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I see this everywhere I go. Women doing endless amounts of Glute kickbacks or barbell hip thrusts and really going at it. Squatting hard and lunging their ass off. Yet, as weeks and months go by, not much has changed.
When women train Glutes, all they ever think of doing is extend their leg back – when you perform a Glute kick-back. But the Glutes don’t just run down the body in a straight line. They come across the body and THIS is the single, most common reason most woman can’t develop a great set of glutes. I’ll break it down so it’s easier to understand. The Glutes have 3 primary movements;
So, from the above, you can see that the Glutes don’t just run up and down, and the movement of the Glutes mean you MUST train it and move in all different angles and ranges of motion.
So always think next time, when training Glutes, am I extending hip? In, most cases yes. Have I got external rotation or abducting of hip? In most cases no. In fact, most people have internally rotated hips and adducted hips which means they struggle to work on the opposite action, a problem for the majority of people I come across.
Typically when girls squat, their knees and hips are rotated inwards, therefore they can’t target the glutes properly. Next time you squat, look in the mirror and watch your knees cave in. Don’t worry, I was the same, but I slowly worked on it. Next time when you come up from the squat, try and point your knees out and pry them open. This one simple trick can make all the difference.
Similarly, when performing standard barbell hip thrust. When you get to the top, try and rotate Glutes and bring them inwards and you will maximally shorten the Glutes. Really squeeze them by driving your knees out as you come up, rather than just coming straight up. I can guarantee if you do this one extra movement with the knees, you will feel the difference. So come up, drive your knees out and open up whilst squeezing your Glutes.
This is as basic as it gets. Your Glutes don’t run in a straight line, so target them from all angles and expose them to heavy tension, otherwise, they have no reason to grow.