Building the Best Glutes
Are squats the best exercise to target the glutes?
Who doesn't want to look better from behind? That's why there's so much focus
on glute exercises to help firm and round the all-important posterior area that
makes you look dynamite in a tight pair of jeans. Without exercise and
training, buttock muscles quickly become loose and flabby from too much sitting
and not enough toning. That's a good reason not to let your glute muscles get
complacent. But which exercises are best for targeting the glutes?
Building Beautiful Glutes
Most people think that doing squats is the best exercise for toning and
rounding the buttock muscles. Squats effectively activate these muscles,
especially if you do them with weights, but they're not the only glute
exercises that shape a flabby backside. According to a team of researchers from
the La Crosse Exercise and Health Program, other exercises work as well or better
than traditional squats for building beautiful glutes.
Glute Workouts Put to the Test
La Crosse
researchers used a technique called EMG to directly measure how many muscle
fibers were recruited when participants performed various glute exercises. They
discovered, as expected, that traditional squats effectively activated the
muscles of the gluteus maximus and gluteus medius, but they weren't the best
exercise for this area. Better than squats for glute work were lunges, step-ups
and hip extensions. These exercises also activated the hamstring muscles
more than standard squats did. Single-leg squats and four-way hip extension
also targeted the glutes well in this study. The worst exercise? The horizonal
leg press was the least effective of the eight exercises they tested.
Surprisingly, hip extensions activated the gluteal muscles best followed
by step-ups and lunges. Despite the fact that participants used no resistance,
hip extensions were more effective than squats for activating the gluteal
muscles. Quadriceps hip extensions are an exercise that many people don't do
when they do a glute workout.
The Best Glute Exercises?
Your best bets for firming the glute region are hip extension standard,
single-leg squats, lunges, standard squats and step-ups. Doing a combination of
these exercises suld help you mold and shape a more beautiful backside better
than standard squats alone.
The Bottom Line?
Squats work, but they're not the only exercise for building better glutes.
Diversify your buttock workout by adding these additional exercises to target
the muscles in a different way. As the exercises become easier increase the
resistance with weights. The buttock muscles are some of the more challenging
muscles to shape, so you need to do a number of exercises that target them
specifically. If you want a firmer backside, diversify your glute workout, and
use resistance. You'll like the way you look in your skinny jeans.
References:
ACE Fitness. "Glutes to the Max: Exclusive ACE Research Gets to the Bottom of
the Most Effective Glutes Exercises"
