Imagine a bench press program where the function of the chest muscles were constantly ignored. Would that program be successful? Why should training the lower body be any different? The pectorals form the base musculature of the arms, and allow for a big bench. Likewise, the glutes form the base musculature of the legs, and allow for big athletic performances.
An athlete who works hard on developing their glutes in the weightroom is taking major steps to reach a high level of success in sport. In (PART I of building powerful glutes for athleticism) two important reasons for building glute strength in the weightroom were addressed. The bottom line: Having weak glutes and ignoring them in resistance training will feed a negative cycle in the development of an athletes sport technique. With two primary reasons under our belts, let’s dive into three more reasons why addressing hip power is a key part of becoming a freak show athlete.
3. Athletic qualities such as acceleration, top end speed, and running jumps are influenced heavily by glute strength.
The strength of the hips/glutes are going to be strongly influential in the following movements:
- Running one and two leg jumps
- Acceleration from a standing/ready position
- Top-end speed
- Deceleration
- Rotational hitting and throwing power
- Pulling movements in the weightroom
- Deep squatting
- Injury prevention in endurance based pursuits
Everyone can perform the athletic movements listed above, but those who do it best are guaranteed to have a lot of power in their backsides. When sprinting or a running jump looks plain awkward, weak glutes are likely a culprit. Athletes who sprint and seem to be moving their legs but not really going anywhere, will accompany their lack of stride length with a lack of gluteal development. Research by Dorn (2012) confirms this, by highlighting the fact that the glutes force output doubles when moving from 7m/s to 9m/s in a sprint. (The hamstrings are actually even more important than the glutes in this scenario, however, so don’t forget about them either). Big glutes = big strides!
More food for thought, just because you are doing a movement well, doesn’t mean you can’t do it better. I thought for a long time that I was sprinting well, until I started specifically training my glutes by doing hip thrusts. Previously, I was an athlete that moved with the correct biomechanics, but didn’t really go anywhere… my teammates always rushed past me after 20 meters of acceleration. After a couple of months of true glute specific training in the weightroom and I finally saw what it was like to have my posterior chain really contribute to a sprint, and had never attained high speed so effortlessly in my life. The sprinters who I have trained similarly will mention the same things.
Sprinting is not the only athletic movement where glutes are a priority. Any movement that converts horizontal velocity to vertical is going to require large amounts of strength through the hip joint. Remember that the legs act as rigid levers to translate an athlete’s velocity from horizontal to vertical. At the base of those levers are the glutes. Think of a pole vaulter planting his or her pole into a plant box to take off over the bar. Having a plant box firmly rooted in the ground is like having strong glutes. Having weak glutes would be like the vaulter planting their pole into a box that moved a few inches during the plant. Obviously this would critically hurt the skyward launch of the vaulter! In the same way, weak glutes hurt the single leg jumper, and high speed, running two leg jumper.
Having weak glutes is like planting the pole into an unstable plant box.
A standing vertical jump will always rely on a bigger knee bend, and athletes can get away with not having strong glutes during that jump. Many great standing verticals are actually characterized by a huge knee bend. As horizontal speed gets brought in to the jump, the importance of gluteal strength power rises. The greater the horizontal velocity of the jump, the more important gluteal strength becomes. I have found that strong glutes will help horizontal based jumping (long and triple jumps, dunking from far out a little more than they will more vertical jumping such as high jumping. This is not to say that they aren’t as important for high jumpers, just not as vital as they are for horizontal jumpers. Bottom line: want to dunk from the free throw line? (even if the hoop is 6 feet), train your glutes specifically in the weightroom.
4. Strong glutes and mobile hips will help keep a healthy back
If I can remember only one thing I learned this summer, it would be from Mike Boyle in his book, “Advances in Functional Training”. In one chapter on hip training, Mike quoted Stuart McGill, stating that: “A bad back is often a strong back”. Why is this true? Because when the glutes don’t work right, the back will pick up the slack and in the process, pack on a lot of extra muscle and strength. There are a chain of events that leads to weak glutes as well. That chain is:
1. Weak external obliques allow anterior tilt.
2. Anterior tilt causes shortening of the psoas.
3. A shortened psoas will inhibit gluteal strength and function.
4. Weak glutes and tight psoas will prevent proper hip extension and function.
5. The lack of hip extension ability will be compensated for by the lumbar vertebrae causing: injury/rehab/repeat.
(Taken from Mike Boyle’s: Advances in Functional Training)
A strong back is often times a bad back as well, as it is typically compensating for weak glutes.
Unfortunately, when the back is always taking more load than normal, it will be a ticking time-bomb for problems. Ever since I read this information, I am constantly noticing that there is a direct association between quad dominant athletes and back pain. An athlete with no butt is almost often destined for back issues once they begin intense work.
Ever since I read about this, I have seen the association in multiple athletes. I have seen tennis players with weak glutes hurting their back doing medicine ball throws (poor power transmission through glutes, and the back picks up the slack) to quad dominant throwers with constant back issues.
A nice way to spot for this aside from asthetics is basic functional testing. Watch an athlete perform a quadruped bent leg extension and see if the lumbar spine stays vertical or flexes into extension. An athlete with a bad back is going to have a lot of issues not flexing their lower back along with them into hip extension.
When it comes to a healthy back (and knees) know that hip mobility is also critical to the function of a healthy athlete. When the hips are immobile, range of motion is sure to be compensated elsewhere in the body and cause issues. I have a handful of sprinters that I train who have very strong glutes, but poor range of hip extension. For these athletes, spending time stretching the psoas and releasing the lumbar spine is a priority. Strong + mobile hips will always equal a recipe for success and injury prevention.
5. Strong glutes make squats, deadlifts, and Olympic lifts better
Want to make your traditional lifts better? Start spending more time getting your glutes as strong as possible.
Even if you aren’t concerned with athletic or functional pursuits, perhaps classifying yourself as the neighborhood gym rat, glute-focused lifting is going to make an impact on your other lifts, such as squats, cleans, and deadlifts. Why? Because glute-focused lifting is going to increase the motor potential and muscle mass of your backside. When performing a squat, the brain will notice that there is more available force that can come from the glutes, and will recruit them more and more as they get stronger, rather than recruiting entirely from the spinal erectors and quads. This also helps to avoid altering the biomechanics of the lift and using “cheating” style techniques.
Stronger glutes will help lifting in the following areas:
- More power out of “the bucket/hole” in squats. Improves deep squatting.
- Helps to improve upon the “knees out” alignment of a proper squat, and helps keep the knees from caving in on the concentric/upward phase of squatting.
- Will help athletes power through their heels longer in squats, cleans and deadlifts.
- Will help athletes recruit more power out of the posterior chain in Olympic lifting.
- Will help athletes start to feel their glutes more in squats and deadlifts, which will provide a positive transfer to sprinting and jumping.
The longer I have been an athletic coach, the more I have realized that the way in which a lift is performed is paramount to long term athletic development. Athletes who squat or deadlift incorrectly for years are bound to reap imbalances over time. Athletes and gym rats alike can reap some great benefits with these improvements to their lifts and enhance their long term development.
Bonus Reason: Physical Appearance
If the above reasons weren’t enough for you, which may be the case if your only goal is what the ladies/guys think of you in the club on a Friday night (or perhaps you spend some time on stage in the fitness arena), training glutes can provide a great hypertrophy based stimulus to pack some more junk in the aesthetic trunk. Strong glutes are desirable from an appearance standpoint any way you look at it. Remember, when it comes to muscle size development, volume is king, but you also need to be strong for that volume to do something! Nobody is going to get big legs doing German volume training with 50lbs on their squat sets. A personal favorite routine of mine for size development is hip thrusts for 4-5 sets of 12, with a 2 second squeeze at the top of each rep. I typically will use between 75-100kg for this type of routine, where my strength based work will revolve around 3-4 sets of 6-8 reps with 1 second squeezes with 100-160kg. For the best asthetic results, alternate periods of training size with training strength.
The barbell hip thrust is my #1 movement for glute size and strength, but there are plenty of ways to attack the glutes from different angles and progressions. Be looking for the next article in the glute series, which will lay down a foundation of how to approach glute training for athletes and clients with differing levels of strength and function.
Conclusion
Summing it all up, training strong glutes in the weightroom is important for the following 5 reasons.
- Strong glutes will help dictate good technique in running and jumping
- Strong glutes need the help of the weightroom in many cases
- Strong glutes will improve performance in a variety of athletic movements
- Strong glutes will help prevent lower back injury
- Strong glutes will make your other lifts better
References:
Advances in Functional Training. Training techniques for coaches, personal trainers and athletes. 2010, On-Target Publications. Mike Boyle.
Muscular strategy shift in human running: dependence of running speed on hip and ankle muscle performance: Tim W. Dorn, Anthony G. Schache and Marcus G. Pandy J Exp Biol 215, 1944-1956 b.
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