Let’s talk about butt stuff…
…specifically training your glutes to be strong and sexy.
The glutes are a crucial muscle group to keep strong. They are primarily responsible for extending your hips (getting up from a chair, for example) and keeping you upright, maintaining good posture. Beyond function, well-developed glutes look great on both men and women. One doesn’t have to look too far beyond popular culture to see that bodacious bums are on the rise in terms of popularity and exposure.
Despite these benefits, most people don’t give glute training as much love as they should. Let’s change that.
“I want a nice butt, Ian. Give me all the nice butts.”
My pleasure. First, we need to ensure you’re including exercises in your workouts that heavily involve the glutes. These include exercises such as…
– Deadlifts (straight bar, trap bar)
– Hip Thrusts (bodyweight, barbell, dumbbell, kettlebell)
– Stiff Leg Deadlifts (barbell, dumbbell, kettlebell)
– Kettlebell Swings
– Squats (barbell, goblet, split squats, sumo squats with a dumbbell)
– Lunges (particularly reverse lunges)
– Step Ups
All of the above exercises can be used in your exercise program to effectively target the glutes.
“Cool, I can do these. Now… when and how should I do them?”
Great question!
If building a booty that’s as strong as it is firm is your goal, you’ll want to train your glutes more frequently. Personally, I prefer to train them a bit each workout, utilizing a variety of set and rep ranges.
For example, let’s say you train 3 days per week, utilizing full body workouts each day. Here’s how you could add more glute-friendly exercises to your workouts:
Day 1: Stiff Leg Deadlifts w/ Dumbbells – 4 sets of 10 reps
Day 2: Bodyweight Hip Thrusts – 3 sets of 20 reps w/ a 1 second pause at the top
Day 3: Deadlifts – 5 sets 5 reps
Outside of dedicated exercises in your training sessions, you can also include some hip thrusts as a part of your warm up / stretching as a way to get those glutes activated and poppin’.
Once you’ve picked some exercises to use in your workouts, make sure to stick with them for a few weeks and try to get stronger on them – whether that means more weight, more reps, or both. That will help ensure your glutes are growing! After ~4-6 weeks of consistency, I’d recommend taking a lighter week – or “deload” – reducing the sets and weight by 50%. After that, you can either get back to working on those same exercises or pick new ones to work on!
So! Nice, strong butts. I think that’s something we can all get behind. Butt pun kind of intended.
Questions? Comments? Want to see more content and tips like this? I’d love your feedback. 🙂
Wishing you all great bums,
Ian
Ian Estabrook 