TorQ’s Wedge Aims To Upgrade Leg Day

In common with any hobby, once you start looking at tools, gear, and nice add-ons to bring to the gym, you learn that a nicer version always exists for whatever option you were considering. Though there’s usually a version with a pretty accessible starting price, there is no limit to how expensive the best version can be.Sometimes that is warranted. Many electrolytes on the market taste terrible, and I’m happy to pay a premium to PureSport for a nicer one. Versa Gripps are expensive but are genuinely the best gripping device on the market. But other times, you’re paying extra for brand names and unnecessary fanciness. Various luxury protein shaker bottles are worse than the standard plastic bottle with a wire coil in the bottom that comes with whey protein. Serious lifters don’t use leather-wrapped, wood-accented dumbbells. Though Versa Gripps are superb, they’re not a huge upgrade over normal straps, available for less than $15.I say all this because the TorQ Wedge looks like the quintessential overpriced gimmick — a big rubber wedge for leg movements, sold by bodybuilder Eric Janicki, which costs $114.On the surface, that’s a crazy amount of money for something so simple. And yet, having bought and used it on every leg day since the v1 version was released, I can confidently say that this is the best product of its kind — thoughtfully designed and extremely useful for what it is — and I now refuse to train legs without it.The wedge, though assembled into a single unit, actually consists of three parts. Two are 10-degree wedge angles, and the third is the flat base, with all the attachment points. Each part snaps together like adult Lego — combined as one 20-degree wedge, or, in my case on the leg press, used at 10 degrees alone, which I found more comfortable — and then the base contains magnets that hold it whatever you’re using it with.Or if the footplate on your machine of choice uses thick rubber and the magnets won’t grip, that base opens to reveal two hooks attached to straps. You just hook them onto the top of your footplate, tighten the straps like a belt until the wedge is in the position you like, then snap the parts back into place. That sounds awkward but in the gym, it takes seconds. And once you load the weight, it does not move.Attached to your machine or under your feet — whether you’re doing a leg press, hack squat, pendulum squat, Smith squat, or other leg machine — the wedge gives you much more stretch and depth on your movements, which is better for tendons, drives more hypertrophy, and lets you train with lighter weights and less risk.It also feels great, as though you’re pushing yourself harder with that extra stretch. It made me want to do leg day more. If you’re not quite sure how to set up the wedge or what exercise to use it for, Janicki has clear instructional videos.The only leg movement where it’s limited is the belt squat because of the belt itself, but you can push the wedge further back and you’re fine.It might be simple, but it works fantastically. It’s built from high-density EPP foam with a textured non-slip surface and integrated magnets, and is clearly designed and used by someone who knows how to train, and train hard. I get to the gym on public transport, and it’s a large wedge — but if training legs, I don’t go without it. That says it all.

TorQ’s Wedge Aims To Upgrade Leg Day

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