Meet the exercises and classes you need to sculpt and strengthen your backside.
Your glutes are more than a nice asset. They are your powerhouse, says Maddie Myers, an Equinox group fitness instructor at Clubs throughout New York City.
The gluteus maximus, the most superficial butt muscle that contributes to hip extension and external rotation of the femur, is the biggest muscle in your body, so it’s able to generate large amounts of force. Keeping the muscle strong supports your ability to lift heavy during squats, deadlifts, and lunges, as well as your performance in explosive actions like jumping, sprinting, and changing directions, all of which rely on the hip extensor musculature.
Training your glutes is also essential to maintaining joint health, says Myers. The glute max helps stabilize the lower back, sacroiliac joint, knee, and femoral head, and it works with the gluteus medius and gluteus minimus to stabilize the hips and maintain proper leg alignment, according to the International Journal of Sports Physical Therapy. The glute med and glute min are often involved in pelvis, hip, and knee disorders. “Growing glutes, strengthening all around that area is going to help our low back feel supported, our hips feel supported,” Myers adds.
How to Train the Glutes
To give your glutes the attention they deserve, Myers recommends single-leg deadlifts, either with kettlebells or dumbbells. The exercise challenges your unilateral strength, balance, and stability. Since you’ll use lighter weights, you also don’t have to deal with your grip giving out before your legs, a common problem with traditional barbell deadlifts, she says. Pro tip: “A lot of people don't bend that standing leg,” she adds. “If you bend that standing leg more, it's going to be all glutes. To me, it’s the number-one movement anybody should have in any program.”
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A heavy hip thrust is also a glute-builder, but setting up the exercise can be time-consuming or inaccessible without a barbell or Smith machine available. One alternative? Single-leg hip thrusts, says Myers. You can use a heavy dumbbell or kettlebell, and performing the exercise with just one foot glued to the ground at a time will help correct any muscle imbalances between your two legs. To take your glutes failure, Myers suggests performing heavy deadlifts until your grip gives out, then going straight into hip thrusts, doing as many reps as your glutes can handle.
Myers also loves a lateral lunge. “It’s good for your hips to not just move forward and backward but also move side to side,” she says. Lunging to the side trains your hip abductors (the muscles that help move your leg away from your midline, specifically the glute med and glute min), while stepping back to center calls upon your hip adductors (the muscles that help move your leg toward your midline, such as the inner-thigh muscle, adductor longus).
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Not into solo workouts? Take out the guesswork with a group fitness class. Best Butt Ever will light up your entire lower body, but especially your glutes, with dumbbells, mini bands, and other equipment, while Stronger offers a full-body workout (glutes included) with heavy weights.
On the EQX+ app, burn out your glutes while pushing your heart rate with David Siik’s Precision Step: Hockey Butt. The audio-only stair climber class, rooted in the formula and methodology of Precision Run, features a mix of long efforts and fast climbs for well-rounded cardiovascular training. But don’t underestimate the machine’s butt-building power. “[The stair climber] is strength training disguised as cardio,” Andrew Slane, an Equinox group fitness instructor in New York City, previously told EQX+. “You have to constantly lift your body weight against gravity with every step. I love it because of the glute activation.”
To get maximum impact in minimal time, try Myer’s 15-Minute Best Butt Ever, or test your single-leg strength in Ideen Chelengar’s 20-minute Cheek to Cheek: Lower Body session. For personalized guidance on glute sculpting and strengthening, consult with a Coach at your Club.