Does Glute Activation Work to Build Muscle?
This Is the 4-Move, 5-Minute Bodyweight Glute Warmup That Got Me My Best Butt Ever
I'm 90 percent sure that, up until a few months ago, I had a case of dormant butt syndrome. It wasn't always that way; in college, I biked and walked everywhere while working out six days a week, rarely sitting for more than an hour at a time. After graduation, that changed. I was sitting all the time: at my desk, in the car, at dinner. I tried to compensate by going harder in my workouts and runs, even using a standing desk for hours at a time. But despite my best efforts, my glutes paid the price, quickly losing muscle tone and strength.
After a year and a half of this frustration, I decided to try something new: glute activation. It was essentially an extra warmup that focused solely on "waking up" my glute muscles before a workout, ensuring that they'd get the highest possible benefit of the exercise. The four moves were easy to slip into my warmup routine and only took about five minutes to complete — a low cost for potentially big gains. I started activating my glutes before every strength workout, about three times a week.
Within a couple of weeks, I started seeing results: my butt was noticeably tighter, more lifted, and more toned. The turnaround time was actually shocking; I wasn't sure whether this change, simple as it was, would work at all, and I definitely didn't expect it to happen so fast. The fact that all it took was a five-minute warmup circuit of bodyweight exercises — moves anyone, anywhere can do — made the surprise all the more pleasant.
You can activate your glutes with several different moves (here's the full list), but I chose just four, sometimes three if I was short on time. I did two rounds of 10 to 12 reps for each move, completing them after a short dynamic warmup and four ab activation exercises. Sound simple? It is, and judging by my results, it's effective, too. Ahead, see the moves I did and add them to your warmup to tone and strengthen your butt.
1 Traditional Bridge Exercise
2 Fire Hydrant
3 Donkey Kicks
