My Round, Firm Glute Series: Part 1

Ahhhh… summertime! It is officially upon us. And seeing as how this season brings on the land of shorts and bathing suits, it has been requested of me to write a blog specifically targeting the glutes. Now, per the name of this blog, this is something that I happen to know quite a bit about J And if summertime clothing tell us anything, it’s that there isn’t much room to hide this beautiful arch of the female body during this time of year!

 In past workout blogs, I have given a specific workout plan for each muscle group. However, for this one, there are SOOOOOOOO many things to do both in the gym and at home in order to round and firm your patoot, that I am simply going to give a list of my favorite butt-blasting moves! Personally, when I split up my workouts I have 2-3 upper body workout days per week and 2 lower body workout days, with one of those days targeting specifically the glutes. Your hip and gluteus muscles are some of the STRONGEST IN THE BODY! They are detrimental for overall strength and body control. And for us women, we carry even more strength in our lower half (proportionally) than men do. I can’t tell you how many of my girlfriends can out squat or out leg press their husbands, based on our muscular composition. Now, that being said, don’t be afraid to push some SERIOUS WEIGHT on some of these moves (I’ll differentiate which exercises require weight and which ones do not). That is... unless you DON’T want to build muscle, OR have a high and tight derriere :-)

I will provide variations on traditional exercises, such as the squat, in order to show how to target the glutes over the quads and I will put an asterisk * next to moves that can easily be done at home, as well as how to make any required modifications for at home workouts. Now let’s get started:

Me doing a smith machine kickback at my gym.
Notice that I have the weight of the bar ON MY HEELS.

·         Kick backs: These should be mandatory in all glute workouts! You can either do them weighted and heavy or do them with no weight as a light move in between heavy squats (as in a superset).

There are several variations of the kick back that I will discuss below, but the basic movement is as shown in the picture above.

Cable:  A cable ankle strap is often provided by most gyms. If it is not, this can be purchased at Academy or any sporting goods store for around $10. I have my own and keep it in my gym bag. The cable kick back can be done either standing or kneeling. If standing, move the cable to the bottom of the tower and connect your ankle strap. Slightly bend over, just enough to give you some momentum, and kick your foot behind you. This should be done with lighter weight (20-40 lbs) as adding more weight forces you to activate the lower back muscles and the tension will be taken off the glutes. You can do variations of a kick with a 90 degree angle in the knee or do a kick back with your leg completely straight. For a kneeling position, place a bench in front of the cable and do roughly the same motion, as seen below:

Image is from Nathalia Melo's You Tube page

I don’t usually do this modification, as my gym is often crowded and I don’t want to be “that guy” taking up a bunch of room with a bench in the middle of the cable towers! Haha

Smith machine: This is what I’m doing in the picture shown above. Again, this is something you will want to keep light. Heavier weight in this movement shifts the focus onto the quads. This is a slightly awkward movement and may take a few tries to get the hang of maneuvering the smith machine bar with your foot. But once you get it down, it will become one of your faves!

 *Ankle weights or dumbbell: This can be done at home or in the gym. Simply strap on an ankle weight or place a dumbbell in the angle of your knee, get on all fours, and go to town! Wait… that didn’t sound right :-/  It’s the same basic movement as the other kickbacks, but this one can be done anywhere. This is a good move to increase your weight on. When I do them in the gym, I will typically try to go up to a 35 lb dumbbell. The trick with this movement is to go up as high as you can as really squeeeeeze those buns! Don’t’ do them too fast, stay very slow and in control.

*No weight: You can even do kick backs with no weight. I prefer to do these at the end of a glute workout, to really fatigue the muscles! If you opt for no weight, then you need to stay in a high rep range, like 20-30 reps, in order to get a good burn.  You can do these with different angles such as with the knee bent versus straight, with the knee straight and your leg pointing out at a slight angle, with the knee bent and lifted vertically to your side ( I call this one "the fire hydrant"… as you will look like a dog peeing! Lol) or you can also move your foot in a circular motion. All of these variations will help you to hit the different glute muscles and help to round out the buns!

·         Donkey kick machines: Most gyms will have some sort of glute machine where you perform a sort of donkey kick. Most of these machines have you pushing back weight with your leg and squeezing the glutes on the way up. If you aren’t sure which machine this is in your gym, ask someone who works there. Using these machines is a good time to use a lot of weight! They are designed to keep the weight in the glutes so lift as heavy as you can and make sure to PUSH WITH YOUR HEELS!!! (This will activate the glutes.) Again, with these machines, go slow and squeeze at the top. Don’t just use momentum to swing your leg up and down. That will get you nowhere.

This is an image of me pre-pregnancy. Because I am not a curvy girl by nature, I really try to focus
on rounding out my lower half in order to create an illusion of a narrow waistline and curves!

 

·         Squats: Ah, squats. You either love em or you hate em! Or you hate them… but love the results!!! Traditional squats are designed to sculpt ALL of the lower body. Here I will discuss how to make small changes and variations on squats in order to target the glutes instead of the quads, calves or hamstrings.  

Wide and low: On this squat, I prefer to keep my weight lighter (45-65 lbs). I put my feet slightly wider than shoulder width and go down BELOW PARALLEL! In a traditional squat, it is normally ideal to have your hamstrings parallel to the ground at the bottom of the movement. In this squat, however, you want your hamstrings to go below parallel. When you do this, it hit the glutes hard! This is why I say to keep it light. You want to focus on the doing the movement properly and not hurting yourself. Again, with this movement, you want to do it slow and controlled. You can even pause for a few seconds at the bottom of the squat, and on the way up, dig in your heels and really SQUEEZE your butt!

*You can do this at home with no weight or with light dumbbells (or whatever resistance you may have at home)

 

A plié squat as shown by Jamie Eason on Bodybuilding.com

Plié: On this squat I prefer to go heavy! (pre-pregnancy weight on this was around 155-175 lbs) You can either use a dumbbell (in which case it is often referred to as a “goblet squat”) or go to the squat rack and put the weight on your back. The squat is as pictured above and the goal in this squat is to keep your legs parallel to the floor at the bottom of the movement… so that your legs form the shape of a rectangle. Now, when I say over and over again how low you need to go on these squats, it is because AT THE BOTTOM OF A SQUAT IS WHERE YOUR GLUTES GET ACTIVATED!!! This is the make or break of a squat. Period. Far too often I see people (men and women both) doing squats with about a 3 in range of motion. It drives me insane!! If you want to change your body, get challenged, burn calories, and work your ass off, then you have got to learn to GO LOWWWW.  Also, keep the weight in your heels. When you push up with your toes, you're using your quads, knees and shins to lift weight. That sounds really safe right??? :-/ But when you shift your weight to your heels, you activate your glutes, hips and hamstrings. Hmmm… I’m guessing those body parts can probably lift more weight than your knees! Weird. Also, when you come up from this squat, don’t try to push up with your quads, focus on LIFTING yourself up with your hips and glutes. These muscles are very strong and using them effectively will help you to do more weight and build them more efficiently.

Split squat, both legs on ground vs one leg on the ground: A split squat is also referred to a stationary lunge. This can be done either with dumbbells or in a squat rack. One modification for a split squat is to prop the hind leg up on a step or bench (this is also referred to as a Bulgarian split squat, as shown below). If I have 2 feet on the floor, I prefer to do this in a squat rack and go heavy, up to about 135-155 lbs. If I only have one foot on the floor, I will often use dumbbells, up to 40lbs in each hand. On this move, make sure you’re digging in with your heels with the front foot in order to keep the weight in the glutes. And just as with a traditional squat, make sure your knee doesn’t go over your toes. In order for this to be possible a fairly wide stance is necessary.

Image from bodybuilding.com.

*The Bulgarian split squat can easily be done at home with dumbbells and a chair to prop your foot up on.

Narrow front squat: This is one of my faves! I feel that by putting the weight in front of you versus behind you ,that the weight shifts to your hips, hamstrings and glutes automatically. Because the weight is in front of you, the back of your body must lift more in order to overcompensate for the imbalance and instability in weight. I do this in the squat rack and will often keep the weight fairly light, only going up to about 85 lbs. Simply place the weighted bar across your shoulders, but cross your arms over the bar so that you don't drop it, and keep your feet slightly more narrow than shoulder width and facing forward.  I will often place a bench or step behind me as well in order to make sure that I go down to a 90 degree angle (or parallel to the floor) and then push up with my heels and hips on the way up from the squat.

Hopefully that will keep all my readers busy long enough for me to get the next part of this series posted! I still have several more exercises and tips for rounding and shaping those buns so stay tuned for another new post next week!!!

Annie McDonald, FB: House of Glutes and Instagram: ANNIE_1FITMOMMA