Natural Glute Ham RaiseMuscles Worked
The natural glute ham raise works your hamstrings hard as they resist your body weight while your knees straighten, with your glutes and lower back keeping your hips extended and your calves assisting at the knee. Only your ankles are anchored, which makes it one of the toughest bodyweight hamstring moves.
PrimaryHamstrings
- Equipment
- Bodyweight
- Level
- Intermediate
- Type
- Compound
- Force
- Pull
How to do it
- Kneel on a padded surface and anchor your ankles under something solid, such as a lat pulldown pad, a loaded bar or a partner's hands.
- Start upright with your body in a straight line from knees to head, glutes squeezed and arms ready in front of you.
- Lean forward slowly from the knees, keeping your hips straight, and resist the fall with your hamstrings for as long as you can.
- When you can no longer hold the position, catch yourself with your hands in a push-up position.
- Push off lightly with your hands and pull with your hamstrings to return to upright.
Form tips
- Keep your hips extended the whole way, because bending at the waist shortens the lever and takes the work off your hamstrings.
- Use a band anchored above you or a light push from your hands to finish reps until you can do them alone.
- Build up by making the lowering slower and longer before worrying about pulling yourself back up.
Why it made the list
No. 7 of 12
Best Hamstring Exercises
Bodyweight hamstring exercise through knee flexion. One of the most challenging and effective ham exercises.
More hamstring exercises
See it on your own body map
Log your Natural Glute Ham Raise sets in KasMaker and watch your hamstrings, calves, glutes, and lower back fill in on the map, weighted by how much you did. Logging and the body map are free on iPhone.
