Glute Exercises to Improve Running
The three best glute exercises to take the load off the knees when running and improve your running stride
You’ve been picking up running.
It feels great, you’re loving being able to get out in the fresh spring air, move, and get fit all at the same time.
Maybe you’re thinking about signing up for races over the summer or even thinking about crushing a marathon (ok maybe a half).
You’re excited, pumped, running on the novelty high.
Then you start to increase the volume…
Things feel great for a little while, but then you start to notice some unpleasant sensations that start to arise quicker and linger longer.
Your body is turning on its check engine light. Not quite saying something is broken, but if you keep it up with no maintenance, something might go awry.
That’s why we are going to talk about the ever so important GLUTES!
Glutes are all the rage right now and for good reason.
They are big, powerful, and important. Plus, weak glutes look good on no one.
Putting aesthetics aside... running is a very anterior dominant sport, meaning we are using a lot of our front side of the body.
Which is why YOU need to make sure you’re keeping your glutes well developed, strong, and functioning the way they should be.
A common complaint we hear from runners is painful achy knees. This can be due to weak glutes, or even more so, glutes that aren’t owning the positions they should be owning.
Utilizing a simple hurdle step test, we can oftentimes see a flexed (bent) knee on the leg that is in extension. Or In the down position.
This signals to us that your quads might be owning extension more than they should and the glute isn’t owning extension like it should. Extension meaning the locking out portion of the stride or absorbing the down portion of the gait cycle.
So when we see this flexed knee position we want to add in some strengthening and exercise correctives that mimic a proper gait cycle.
Here are 3 glute exercises that will strengthen the glutes and help improve your running mechanics.
Take the load off the knees and say goodbye to those aches.
exercise #1 - simple single leg glute bridge
Play around with how close or how far away your foot is from your body. It is very interdependent on where people feel it in the glute the most. You can also come back onto the heel of the foot staying down. The goal is to feel activation in the glute as opposed to the quad.
The single leg variation is one of our favorites because it doesn’t allow for one weaker side to hide under the stronger side.
Single leg glute bridges force both sides to complete hip extension and stabilize at the same time.
With the opposing hip flexed, we add in a more natural motion that mimics your running cycle.
Often people can complete a bilateral (both legs on the ground) glute bridge with full hip lock out but during single leg glute bridges, that same athlete has trouble locking out that hip.
We want to create that single leg extension and stability strength to minimize quad dominant running.
Make sure you hip looks like this
and NOT this.
Complete 3 sets of 10 reps.
exercise #2 - weighted version of exercise #1
Here we are using a jump stretch band but you can also use a moderate DB or KB on one leg to substitute.
Sometimes to get the glute strength to where we want it, we need to add in some weight bearing variations.
Again, with this being single leg versus a double leg glute bridge forces the one side to own extension and stabilization on its own just like it will have to in the gait cycle.
Same thing - make sure you are locking out that hip in full extension.
For this exercise, take the glute to just before failure as the glute max is a predominantly a slow twitch muscle.
So getting to that burning muscular endurance zone is good!
Complete 3 Sets to Max Effort/Almost Failure
exercise #3 - side box step down
After we do purely glute strengthening drills we like to reintegrate strength and activation into our gait cycle.
The simple side box step down is a great exercise to do just that! The box (or weights or any other elevated surface) doesn’t have to be too high. 4-6” will get you feeling that glute.
On the down portion be sure to keep the knee back behind the toes and tracking in a straight line with the foot.
From there, lightly tap your heel to the ground while staying in control.
Finally, drive up while thinking about driving through the ground and bring your other knee into the high knee position while locking out the bottom hip and knee.Here we are training the glute to own more of the concentric and eccentric portion of the gait cycle.
Complete 3 sets of 10 reps.
bonus* exercise - Banded Glute Death March
We love training the gluten in the standing extension position as we believe it carries over the best to our everyday movement.
So if you have the equipment available. Give this one a try.
Attach a weight belt to some bands, put on a weight vest or hold an object like a medicine ball in the front rack position and just march it out with some high knees until your tushy is burning. This is our side box step down amplified!
Complete Reps to Glute Failure
Don’t over obsess about glute development or strengthening and go down the rabbit hole and make it so other areas don’t stay structurally balanced and well developed.
Once or twice a week for a running warm up or lower body strength training day will get the job done to keep active and well developed glutes suited for running!
Plus you may take some load off of those knees in the process!
Garry Dubbs is the Co-Creator of ATH Fitness
His main objective in life is to increase people's physical capabilities to allow them to try and explore more things that are fun. If you can only walk, you’re not going to try many new things. But if you can be totally confident in your body’s capabilities, then you will make the world your playground. That’s why for a limited time, ATH is offering the Rugged Body Blueprint for FREE! It is a quick total mobility guide that is designed to make your body ready for anything! Just put your email in below and we will get you started on becoming an All Terrain Human, TODAY!