Rich Gaspari
Rich Gaspari has been involved in the bodybuilding and fitness field for more than 30 years. He excelled as a top professional bodybuilder from the mid ’80s through the ’90s, winning the very first Arnold Classic in 1989, Mr. America (now known as the NPC Nationals), Mr. Universe, Professional Mr. World, and is a three-time runner-up for the most coveted title in professional bodybuilding: Mr. Olympia. After retiring from professional bodybuilding, Rich began developing his own line of quality supplements and built one of the most formidable and respected brands in the world, Gaspari Nutrition.
A glute building workout plan you can do in the gym or at home.
Very often I’m asked for a glute building workout plan. For better or worse, one of the things I’m most known for is my ass. I was the first pro bodybuilder to bring striated glutes to the Olympia stage. Since then, lifters – guys and girls – who want to know how to strengthen glutes come to me for their glute building workout plan. Now that the Covid thing has driven a spike in the gym business, a lot of people have gotten used to working out at home, with limited equipment. So, now, people coming to me for a glute building workout plan want to know how to build glutes at home.
In theory, the glute building workout plan is the same whether your training in a gym or building your glutes at home. And, while it would be nice to have a squat rack, a smith machine, a leg press, extension and curl machines in your home gym, most of us are not so fortunate. For us, there’s the dumbbell glute workout. I’d say it’s the best way to build glutes at home without anything more than a flat bench and a few pairs of dumbbells in varying weight – or, you can get an adjustable set of dumbbells. These are great for people with limited space because adjustable dumbbells occupy a very small footprint.
Using this simple combination we can come up with the following exercises for your dumbbell glute workout:
- Walking Lunges
- Reverse lunges
- DB Squats
- DB Stiff Leg Deadlift
- DB Sumo/ Plié Squat
- Lying leg curl
- DB Hip Thruster
Using these exercises, this is the glute building workout plan I’d do at home.
Start with a big compound movement first, such as dumbbell squats or Sumo/ plié squats (alternate one with the other each workout).
Start light and do five – six sets, adding weight each set. Obviously, even with the most aggressive home dumbbell rack, you’re likely to run out of weight long before you run out of reps. However, even if the volume is high, you can still keep your form tight and crank out some seriously intense, muscle building, reps. See how far you can push yourself every set.
The next big move you can do for your glutes and your hamstrings, is the stiff leg dead lift. Once again, your strength will likely exceed your heaviest dumbbells. So, strict form, high volume and searing intensity for as many reps as you can get for four – five sets.
Now you can pick either walking lunges or reverse lunges (alternate one with the other each workout). I was the first bodybuilder to incorporate lunges into his glute building workout plan. Everyone thought they were a girl exercise – same goes for hip thrusters (which you’ll do next). But, the day after I walked across the Olympia stage with deep striations in my glutes, everyone started doing them. A new standard had been set. These days, striated Glutes are expected. So, get used to doing lunges.
For either reverse or walking lunges, you’ll hold the DBs down at your sides. Pick a weight where you can grind out 20 – 30 steps on each leg.
Finish off with either hip thrusters or DB hamstring curls (alternate one with the other each workout). For the hip thrusters, support your upper back against the bench and hold the dumbbell in your lap with your feet out in front of you, perpendicular to the bench. For the DB curls, lay face down on the bench – or the floor – grip a dumbbell between your feet and curl it up slowly with strict form. Same goes for the hip thrusters. These are finishing exercises and are meant to be done as strict as possible with as much volume as possible. So, a nice manageable weight and lots and lots of reps for three- four sets.
That should do it. This is a great dumbbell glute workout that can be done either at the gym, or it can be an effective answer to how to build glutes at home.
