The Ultimate Guide to Glute Training for a Better Butt
By: John Fawkes
Tags: Bodybuilding, Exercise, Workout, Fitness, Glutes

Part 4: The Best Booty-Building Exercises

Not all exercises are created equal. Many of the most popular glute exercises are sub-optimal. Here are some of the characteristics of a good exercise:

Full range of motion. A good exercise should make it possible to work the muscle through the full range of motion. This is particularly important for the glutes since many exercises only bring the glutes into play when you go deep.

A full range of motion isn’t possible with some exercises. For instance, hip thrusts need to be done from a deficit to allow a full range of motion, but it’s damn near impossible to do barbell hip thrusts from a deficit, so barbell hip thrusts are not one of your best options.

The strength curve matches the resistance curve. In other words, there’s no sticking point. It’s hard to get this perfect, but if you’re only slightly weaker at the sticking point than at other parts of the movement, that’s close enough. This is why you’ll use resistance bands when you squat.

Closed-chain, not open-chain. The technical definition of the kinetic chain is, well, pretty technical. But in practice it’s simple: Closed-chain movements are movements in which your body moves. Open-chain movements are movements where your body stays still while you push or pull a weight. Closed-chain movements are better, which is why (well, one reason why) we’ll favor squats over leg presses.

Unilateral over bilateral. I’ve already covered this one. There are some bilateral movements that are worth doing because they have no direct unilateral equivalent, but six of the nine exercises I’m about to list are unilateral.

Dynamic contraction. Exercises that involve dynamic contraction — meaning the muscle is actively contracting during both the concentric (raising) phase and the eccentric (lowering phase) — are superior to exercises that are only either concentric, eccentric, or isometric. Concentric and eccentric contractions each stimulate muscle growth in different ways, so you need both.

With that said, how many different exercises do you need to do for your glutes? As with volume and frequency, the optimal amount of variety goes up with training age, but you don’t need much. Having one or two compound and one or two isolation movements in your workout split at any given time is good enough, but a little more won’t hurt either. I’m going to give you four compound and four isolation movements (in addition to one exercise purely for pre-exhausting the hamstrings) so that you can choose the ones that work for you, or that your gym has the equipment for.

Compound movements

Back squats with elastic bands. The back squat is a mainstay of glute programs. While it’s not the best exercise for targeting the glutes per se, it does build the lower back and upper glutes. I include it in most glute programs for developing clear muscle separation between the butt and lower back.

This is your standard back squat, but with about 30–50% of the total weight replaced with elastic band resistance in the top half of the movement. Remember that resistance bands add more resistance as the weight moves up. Each band has two numbers listed, representing the amount of resistance applied at the bottom and top of the movement. It’s the higher number you want to look at.

As an example: suppose you normally back squat 150 pounds (that’s the amount you squat for your usual working sets, not your 1RM). You would want a band that applies 50–75 pounds of resistance at maximum, which means you’d want the black band from my recommended brand. If you squat at 250 pounds (again, for working sets), you’d want a band that applies 90–125 pounds, meaning you’d pick the purple band.

And remember: to target the glutes, you need to go as deep as possible. Don’t add more weight then compensate by not going deep; that’s totally counterproductive when your goal is to build a big, strong butt.

Video 1: Deep back squats

Video 2: Back squats with resistance bands

Bulgarian split squats from a deficit. The Bulgarian split squat is the best iso-lateral squatting exercise, period. It works to sculpt and defines the sides of your butt in a way that bilateral squats never could.

To get a full range of motion, you should do it from a deficit — meaning your front foot, as well as your back, is elevated, allowing your knee to drop below the level of both feet. This provides better muscle activation, and of course, lets you go deeper to target the glutes more effectively.

Video: Bulgarian split squats from a deficit

Video: How to fix the most common mistake with the split squat

Cable pull-through. This exercise isn’t well-known, but it’s one of my favorite glute exercises — particularly for guys, since it trains the same hip-thrusting movement pattern used for… fun times. Ahem.

Make sure to stand far enough away from the cable machine that there’s tension on the cable throughout the full range of motion, even when you’re bent all the way over and your hands are going slightly behind your butt. Contract the glutes with each rep and keep a loose grip — don’t turn this into a arm exercise. Your arms should move forward because your hips push them forward, not because you contract your arms.

Video 1: How to do pull-throughs

Video 2: Cable pull-throughs

Jump lunges. I used to recommend jump squats, but I switched to jump lunges because they’re iso-lateral, and it’s also a little easier to go deep on them compared to jump squats. This is a great exercise for athletes who want to train for power. For aesthetic purposes, its main use is in post-activation potentiation supersets.

Don’t try to add dumbbells to these — you don’t want to smack yourself with them.

Video 1: Jump lunges, outdoors

Video 2: Jump lunges, indoors

Isolation movements

Unilateral hip thrust from deficit. I like this better than the barbell hip thrust because a) the deficit allows a better range of motion, and b) it’s unilateral. The downside is that you can’t easily put a barbell on your hips, only a single barbell plate. Once you get really strong, that might limit this exercise to higher-rep work. Once you can do more than twenty or so and can’t raise the weight, it’s about time to switch to kick-backs.

Video 1: Unilateral hip thrust from a deficit (note: the deficit should be bigger)

Video 2: Unilateral hip thrust from a deficit with weight (better deficit)

Cable unilateral hip abduction. This is the best exercise for specifically targeting the gluteus medius. As a reminder, the gluteus medius is involved in hip abduction, but only when the knees are straight. The more common seated hip abduction will build your outer thighs, but won’t do much for your butt. If you want to develop wider hips, this is the main exercise you would use to do that.

Video 1: Cable hip abduction

Video 2: Cable hip abduction

Glute cable kick-backs. This iso-lateral booty-building exercise is your best option for building the main part of the gluteus maximus once you reach a point where you can’t keep increasing the weight with the unilateral hip thrust.

Video 1: You’re doing it wrong — Cable kickback booty workout

Video 2: How to do cable kickbacks

Glute-ham raise. This movement works both the hamstrings and the gluteus maximus at various parts of the movement; the assistance from the hamstrings make this useful for post-exhausting the glutes after they’ve been fatigued by a compound movement. It can be done either on a glute-ham station, the seat of a cable machine, or on the floor with a partner holding your ankles. Keep your back as straight as possible; while it looks similar to a back extension, the movement here should come from flexing/extending the knees, not the back.

I prefer doing them on a machine because the contractions are more dynamic, whereas when doing them on the floor, the movement can easily become eccentric-only as you push yourself up with your hands. If you do perform them on the floor, be careful to push off with your arms only as much as you need, and no more.

Video 1: Glute-ham raise on machines

Video 2: Glute-ham raise on the floor

Unilateral lying leg curl. The leg curl is the main movement used for the isolation of the hamstrings. Whereas the glute-ham raise will be used to post-exhaust the glutes, the leg curl is going to be used to pre-fatigue the hamstrings before your main compound lifts. The lying leg curl is preferred over the seated leg curl because it produces superior levels of muscle activation and allows a slightly greater range of motion.

Video 1: Unilateral lying leg curl

Video 2: Bilateral lying leg curl with emphasized eccentric