Death to Hip Thrusts!

Hip thrusts leaving your glutes feeling underwhelmed? It might be time to reconsider your go-to exercise and explore alternatives that will create better results

TL;DR (Too Long Didn’t Read)

Hip thrusts are not the best movement to maximize hypertrophy in the gluteus maximus. Hip thrusts only allow you to isolate and use the glutes without engagement of other hip or leg musculature.

As compared to doing a squat, deadlift, or goodmorning which these exercises give as good, if not better development because of more tension in the bottom compared to the hip thrust. 

Movement Specificity and Functional Carryover:

While hip thrusts target the glutes directly and isolate the movement, squats and deadlifts are compound exercises that engage multiple muscle groups simultaneously, including the glutes, hamstrings, quadriceps, erector spinae, and core muscles. You can get more “bang for your buck” with squats and deadlifts. Instead of only developing your glutes you can develop quads and/or hamstrings without leaving any gains on the table for glutes. (Plotkin et al., 2023)

 

Squats, deadlifts, goodmornings mimic functional movements that we perform in daily life or sports activities, thereby potentially offering better carryover to real-life tasks or athletic performance. Although we need hip extension in every-day life and sports, practicing it supine with a large base of support does not have as much carryover as movements where we are standing 

 

Biomechanical Complexity and Joint Involvement:

Hip thrust and bridges can be good tools to use for beginners to teach them how to hinge because of the supine position and greater base of support and greater stability  

 

Compared to squats deadlifts and good mornings engaging these multiple joints in a coordinated manner not only recruits a wider range of muscle groups but also promotes better coordination and proprioception. (BJ, 2010)

 

Lack of tension in lengthened position:

The lack of tension and stretch-mediated hypertrophy at the bottom of the hip thrust movement may result in suboptimal muscle stimulation and growth compared to exercises that offer a more continuous tension throughout the entire range of motion. (Andersen, 2018)

 

While hip thrusts can still be effective for targeting the glutes, particularly in the mid-range and top of the movement where tension is higher, they may not fully capitalize on the stretch-induced hypertrophy potential seen in exercises like squats or deadlifts.

 

Exercise Set-up:

The barbell hip thrust which is one of the most widely popularized and used variations of a hip thrust can be annoying to set up. First of all loading a bunch of plates onto the bar without a deadlift jack is time consuming and taxing. Then you have to ensure you get a bench or platform with a proper height to thrust from, then you may have to find a wall or immovable object to anchor your bench in. As well you have to get under the bar and wiggle your way under it and your hips underneath it.

 

 Bibliography: 

1. Andersen, V. (2018, March). Electromyographic comparison of barbell deadlift, hex bar deadlift, and hip thrust exercises: A cross-over study. Journal of strength and conditioning research. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/28151780/ 
2. BJ, S. (2010, December). Squatting kinematics and kinetics and their application to exercise performance. Journal of strength and conditioning research. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/20182386/ 
3. Plotkin, D. L., Rodas, M. A., Vigotsky, A. D., McIntosh, M. C., Breeze, E., Ubrik, R., Robitzsch, C., Agyin-Birikorang, A., Mattingly, M. L., Michel, J. M., Kontos, N. J., Lennon, S., Frugé, A. D., Wilburn, C. M., Weimar, W. H., Bashir, A., Beyers, R. J., Henselmans, M., Contreras, B. M., & Roberts, M. D. (2023, September 27). Hip thrust and back squat training elicit similar gluteus muscle hypertrophy and transfer similarly to the deadlift. Frontiers. https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fphys.2023.1279170/full