“Don't skip leg day” is a saying that has become popular among people who go to the gym. It is a warning to people to make sure that they put as much emphasis on training their lower body as they do their upper body.
This is all well and good, but many people still end up skipping a relatively large portion of their lower body when it comes to “leg day.” Not even addressing the issue of calf training. The hamstrings deserve your attention more than any other body part.
Best Hamstring Exercises
If you want to improve your athletic performance, target the backs of your thighs with these must-do movements. These exercises will also help you develop total-body power and a well-developed set of legs.
Lying Leg Curl
The lying leg curl is not appreciated enough, and is often done with incorrect form. When this exercise is performed properly with a full range of motion, it strengthens the hamstring and calf muscles. To avoid moving anything but your hamstrings, keep your hips and upper body still.
Benefits of the Lying Leg Curl
The lying leg curl exercise strengthens the hamstrings by isolating them as knee flexors.
When used with a full range of motion, it can help improve hamstring flexibility.
Trains the calf muscles.
How to Do the Lying Leg Curl
Lie face down on the leg curl machine. Position yourself so that the backs of your ankles are under the pad and your hips are down. Draw the belly button inwards to avoid movement compensations. Curl the weight towards your glutes. It is best to lower slowly in order to keep the muscle under tension for a longer period of time during the eccentric portion. Rinse and repeat.
Hamstring Slide
The hamstring slide is an exercise that uses your hamstrings to extend your hip and flex your knee. This exercise is easier than the razor curl. If you want to increase your eccentric hamstring strength to reduce your risk of hamstring injuries, this may be a good place to start. This type of exercise is gentle on your joints.
Benefits of Hamstrings Slides
Increasing eccentric hamstring strength can help prevent hamstring strains and improve squat and deadlift performance.
Exercising is easier than using a razor or performing Nordic curls.
How to Do Hamstring Slides
To do this exercise, start by lying on your back with your legs bent at 90 degrees and your heels underneath your knees. The heels should be on a pair of workout sliders for an effective workout. Place your heels on a hard surface with your legs extended and squeeze your glutes to raise your hips. Lift your heels so that your toes are the only part of your feet touching the ground, then lower them back down.
Romanian Deadlift
The Romanian deadlift is a variation of the conventional deadlift that is adjusted to create a greater growth stimulus in the lower back, glutes, and hamstrings.
If you keep your legs slightly bent while you extend your hips, your hamstrings will be in a longer stretched position. This also forces them to contract harder, which leads to greater growth.
How to Do the Romanian Deadlift
Hold the barbell with an overhand grip that is slightly wider than your shoulder width. Pull your shoulder blades back and raise your chest. Bend your knees slightly and push your buttocks away from the wall behind you.
Reach your tailbone back towards the wall, keeping your legs straight. When you get the bar down as far as you can without arching your back, use your heels to push off the ground and bring your hips back to the starting position.
Benefits of the Romanian Deadlift
With the Romanian deadlift, you can use heavier weights than other types of deadlifts, which can help you increase your strength.
The benefits of this movement for muscle growth are due to the deep stretch it puts the target muscle through.
Split-Stance Dumbbell Romanian Deadlift
Single-leg training can help improve strength, power, and muscle growth. However, many lifters find it difficult to keep their balance while doing single-leg exercises. You will reduce the amount of balance demanded from your body if you take a staggered or split-stance while still maintaining the single-leg focus.
This exercise allows you to focus on working the hamstrings on your lead leg by having your rear leg provide just enough stability to keep you steady. Dumbbells allow you to have a greater range of motion than if you were using a barbell, while also reducing strain on your lower back.
How to Do the Split-Stance Dumbbell Romanian Deadlift
Hold a dumbbell in each hand by your sides. Stand with your feet shoulder-width apart, with the toes of your front foot in line with the heel of your back foot. Stand with your back straight and push your hips and glutes backward. The weights should lower toward your front foot while your hands face each other. To stand upright, you should pull with your front leg, not with your rear foot. Perform all reps on one leg before switching sides.
Benefits of the Split-Stance Dumbbell Romanian Deadlift
This movement pairs the benefits of single-leg training, which is stability on one leg, with the stability of a bilateral (two-legged) exercise.
Romanian deadlifts can be done with dumbbells in a split stance, which allows you to use lighter weights while still getting a significant muscle-building stimulus. This is because of the stance and leverage.
Toes-Elevated Dumbbell Romanian Deadlift
Romanian deadlifts are a great accessory exercise for deadlifts that add strength and mass to your glutes and hamstrings. The toes-elevated variation takes this to a new level. Lifting your toes up moves the weight to your heels, making your hamstrings work harder and helping them to get stronger. When you do this exercise slowly and with control, it will help build strength in the muscles when they are stretched. This will help prevent injuries.
Benefits of the Toes-Elevated Dumbbell RDL
The higher heels on the shoes help to work the muscles in the butt and legs more for better strength and muscle building.
Increases hamstring eccentric strength to help prevent hamstring strains.
How to Do the Toes Elevated Dumbbell RDL
You will need to find a 25-pound bumper plate or a low platform to elevate your toes and bring your feet close together. As you bring your body down, reach the dumbbells out so they are over your toes instead of keeping them close to your body. Slow down the movement to improve the stretch, hold for a second in the bottom position, and then go back to the starting position.
Single-Leg Single-Arm Romanian Deadlift
Although the single-leg, single-arm Romanian deadlift might look like a circus trick, it is a serious training exercise. This is an excellent choice for people who want to build muscle and improve their athletic ability.
You're using your legs, core, and back when you do this exercise, which is more than other exercises.
How to Do the Single-Leg Single-Arm Romanian Deadlift
Stand up straight with a dumbbell in your left hand by your side, with your palm facing your body. Bend your right knee slightly and lean forward at your hips. As the weight moves toward the ground, your left leg will raise into the air. Avoid twisting your shoulders or rounding your spine. Move slowly to control the weight and maintain balance. After you have moved as far as you can, return to the original position slowly. Do all repetitions with one hand and leg before switching to the other hand and leg.
Benefits of the Single-Leg Single-Arm Romanian Deadlift
This exercise works the muscles in the “posterior oblique sling” which are important for posture, especially when walking or moving.
This exercise strengthens the muscles on the sides of your abdomen and lower back.
The following text discusses the benefits of an exercise in improving joint health by recruiting stabilizer muscles in the ankles, knees, hips, and shoulders.
Dumbbell Good Morning
individuals with limited shoulder mobility may have difficulty completing the barbell good morning exercise After all the compressive and shear load on the spine from squatting and deadlifting, your spine needs a break. The dumbbell good morning is a great way to engage your anterior core muscles, and train the same muscles as the barbell version, but without the load on your spine. If you place the weight more towards the front, you will be more aware of how your upper body is positioned.
Benefits of the Dumbbell Good Morning
The dumbbell variation of this exercise is easier on the lower back and shoulders than the barbell variation because it engages the anterior core.
This exercise strengthens the three mentioned muscles together.
How to Do the Dumbbell Good Morning
Hold a heavy dumbbell against your chest, keeping your shoulders down and chest up. Keeping your back straight, bend at your hips until your torso is almost parallel to the ground, maintaining a soft bend in your knees. After pausing for a second, return to the starting position and repeat the process.
Razor Curl
The razor curl is a variation on the Nordic curl in which you keep your hips flexed. If you flex your hip, you can contract your hamstring more intensely at the hip, and more forcefully at the knee. Anterior cruciate ligament injury is less likely to occur when this is done. This exercise is only for advanced people who have built up their eccentric hamstring strength.
Benefits of the Razor Curl
This exercise improves the eccentric strength of the hamstrings, as well as increasing glute strength.
Increases core strength due to falling forward with control.
How to Do the Razor Curl
You will need a training partner to hold your feet, or you can use a barbell or piece of equipment to anchor your lower body. Flex your hips slightly and hold this position throughout the exercise. To execute this movement, begin by falling forward while keeping control over the eccentric movement. lightly touch the ground with your hands. If you are starting to find the concentric hard to do, use your hands to help make it easier.
Single-Leg Stability Ball Curl
The single-leg hip extension hamstring curl helps work your hamstrings by both extending and flexing your hips and knees. When you work with a stability ball, you have to be more disciplined with your technique because the ball is unstable. This also makes your stabilizer muscles work harder. This exercise will help strengthen your hamstring muscles and protect them from injury.
Benefits of the Single-Leg Stability Ball Curl
Strengthens the hamstrings, hip extensors, and knee flexors.
The increased stabilization demands improve hip and core stability
The stability ball is a great tool to help runners train, as it can help simulate the unevenness of running on a road.
How to Do the Single-Leg Single-Leg Stability Ball Curl
Place your feet on a stability ball and engage your glutes. Lift your hips off the ball and bring one leg up. Now, curl the ball toward your butt with the leg that is not injured. Slowly reverse the movements you just did and lower your hips to the floor. Repeat the entire sequence.
Standing Leg Curl
The standing leg curl machine can be found in several different but similar varieties. However, they all have the same basic function, which is to work the muscles in the back of the legs. Some machines allow you to plant your non-working foot firmly on the ground in a fully standing position, while others, sometimes called “kneeling leg curls,” have a specialized pad to support your non-working leg in a bent position. The overall result and performance are the same either.
You can focus on bending your leg more when you do standing leg curls, which is an important function of the hamstring muscle. An extra benefit of the standing machine is that you can target each leg individually.
How to Do the Standing Leg Curl
Attach the curl pad to the machine at the level of your ankle. Secure your torso in position using any available handles. Tighten your abs and squeeze your buttock towards your thigh. Achieve a complete range of motion. Lower the weight until your leg is extended. Perform all reps on one side before switching legs.
Benefits of the Standing Leg Curl
The standing leg curl machine applies constant tension to the target muscle, unlike free-weight movements which apply varying levels of resistance due to gravity.
Training one leg at a time can help to even out any muscular discrepancies between the left and right sides of the body.
The machine makes it hard to use your whole body's momentum to swing the weight, which would reduce how much your muscles have to work.
