Expert: Brian - 7/20/2006

Question
    I am a 25 year-old female who has been lifting free weights once a week for about 7 years.  I lift only 8 lbs., but do at least 40 reps per exercise.  
    Could you please give my some suggestions for moves I could do to increase the muscles in my buttocks without putting so much stress on (and thus bulking up) my quads?
    I've also been hearing about certain exercises that minimize the appearance of female breasts.  Is this true?  If so, what are these exercises?  Are there any that enhance these curves?
    Thank you very much for your time and feedback - I really appreciate it!

Answer
Julie - Lunges are probable the best exercises for the buttocks. There are some machines designed to isolate the area as well, maybe your gym has one, maybe not.

There aren't really exercises that will decrease breast size, per se. It's a fact that weight loss can reduce the breast size (esp. if one was overweight), but there are no specific exercise that will either increase or decrease the size of your breast, since the tissue in your breasts is mostly glandular (mammories) and bodyfat.
--Brian