And so even a high foot placement doesn't save this exercise this placement at the bottom
of my list, the Leg Press has got to go.
What's up, guys? Jeff Cavaliere, athleanx.com. What you see behind me is a bunch of different
leg exercises, specifically for the hamstrings and glutes. And they share a lot of functions
together, so we're going to group them together. But not just that, I want to help you to find the
ones that are actually worth your time. Because we're going to do what we always do here, we're
going to rank them from the best to the worst, leaving you only with the best exercises capable
of delivering the gains that you're after. So, it's all these guys in our Exercises Rank
Series, we have to define the criteria for the inclusion of these exercises in this list.
Number one, they have to be capable of being progressively overloaded. Can you continue
to increase the resistance to keep those gains coming? Number two, can you do these exercises and
create muscle growth and hypertrophy as the main focus? Sure, there are strength exercises, but
for this list, they have to create muscle growth. And number three, guys, as a physical therapist,
as always, each of these exercises has to have one thing in common. They all have to be
Don by me. Oh, God. Where have you been?
I've been hanging in the back. Where have you been?
Why do you have to do the exercises? Oh, I'm the one with the juicy booty,
remember? Oh, I wish you'd stay away. Listen,
they all have to be safe and by being safe, what I'm talking about is they can't compromise
pain in order to deliver the gains that we're after here, guys. So, each of these exercises
is going to fit that important criteria. And so, as always, we're going to start here
at the bottom of the list in the Worst Category and work our way up. And as I mentioned in the
open here, the hamstrings and glutes actually do share some functions together. Both of them are
capable of extending the hip or bringing the legs straight back behind the body. But the hamstrings
also have the capability of bending the knee. So, one of the worst ways to do this, unfortunately,
is one of the most popular exercises and ways to do it. It's the Prone Hamstring Curl. But before
you get too excited, trust me, there's going to be better options ahead. The reason why I don't
like this particular version of the exercise is because of the position, being faced down. And as
you struggle to get that weight up and really try to get your feet into that end position,
we oftentimes will drive our thighs down into the pad. That engages the hip flexors, which,
as we know, attach to the lumbar vertebrae, which can start to pull on them and result in
low back pain or spasm. Not the way we want to really try to build our hamstrings.
As I mentioned, the exercise does fit the criteria of hypertrophy and overload. But again,
knowing that there's better options ahead, I'm not willing to take that trade off. So, for me,
it's going to start at the bottom of the barrel with a big red X.
Next up, we have a glute exercise and this one you've probably seen before or done and it's just
a simple Heel Press. Now, this is a bodyweight exercise, easily done, no equipment limitations
here to get in the way. However, it still doesn't make it very high on my list. Why? Well,
it's very much incapable of the overload that we seek in order to build muscle. You're doing mostly
a bodyweight movement here, and it's also very limited in its range of motion. Even when it's
done correctly here, you're talking about a very limited 10 to 15 degrees of motion for the entire
exercise. And even more than that, it's oftentimes missed performed because this is one of those
exercises that easily leads itself to muscle substitution as we start to rotate the hips,
taking away some of the effort from the glute max. Guys, this is definitely one
that belongs here at the bottom and it's not going to deliver the gains that you're looking for.
So, between the last exercise and this one, I kind of feel like I'm pissing off a lot of people in
my audience and a lot of females. But it has to be said, and I'm trying to deliver you the best
information and that exercise that has to go next is the Step Mill. And you guys have probably seen
this and maybe even seen the people who add that little flare of the hip extension at the end. It
still doesn't save the exercise. Why? Well, a lot of times these Step Mills are actually powered,
which means that as you step, the motor on the machine brings your leg back down into extension,
not the muscles in your body. That's a problem. What makes this worse is the only muscles that
are working are your hip flexors once again, just to lift your foot up onto the next step,
only to take that ride back down. It's not going to get you where you want to be,
and it could lead to some of that back pain we talked about. Now, sometimes, if be lucky enough
to find a version of the machine that you actually power by driving your foot down into extension.
But at the end of the day, any exercise that can be done for many, many, many minutes in a row
becomes less anaerobic and therefore less likely to deliver muscle gains and more aerobic. It
doesn't fit our categories or criteria here, and therefore it also is going to get a big red X.
And so, if my ladies out there got maybe a little bit mad at me, this time I'm
going to give everyone a chance to, because the next exercise on this list is the Leg Press. Now,
look, I understand a lot of people have used the leg press as an alternative to a squat,
especially if they have knee pains and problems and maybe even had seen some gains along the way.
My issue is, as a glute developer, it's a horrible exercise, there's no way around it.
And I know people say, Well, Jeff, that's maybe because you're doing it incorrectly. You need to
put your feet high up on the platform in order to get more glutes and hamstrings. It doesn't
save the exercise, guys. And here's why. First of all, when we put our feet high up on
the plate, what we get is a lot of hip flexion, a lot of hip flexion, actually. You may not be able
to see it until I take the position at the bottom, and I simply turn it to a standing position, as
you would at the bottom of the squat. And there's no squat you've done that's ever looked like this
for good reason, because it's not a great way to do a squat. With this amount of hip flexion
what oftentimes happens is you get an extreme amount of posterior tilt and lumbar reflection
that can compromise the stability of the low back and the SI joint. Two things we don't want to do,
but more than that, when we go back and we extend our legs, look at the excursion we go through,
what is the range of motion on the exercise? Remember, hip extension is what we're looking
for when we're trying to train the glutes. We've gone through very little hip extension,
went from extremely flexed to moderately flexed, but still never even close to neutral,
let alone extended. The exercise does not do a good job of targeting the glutes. Therefore,
it's going to stay here at the bottom of the list with the big red X right through it.
And so, with that, now I get to break out my blue marker as we head up the charts here into
the Better Category. And for this, we need to go back and look at the same position we just talked
about with the Leg Press. It's the Dumbbell Reverse Sprinter Lunge. And yes, you might notice
that same chest to thigh position, but there's some very different things going on here.
Number one, with that one leg left behind us, we're actually neutralizing the pelvis a little
bit and relieving some of that excessive posterior tilt, which makes this exercise a lot safer. But
more importantly, in terms of the effectiveness of it, we're overloading that hip extension.
We're getting not into that abbreviated range we saw in the leg press, but we're able to overload
it through much more active hip extension. This is one of my favorite ways to do the movement.
And for those of you who I mentioned that had knee pain on squats, this is going to give you a chance
to relieve yourself of a lot of that pain and still get the gains that you were looking for
in the first place. So, for me, it gets the first blue circle in the Better Category.
Next up in the Better Category is one of those step ups from the exercise that we're in the Worst
Category. And if you're going to do those Heel Presses, you might as well do instead a Standing
Cuff Kickback. And this is where you take one of those cuffs and put it around your ankle and
just kick back against resistance. And that's the key against resistance, because what was lacking
in that first exercise, as you remember, was the overload and resistance capable of creating any
type of muscle growth. Well, here we can get that. And more importantly, while it may still
encourage some of those muscle substitutions that we talked about with the Heel Press before being
on your feet proprioceptively allows you to move your leg back easier in a straighter line. So,
while it's still a small range of motion, it's one that you can perform more effectively and easily.
And as I said, overload it. It gets the next up in the Better Category with the blue circle.
And so when it comes to exercises that hit that posterior chain, both the hamstrings
and the glutes, the RDL and its many variations are always going to find their way on that list.
However, when we're looking for esthetics or athletics and we want to get the balance that
we might lack right now, splitting up the legs one at a time is where we're going to turn to the
Dumbbell Single Leg RDL to accomplish that. And what I like about this exercise is it does give me
a chance to either focus a little bit more on the hamstrings by keeping the leg a little straighter
or a little bit more on the glutes by allowing the knee to bend more as I lean forward. So, if
your main pursuit was to grow bigger hamstrings, the overloaded aspect of this with the dumbbells
will give you that leg up. However, because the balance might become your limiting factor,
it's not the best option for you. So, it's going to get a ranking of Better, but just
not Best yet. We have better options coming. And so, with that, I now get to break out my
yellow marker as we continue to work our way up the charts, this time to the Better Still
Category. And what I like to do here is give you that next best option that I just mentioned.
And we're talking about the Single Leg RDL, well, let's start doing it with a cable rather than a
dumbbell. Because what this does is it gives us all the same benefits, we just talked about with
more stability. Why? Because the cable actually gives us more control in the frontal plane.
What I mean is if you held that dumbbell in your hand, it can kind of float in all three
directions. But with the cable, you're actually controlling that side-to-side frontal plane motion
a little bit. Which actually lends additional balance to you, which takes that exercise
that was supposed to be driving those glute and hamstring gains and actually allows it to do so
without having your balance undercut you. So, it gets the first in the Better Still Category.
And so, I promised you I wouldn't bury the Hamstring Curl all together, that I give
you a better option. Well, all you have to do is change the way you perform the exercise. And this
is sitting on your butt. That's right. A Seated Hamstring Curl is a much better option. Why?
Because we're fixing all the things we saw wrong with the earlier versions. And you
can see that when you perform the exercise from this position, your knees and thighs actually go
down towards hip extension rather than into hip flexion as you bring your knees back.
And what's good about this is you still get the ability to grow those hamstrings through
isolated knee flexion and overload. But we don't have to have that negative side effect that came
by just being in the opposite prone position where their knees driving into hip flexion,
all those low back pains go away, but the gains are actually here. So,
the Seated Hamstring Curl is a much better alternative for those looking to use a machine.
And speaking of improvements, let's keep them coming. Instead of doing those Heel Presses
or even the Standing Cuff Kickbacks, we have another option here it's the Banded Step Through.
And what you'll notice about this exercise is that it gives you more range of motion, so therefore
more resistance through hip extension, making it a better exercise. And once again, the bands
will give you the opportunity to progressively overload to a higher resistance band, which will
continue to allow you to progress the exercise as needed. Now, this is one that I like to use with
my athletes. Not just because of what I just spoke about, but also because it tends to help you as a
mobility drill to get into deeper and deeper hip flexion. There's a lot of good to say about this,
and it's certainly the best variation we've talked about so far to accomplish the same thing. So, the
Banded Step Through gets the yellow circle. Now the criteria for this list was to choose
exercises that were capable of driving high levels of conditioning and power. Then this
next one would be way at the top of the list, but it's not, so, it falls here. We're talking about
the Kettlebell Swing. Now, this exercise is one of the best ways to train the glutes and to do
so explosively. But it also almost automatically guarantees that you learn to hinge properly. And
the hinge is the foundation of glute activation. If we can learn to hinge properly at the hips,
then we can engage the glutes at the right time and learn to ultimately recruit them and grow
them better. Now, the limitations oftentimes is the load that we use here, unless you have
access to a very heavy kettlebell or one that's challenging for you, you're not going to find
the ability to overload this enough to keep the gains coming once you've reached a certain point.
But it certainly is an amazing exercise and one that deserves a spot here up high on the list and
the last one in the Better Still Category. And so now I get to break out my green marker
as we continue to work our way, all the way up to the top. But we're stopping just short here
in the Almost Best Category in the place we're going to start is with an improvement on those
Kettlebell Swings. We're talking about the Pull Through. Now, once again, we have a ground-based
exercise like the Kettlebell Swing, which I like. But we also get a chance to load this a little bit
more heavily because we have the option to just move that pin up the weight stack more and more
to accommodate our increasing strength gains and ultimately size gains. Now,
I also like the fact that this is once again reinforcing all the good things about the swing
through that hip hinge overload. And what's nice about this exercise is oftentimes for people, when
you remove the speed component of the Kettlebell Swing, they have a much easier time getting to
a good glute contraction, which ultimately is going to drive the hypertrophy you're looking
for. So for me, the Pull Through gets the first green circle in the Almost Best Category.
To me, this next exercise is one that's way too often underutilized, but one that we use often
with our athletes and it's the Dumbbell Leaning Forward Step Up. And what's great about this
movement is you can easily load it depending upon the weight of the dumbbells that you grab. But
what's nice is just by changing the orientation of your body prior to starting the exercise,
you can shift the load more from the quads to the glutes and hamstrings. So, we just assume
this forward tilt of our torso before we start the ascent on every rep. So, what this does is
it just preloads the glutes. So now as I press down through my foot and drive myself up and
get as close as I can to full hip extension, and I even have that good eccentric loading on
the way back down again. I can train one leg at a time to overcome those muscle imbalances and
weaknesses. It's going to get another green circle here in the Almost Best Category.
And so, I mentioned before that the glutes and hamstrings prefer to work together.
If we had an exercise that allowed us to overload and resist knee flexion and also hip extension,
then we would have a great exercise. Well, this pair of exercises actually allows you to do just
that. And regardless of whether you have access to the equipment, you're going to have an option to
do it. And we're talking about either the Glute Ham Raise or The Slick Floor Bridge Curl. And
what you can see here is, again, that coordinated effort between the glutes and hamstrings. On the
Glute Ham Raise you get that initial contraction from the glutes to stabilize the pelvis and assist
in the driving of the whole body up into this knee flex position. And of course, this is a
tremendous overload on the hamstrings. And we can actually increase the load here as we want to by
simply adding additional plate if needed. But let's say you didn't have access to this
machinery. Well, you can do what I always show here is a The Slick Floor Bridge Curl,
and this is a body weight variation and it's a lot harder than it looks. You're basically doing
the same thing here, you're starting with a glute bridge through good hip extension, maintain that
throughout and then actively and dynamically using your hamstrings to curl your legs in and back out.
A good eccentric overload here, too. The key, as always, is to keep your glutes really, really
high while you're moving your feet back and forth. And even here, if you want an additional overload,
try to do this one leg at a time. It is not easy. Either way, you're getting that holy grail, that
good combination of the activation of both those muscle groups together, and therefore it gets that
big green circle in our Almost Best Category. And so, as we've done here a few times on this
list already, we've made the improvements and now we're going to make that ultimate improvement when
it comes to the RDL. So instead of the single leg variations, we can now move towards the classic
Barbell RDLs and with good reason. Because if you're pretty confident that you don't have any
of those underlying left or right imbalances, then this is going to give you the best chance
to overload the exercise and create the most growth in both the hamstrings and the glutes.
And again, with a lot more stability since you're not in any single late balance situation.
An additional plus for the exercise is it's a good accessory movement to help you
if you struggle at all with that and range of a deadlift. It just has a lot of utility here and
it's one of the best exercises you can do for the posterior chain. It has to be on this list,
and it has to be somewhere at the very top, it belongs to the Almost Best Category.
And so, any good list of leg exercises wouldn't be good if it didn't have some variation
of a squat on it. For us, it's going to be the low bar variation. And there's a reason for
this because it sets your body up to recruit the posterior chain muscles more effectively.
By simply carrying the bar lower on those lower rear delts, you're going to have
to pitch your torso forward at a bit of an angle. What this does, as I mentioned before,
is it recruits those posterior chain muscles more effectively, and it carries through as you go down
into the bottom portion of the squat. Allowing you to more effectively drive out of the squat
and also handle heavier loads. The progressive overload was never in doubt here, nor was its
placement at some point on this list. Ultimately here, way up high, the Low Bar Squat is going to
be the last and the Almost Best Category. And so, some of you might be thinking, but
what about some of the other exercises that Jeff has shown in the past that have been very, very
helpful? Well, I would consider those corrective exercises either done for neuromuscular activation
or to overcome a glute medius weakness or some sort of hip imbalance. They wouldn't
necessarily find a home on this list when we're talking about hypertrophy and growth. However,
stay tuned, that one's coming. And so that leaves us with only
one. And of course, there can only be one when it comes to the best of the best. You
weren t looking over my shoulder the whole time, were you? Well, whether it's a surprise or not,
we're talking about the Barbell Hip Thrust. And this exercise simply checks all the boxes when
it comes to glute development. Yes, you can progressively overload it very easily. Yes,
you can perform it safely. And yes, it's going to provide the muscle hypertrophy
that you're looking for. Or as Jesse said, It's going to help you grow that juicy booty.
The reason why this exercise sits way up here at the top, even above our beloved squat, is because
muscle activation studies will prove how much more superior this is when it comes to recruiting the
glutes on any exercise. Throw in the fact that the resistance curve here is superior as well,
ensuring that we have a heavy load placed on those glutes in peak contraction. Guys, this is just
the best exercise when it comes to delivering the gains that you really want. And it also has those
hamstring isometric benefits built in as well. This is going to get that Green Star as the best
of the best in our glute exercise rankings. So, if you're looking for quads, that's coming
soon. If you're looking for a chest or shoulder's ranked video, you can find them here. And also,
if you're looking for a complete program, you can get them over at athleanx.com.
Guys click subscribe so you never miss a video when we put one out. See you soon.