movement.

A Better Foundation

The second reason why you must include squats in your program is because it helps to build a very strong foundation to your body. If you're legs are weak, this may affect your ability to perform other exercises correctly with an optimal weight designed to promote high levels of muscle growth.

Weak legs set you up for an injury and if there is one thing that's going to put a complete halt to your muscle growth, an injury is it. You can't grow when you can't train.

Squats Get The Metabolism Growing

Finally, the last reason you need to be sure you're including this critical movement in your bodybuilding program is because it's going to ramp that metabolic rate up, thus further increasing the amount of tissue synthesis that's going on. While having a higher metabolism does mean you'll need to consume more food, it also means you're body is repairing and rebuilding new muscle (assuming ample calories are provided) at an elevated rate. And if you're dieting, this just means the process is going to go that much quicker.

When working out, why not choose exercises that get that metabolism the highest? It wouldn't make sense to miss out on this.

So, if you are primarily an upper body focused trainer (or perform one to two sets of leg workout per week, with heavy, FULL squats not being part of the picture) it is really time you re-evaluate this.