Training
Marisa HeinzeApril 24, 2023
5 Exercises to Train Your Hamstring Muscles
You want to train your leg flexer muscles? Good! There are many benefits to strengthening your legs and glutes with hamstring exercises, because your hamstrings need a lot of attention.
The hamstring muscles are important for the performance of your whole body. You need them for squats, hip extensions, a stable pelvis and for fast sprints. In addition, they support your glutes in their function and transfer the power of the legs to the upper body.
Training plan for strong legs
The hamstring exercises clearly focus on the backside of the legs. After all, you want to build more muscle there and become fitter and healthier overall. A tailor-made training plan with 5 special exercises ensures quick success.
It's best to start immediately. Ideas are often put off and then forgotten altogether, so it's important to start right away with the exercises and stay disciplined. A proper diet and a positive attitude while exercising support the success of the exercises. After all, the hamstring exercises should give you pleasure and enrich your everyday life.
Before we begin, you will learn some interesting and important facts about the hamstrings.
Why train the hamstrings?
It is very important to exercise the hamstrings to prevent sports injuries. The hamstrings are a muscle group that is generally very susceptible to injury. Competitive athletes in particular are familiar with the problem of hamstring injuries. In football or athletics, many professionals quickly drop out due to such injuries. Changes of direction, surprising sprints, and fast braking lead to tears in the hamstring muscles.
As a result, the legs are no longer able to bear weight properly and a forced, extended break is the consequence. For hobby athletes, however, this danger also exists. Good training of the hamstrings successfully prevents such troublesome and long-lasting injuries, even though a certain residual risk can never be ruled out.
What exactly are the hamstring muscles?
These muscles are located on the back of your thigh in the compartmentum cruris posterius, a compartment that houses the flexor muscles of the lower leg. As such, it is one of the most important muscles in the whole leg.
Basically, the hamstrings flex the knees, extend the hips, and keep the pelvis stable. So, you can see how important it is to train this muscle group specifically with hamstring exercises.
The most effective leg workout: these 5 exercises strengthen your hamstrings
Effective hamstring training includes exercises that stretch the hips and increase knee flexibility. Warming up is especially important for the leg flexor muscles. You should warm up your thighs before doing hamstring exercises. The best way to do this is to run on the spot, stretch dynamically but gently or do high-knee jumps. After the five-minute warm-up, you can start with the strength exercises.
Overview: Training plan hamstrings exercises
Warm-up: 5 minutes run
- Hip Bridges
- Romanian Deadlift
- Good Mornings
- Standing Balance
- Bulgarian Split Squat
Equipment
- Barbell
- Dumbbell
- Exercise Mat
- Wooden Box (or similar)
Execution
1. Hip Bridges
With this exercise you activate your leg flexor muscles. At the same time, you strengthen the gluteus maximus and the lower back. Therefore, it is very popular and effective.
- For the hip bridge, lie on the floor with your back on a mat.
- Your arms are flat on the floor. Your palms face the floor.
- Bend your knees, place your feet under your knees and push your pelvis and buttocks upwards using the strength of your hamstrings.
- Exhale slowly as you lift up.
Then carefully lower your pelvis again, but only so far that your buttocks do not touch the floor. Breathe in deeply as you descend. 10 repetitions are enough to start with. You can then gradually increase to 20 repetitions.
2. Romanian Deadlift
In contrast to the classic deadlift, the legs remain straight during the Romanian deadlift, which puts more strain on your hamstrings and therefore gives them a stronger workout. The front of the thighs is relieved. You can do this exercise with a dumbbell or a barbell.
- The feet are parallel and hip-width apart on the floor. The tips of the feet point forward.
- Before lifting, tighten your buttocks and keep your back straight. Pull your shoulders slightly back. Hold the weights firmly in your hands.
- Push your hips slightly back. Then bend forward from the hips.
- Keep your back straight, abdominals tight and weights close to your body.
- Bring the weights close to your thighs and straighten up completely.
Make sure your upper body is straight and your abdomen is tight. Start with less weight at the beginning until you have fully mastered the technique. Use only enough weight, so that you can perform 12 repetitions cleanly. You can start with 2-3 sets. Advanced exercisers can increase the weight, lower the number of repetitions to 10 and work with 3-4 sets.
3. Good Mornings
Good mornings are one of the classic hamstring exercises. The exercise has a similar movement to the deadlift, but the weight should be lighter. It also strengthens your hamstrings, glutes and back.
- Stand with your feet hip-width apart.
- Place the barbell on your back or hold a weight plate with both arms in front of your chest.
- Your head is facing forward.
- Then tense your body, pull your belly button inwards and bend forward with a straight back until you reach about 90 degrees.
- Make sure your knees are only slightly bent. The head forms an extension of the back.
Ideally, the upper body is horizontal to the floor. It is important that the back remains completely straight, especially in the lumbar region. Therefore, you should tense your abdomen firmly. Then come back up slowly and in a controlled manner. Start with less weight until you have mastered the technique. Similar to the deadlift, start with 12 repetitions with little weight and do 2-3 sets. In the next step you increase the weight, do only 10 repetitions and 3-4 sets.
4. Standing Balance
For now, you don't need any additional equipment for this exercise as you are working with your own weight.
- Stand up straight and tense your body.
- Bend forward, keeping your back straight.
- Keep your abdomen tight.
- Now lift your right leg until it is level with the floor and your body forms a line.
- When you straighten up again, put the leg back down.
- Then repeat the exercise with the other leg.
As you start this exercise with your own weight, you can work with 10 repetitions per leg and 3 sets. If you are more advanced, you can add weight in the form of a dumbbell and hold it in your hands with your arms extended while performing the exercise.
5. Bulgarian Split Squat
The Bulgarian split squat is basically a lunge with the back leg elevated, which means that the supporting leg has to bear more weight and a flexibility of the back hip flexors is required.
- Stand in front of a box or an elevated object (like a chair) and take a step forward.
- Now place the back foot on the box or elevated object.
- Then lower your body until your front leg forms a right angle.
- Make sure that while doing the lunge, the front knee stays above the ankle - come low rather than forward.
The back remains straight. The front knee should not rise above the toes. Then push back to the starting position. Start with your own body weight and 10 repetitions per side with 2-3 sets. In the next step you can add extra weight in the form of dumbbells and do 8 repetitions and 4 sets.
Conclusion: exercising the hamstring muscles
The hamstring muscles are important for the stability of your entire body. They are needed for squats, hip extensions, and a stable pelvis. In addition, the hamstrings support the gluteal muscles and transfer the power of the legs to the upper body.
It is important to train the ischiocrural muscles to avoid injury. You should warm up your legs thoroughly before doing the exercises. Hamstring exercises such as hip bridges, deadlifts, good mornings, standing balances and Bulgarian split squats are good for training the leg flexor muscles.
These 5 exercises work all the important parts of the muscle group and also strengthen the back muscles and shape the buttocks. They also stretch the hips and increase the flexibility of the knees. Therefore, felxible and strong hamstrings support the entire organism and make the body leaner, healthier and fitter.