Barbell hip thrusts

[Nico Garcia]

What the hell is this hip thrust movement I see like every other woman in the gym doing? Did some influencer say everyone must do this for glutes? Isn’t the squat much better? Looks pretty meaningless and also manages to take up half the gym.

[Mark Rippetoe]

It's so you don't have to learn how to squat. Just enjoy the fact that these women want you to look at their asses.

[neilc1]

It's so you don't have to learn how to squat. Just enjoy the fact that these women want you to look at their asses.

their asses? or their crotches ?

[Mark Rippetoe]

THEY think it's the ass. We know what we want to see.

[Nico Garcia]

THEY think it's the ass. We know what we want to see.

I feel sorry for people doing some of these ridiculous movements. This younger very attractive girl I see at my gym pretty often was doing what I now realize are called wall lunges, thanks Google. I was squatting next to her and didn’t really pay much attention to her workout because I’d seen her doing the lift many times previously. I always thought it was of that she would hold a dumbbell in one hand while doing it. It just looked very uncomfortable. Anyhow, on this day she called me over after a set. I walked over and she was like “excuse me but could you help me?” “Sure” I said “What’s up?” Then she says, “ Could you put this weight back for me? I think I’ve injured my back.” I was like yes of course and then went to pick up the dumbbell… the damn thing was 55kg! Poor girl hobbled out of the gym and I hobbled to re-rack the weight.

[Jason Donaldson]

It's so you don't have to learn how to squat. Just enjoy the fact that these women want you to look at their asses.

Strictly speaking, they want SOMEONE looking, but it may not be you. Especially once you're caught looking...

[Marc Brainich]

It’s the old Tom Brady / office drone quandry. Maybe you get the lunch date … but maybe you get reported to HR …

[Martin Shenfield]

What the hell is this hip thrust movement I see like every other woman in the gym doing?

I thought you were a man?


I actually thought it's so they didn't have to deadlift.

[Gerhard Häring]

When I was in a powerlifting/bodybuilding oriented gym I got these prescribed as assistance exercises by the head coach there. Just looked into my old plan: 3 sets of 10 at (trigger warning for Rip) RPE 8.

For the lols, here is this plan's complete list of assistance exercises: bulgarian split squats, reverse flies, hanging leg raises, seal rows, deficit push-ups, leg curls, dips, hip thrusts, pull-ups, barbell curls and side planks.

[Farmer]

There is some 'recent' irony to the whole hip thrust fad.

More recently, in the fitness/"physique"/exercise science/bodybuilding/evidence based training community .... its been trendy now to say that training a muscle at its utmost stretched or lengthened state will yield the most hypertrophic gainz.

That is, #1- you want to really go thru a full range of motion, and arrange the limbs/body in such a way the muscle in lengthened to the max. And #2- and if possible bias the loading to where the muscle is working its hardest in/at the lengthened state.

So by their logic, hip thrusts would absolutely suck at those^ two things. #1- the ROM is kind of limited, the femur may not move about 45 degrees there. And #2-The vector of the loading all comes into play when the glutes are almost fully contracted and shortened (not is the lengthened state).

Funny because a low bar squat would be so much better for developing the glutes according to this new science-based dogma. The glutes and hamstrings go into a extreme stretch when you do a "bent over" squat. Maybe 110 degrees of ROM or more. Hip angle is very closed (glute is stretched) in the bottom position.

The only thing I could say (in their terms and rationale) that is 'good' about the hip thrust, is the way the knee is severally bent, will take a lot of the hamstrings out of the movement, and require to the glutes to be the absolute prime mover.