Bikini Competition Prep Glutes

The Secrets to Bootybuilding

Some women are unaware of the power of an amazing booty.

Not only can your buns allow you to rock your favorite jeans with authority but they can also give you the curves to look feminine in a form-fitting dress. Ladies, show others how much you love your body by showing your body some love. It’s time to get bikini ready by building up your backside with buns of steel.

Today you will learn how to build your glutes FAST. Which is especially important if you are doing a bikini competition prep.  The bikini division is all about the glutes!

What could possibly get in the way of you and a bubblicious booty? Quite a few things. I see many women in the gym doing ineffective glute building programs: poor programming, poor utilization of different angles, poor muscle activation, and poor use of heavy compound exercises. Booty-building is not complicated once you understand a few important concepts. That is where I come in.

I’ve got the bootybuilding secrets for bikini competition prep glutes and I am ready to spill them. They worked for me and I guarantee they will work for you if you put in the work.

Let’s make you a pro at putting together an effective program. It will save you time and energy, trust me. I am going to teach you how to put together an effective booty workout.

First we must start with the basics. We will cover gluteal anatomy, muscle actions, variations, and categories to utilize in a training program built for success.

BOOTY  ANATOMY

The five main posterior chain (hip extensor) muscles are:

Gluteus Maximus (the largest, thickest and strongest muscle for most people)
Adductor Magnus (inner thigh)
Biceps Femoris (hamstring)
Semimembranosus (hamstring)
Semitendinosus (hamstring)

Some secondary muscles that also assist with hip extension are:

Adductor longus, brevis and minimus
Gluteus minimus and medius
Piriformis
Obturator internus and externus
Gemellus superior and inferior
Quadratus Femoris
Sartorius
Pectineus
Gracilis

Basically, Gluteus Maximus is the big man on campus.

BOOTY MUSCLE ACTIONS

The main actions of the Booty are:

Hip Extension (main action)
Hip Hyperextension
Hip Abduction
Hip External Rotation
Plus, assistance with knee stability (due to the gluteus maximus fibers that insert into the IT Band) and SI (sacroiliac) joint stability.

This means they lift your leg straight backward, out to the side, and they help rotate your hip outward. In addition, your Gluteus Medius is a crucial muscle required for single leg balance. So as with any strength training program, you want to strengthen your back end with exercises that incorporate all 3 of these movements plus balance. Don’t worry…I won’t leave you hanging! I will teach you some exercises later!

BOOTY EXERCISE VARIATIONS

When putting together a training program for the booty, you want it to be well-rounded and include many exercise variations. Here are some possible variations to consider:

– Range of motion: Have a variety of exercises that strengthen the posterior chain at end range (shortened), midrange, and bottom range (lengthened).

– Unilateral or Bilateral: Focus on bilateral leg work for increased muscle activation, however practicing some unilateral/single leg work is also beneficial as it is more functional and improves balance/stability. If you notice you are weaker on one leg versus the other, you can do double the amount of reps on the weaker leg to improve your muscle balance.

– Foot placement: Toes turned out (hip external rotation) will fire the glutes more than toes straight forward (hips neutral).

– Weight bearing: By now your keen insight has detected that if you put more weight into your toes your hamstrings fire up with excitement. However, shifting weight into your heels triggers action closer to your booty muscles. So keep this in mind when you are trying to target glutes vs. hamstrings.

– Intention: To avoid knee injury, maintain outward intention during most booty exercises. Let’s explain that in easier terms: press your legs open through your hips by pretending you are stuck in a tiny children’s chair but you have to remain stuck while you walk across the room without your hands holding it on. Got it?! Good.

BOOTY EXERCISE CATEGORIES

Most people train the booty in purely an Axial range, which results in strengthening them thru only 0 degrees of hip extension. Going past that 0 degrees into hyperextension would be dangerous during an axial exercise due to the compressive forces on the lumbar spine (low back). As a result, they are missing out on strengthening through an extra 20 degrees of hip hyperextension that Anteroposterior exercises are able to achieve.

Here are the 7 exercise categories (according to Bret Contreras) I pull exercises from when writing a client’s training program:

i) Axial Extension. Examples are squats, split squats, leg press, or step-ups. These tend to focus more on quad strengthening. So yes, squats are good for bootybuilding but other exercises are better!

ii) Axial Semi-Straight. Examples are deadlifts or good mornings. These tend to focus more on back (erector spinae) strengthening.

iii)Anteroposterior Straight Leg. Examples are back extensions or reverse hyperextensions. These tend to focus more on the glutes while keeping the legs straight the whole time.

iv) Anteroposterior Bent Leg. Examples are hip thrusts or bridges. These are the absolute best for the glutes. *** I repeat, the BEST BOOTYBUILDERS! See how you can strengthen thru that extra 20 degrees of hip extension?! Glorious.

v) Anteroposterior Hip Extension with Knee Extension. Examples are cable pull-throughs or bird dogs. The knees go from bent to straight. These are also great for the glutes.

vi) Anteroposterior Hip Extension with Knee Flexion. Examples are bridges with sliding leg curls or stability ball bridge leg curls. The knees go from straight to bent. These are great for the glutes and hamstrings. They actually cause active insufficiency of the hamstrings which fires the glutes even more.

vii) Hybrids. A mixture of any of the above. Examples are seated band hip abductions or banded clamshells.

I have built a booty workout plan based on the concepts you just learned.

You can watch them in the video below. There are comments underneath to explain my reasoning for why I chose each exercise for this particular workout.

 [responsive_video type=’youtube’ hide_related=’0′ hide_logo=’0′ hide_controls=’0′ hide_title=’0′ hide_fullscreen=’0′ autoplay=’0′]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-aXgmtp2SzA&feature=youtu.be[/responsive_video]

#1 Hip Thrusts

Category iv which strengthens in a fully shortened position

Heavy weight to strengthen the glutes to their maximum potential

#2 Landmine Deadlifts

Category ii which strengthens the glutes mid-range now

#3 Kettlebell High Step Ups

Category i to strengthen in mid-range but with unilateral focus now

Works lower extremity stabilization as well

#4 Weighted Squats

Category i again but this time bilateral work

#5 Upright Hack Squats

Category i again but this time on a machine so less stabilization is required

and now you can just focus on heavy weight

with a more narrow but high foot placement than squats

#6 Hip Abduction Machine

Category vii to work purely hip abduction

#7 Superset: Banded Clamshells + Banded Froggers

Category vii again but this is the time to burn out

Higher reps and superset utilized to go to fatigue and finish the workout strong

So as you can see, the variety in exercise categories and variations was kept in mind when putting together this particular workout. Now that you know my thought process, you too can put together future booty workouts for yourself!

Have any questions about the booty workout you are writing? Comment below and I am happy to contribute 🙂