8 Exercises That Will Strengthen Your Hamstring Like Crazy
We’ve all heard sportsmen straining their hamstring and some of them even missing out on their games due to this. But what is this hamstring? And what can you do to keep your hamstring away from this strain? Hamstrings are the muscles in the back of the upper thigh which connect the knee, the upper thigh and the pelvis.
They play an essential part in controlling our basic movements like walking and running. This makes it very important for one to prevent them from any strains or tears. This can be done by keeping your hamstring flexible by doing hamstring exercises. Moreover, keeping them strong will only help you move better, and also make your thighs look big and enable you to better fill up your denims, chinos, joggers, pants or shorts.
8 Best Hamstring Exercises
Here are some of the exercises for hamstrings that will keep them flexible and strong:
1. Walking Lunges
A very good beginner exercise, the walking lunges are one of those exercises for hamstring which can be used to warm up your body. The walking lunges involve you standing straight and then bending both your knees, with one knee parallel to the ground, and the other perpendicular to it. If you wish to add on some weights to this exercise, lift some dumbbells while doing these walking lunges. This added level of difficulty exercises your hamstring better.
2. Glute Bridge
This is one of the easiest and probably the best hamstring workout to begin your workout session with. The glute bridge exercise involves the person lying straight on their back with your legs bent at the knees and then pushing your hips and abdomen upwards towards the roof and your arms remain on the floor,
The glute bridge is another good warmup exercise for you to do before you move on to more strenuous hamstring exercises. This exercise involves your hamstring muscles to sustain the weight and the effort required to make the upwards movement, holding it for a few seconds, and the movement back to the floor.
3. Single-leg Glute Bridge
Very similar to the glute bridge, in terms of the movements involved in the exercises, and also the effects that have on the hamstring. Another good warming up hamstring workout, it consists of lifting one leg with you straight when you thrust your abdomen and pelvis upwards. This exercise causes a little more stress on your hamstrings, as one leg bears the weight in this; unlike the standard glute bridge where both the legs together bear the pain and stress.
4. Bench Hip Thrust
The bench hip thrust is quite similar to the glute bridge, except that instead of lying on your back on the floor, you are supposed to rest your shoulder or upper torso on a bench. Here too, it is your own bodyweight that is going to cause the pressure on your thighs. This up and down movement of the hips with the weight being borne by the knees and feet, it is your hamstring muscles that carry that weight into these joints.
Another variant of this is the Single-leg Bench Hip Thrust., which has a little added difficulty added to it. This added level of stress on the hamstring is when only one leg is used to sustain the entire weight of your body. These hamstring exercises repeatedly stretch and relax your hamstrings, making them flexible and strong over time.
5. Romanian Deadlift
The Romanian deadlift or the stiff leg deadlift is ideal for those looking to strengthen and thicken their thighs. This is because the weight that you lift up in your deadlift is borne by your legs; and in the Romanian variant, the knee is not strained upon and so the lift is borne by your upper thigh and the pelvis.
This means that it is the hamstring that is being used. This hamstring workout can be adjusted according to how new you are to the exercise, and the weight can be increased according to when you are ready and how much you want to bulk up your hamstring.
6. Kettlebell Swings
When you look at them at surface level, this exercise might not look like it’s one of the exercises for hamstrings. However, once you start doing them, you realize where the pressure is exerted at. It’s your hamstrings! The swinging of the kettlebell requires you to control the movement of its weight, and that too with the help of your leg strength. This hamstring workout can
7. Back Squats
Deep squats but with weights on the back of your shoulders are what a back squat involves. If your squats are shallow, then this exercise will not help your hamstrings to become strong and flexible. Deep squats will help create muscular legs with strong hamstrings, thus, very good exercises for hamstring exercises. Back squats are also referred to as compound exercises as they work on multiple muscles at the same time.
8. Lying Leg Curl
If you have made it to the end of this article, you deserve a treat! This hamstring workout is probably the easiest of the hamstring exercises. One reason being that the exercise only exercises the hamstring muscles and the rest of your muscles can essentially relax here. You are supposed to lie down flat on your stomach on the lying leg curl machine, and slowly and consistently raise your legs lower legs and then take them down.
Repeating this hamstring exercises works on the upper thigh which requires you to pull and relax the lower leg. It might seem like it does not benefit you a lot, when in fact it really does. This is probably even a better warm-up that the walking lunges that we mentioned at the beginning of this article.
Now that we have listed these 8 best hamstring exercises, and that you have reached the end, it’s time for you to take some of them up and add on to your workout routine. As we mentioned in the beginning, not only are strong hamstrings important for your daily movements and body flexibility, they also are very attractive! Hopefully, that motivated you.
8 Exercises That Will Strengthen Your Hamstring Like Crazy
We’ve all heard sportsmen straining their hamstring and some of them even missing out on their games due to this. But what is this hamstring? And what can you do to keep your hamstring away from this strain? Hamstrings are the muscles in the back of the upper thigh which connect the knee, the upper thigh and the pelvis.
They play an essential part in controlling our basic movements like walking and running. This makes it very important for one to prevent them from any strains or tears. This can be done by keeping your hamstring flexible by doing hamstring exercises. Moreover, keeping them strong will only help you move better, and also make your thighs look big and enable you to better fill up your denims, chinos, joggers, pants or shorts.
8 Best Hamstring Exercises
Here are some of the exercises for hamstrings that will keep them flexible and strong:
1. Walking Lunges
A very good beginner exercise, the walking lunges are one of those exercises for hamstring which can be used to warm up your body. The walking lunges involve you standing straight and then bending both your knees, with one knee parallel to the ground, and the other perpendicular to it. If you wish to add on some weights to this exercise, lift some dumbbells while doing these walking lunges. This added level of difficulty exercises your hamstring better.
2. Glute Bridge
This is one of the easiest and probably the best hamstring workout to begin your workout session with. The glute bridge exercise involves the person lying straight on their back with your legs bent at the knees and then pushing your hips and abdomen upwards towards the roof and your arms remain on the floor,
The glute bridge is another good warmup exercise for you to do before you move on to more strenuous hamstring exercises. This exercise involves your hamstring muscles to sustain the weight and the effort required to make the upwards movement, holding it for a few seconds, and the movement back to the floor.
3. Single-leg Glute Bridge
Very similar to the glute bridge, in terms of the movements involved in the exercises, and also the effects that have on the hamstring. Another good warming up hamstring workout, it consists of lifting one leg with you straight when you thrust your abdomen and pelvis upwards. This exercise causes a little more stress on your hamstrings, as one leg bears the weight in this; unlike the standard glute bridge where both the legs together bear the pain and stress.
4. Bench Hip Thrust
The bench hip thrust is quite similar to the glute bridge, except that instead of lying on your back on the floor, you are supposed to rest your shoulder or upper torso on a bench. Here too, it is your own bodyweight that is going to cause the pressure on your thighs. This up and down movement of the hips with the weight being borne by the knees and feet, it is your hamstring muscles that carry that weight into these joints.
Another variant of this is the Single-leg Bench Hip Thrust., which has a little added difficulty added to it. This added level of stress on the hamstring is when only one leg is used to sustain the entire weight of your body. These hamstring exercises repeatedly stretch and relax your hamstrings, making them flexible and strong over time.
5. Romanian Deadlift
The Romanian deadlift or the stiff leg deadlift is ideal for those looking to strengthen and thicken their thighs. This is because the weight that you lift up in your deadlift is borne by your legs; and in the Romanian variant, the knee is not strained upon and so the lift is borne by your upper thigh and the pelvis.
This means that it is the hamstring that is being used. This hamstring workout can be adjusted according to how new you are to the exercise, and the weight can be increased according to when you are ready and how much you want to bulk up your hamstring.
6. Kettlebell Swings
When you look at them at surface level, this exercise might not look like it’s one of the exercises for hamstrings. However, once you start doing them, you realize where the pressure is exerted at. It’s your hamstrings! The swinging of the kettlebell requires you to control the movement of its weight, and that too with the help of your leg strength. This hamstring workout can
7. Back Squats
Deep squats but with weights on the back of your shoulders are what a back squat involves. If your squats are shallow, then this exercise will not help your hamstrings to become strong and flexible. Deep squats will help create muscular legs with strong hamstrings, thus, very good exercises for hamstring exercises. Back squats are also referred to as compound exercises as they work on multiple muscles at the same time.
8. Lying Leg Curl
If you have made it to the end of this article, you deserve a treat! This hamstring workout is probably the easiest of the hamstring exercises. One reason being that the exercise only exercises the hamstring muscles and the rest of your muscles can essentially relax here. You are supposed to lie down flat on your stomach on the lying leg curl machine, and slowly and consistently raise your legs lower legs and then take them down.
Repeating this hamstring exercises works on the upper thigh which requires you to pull and relax the lower leg. It might seem like it does not benefit you a lot, when in fact it really does. This is probably even a better warm-up that the walking lunges that we mentioned at the beginning of this article.
Now that we have listed these 8 best hamstring exercises, and that you have reached the end, it’s time for you to take some of them up and add on to your workout routine. As we mentioned in the beginning, not only are strong hamstrings important for your daily movements and body flexibility, they also are very attractive! Hopefully, that motivated you.