This post may not be relevant for overweight readers. As a matter of fact, excess fat can hide atrophying glutes (buttocks) muscles by giving an impression of plumpness, especially in women. Needless to say that I do not recommend being overweight. However this post will become extremely relevant as soon as an overweight person will have lost significant weight as muscle weaknesses will become exposed.
figure more surely than a flat derrière. And in this case, no amount of dieting will help.
Strong glutes (the main muscles in your buttocks) are an essential asset for both males and females in the seduction game. Therefore (if one of your goals for being physically active is to retain your sex-appeal) glute muscles should be made a priority in every workout routine, all the more so as we age.
The problem of atrophied glutes has actually gotten worse in the last few decades as most of us spend at least 8 hours a day behind a screen or a TV. Nothing could be more detrimental to your glutes than seating idle for a long period of time.
Countering this deleterious sedentary lifestyle takes some medium to high intensity resistance training. Simply walking 30 minutes a day, while healthy, will do very little to tone your backside. Here is a few ideas for remedying weak glutes.
RESISTANCE TRAINING EXERCISES
Leg press
In my opinion, this is the mother of all resistance-based glutes exercises (except for squats see my prior post on the dangers of squats). If you should only do one thing for your glutes weekly, that would be it. There are different varieties of leg presses (fixed seat, sliding seat, vertical, horizontal)
but no matter which one you will use, the most critical thing is to go down (or bend your knees) far enough with each repetition. How would you know? A simple rule is to make sure than your thighs make approximately a right angle with your calves at the deepest point of the rep.
Squatting not deep enough hardly puts any stress on your glutes. How many times have I seen someone doing what she thought was leg presses while squatting at no more than a 45 degree-angle: this is a waste of time. You are much better off doing leg press at 90 degrees correctly with a lighter weight than trying to do more while going to shallow. Once again, form is much more important than weight.
Be careful though not to go overboard and squat too deep as this movement may be hazardous because more often than not you will have a tendency to arch your lower back.
Make sure that this does not happen by keeping it in constant contact with the seat back. Not doing so my cause severe back injuries.
Abductor press
The fact that leg abductors are a rarely used in everyday life (much like triceps for the arm) explains their rapid atrophy with age. It is thus essential to exercise them at least once a week with the abductor press.
With this machine in particular, you should start with a light weight and make sure you do not twist your back or take it off the seat back when performing the movement. Weight should be added on a weekly or bi-monthly basis after a few weeks. Once again: form is more important than how much plates you put on.
AEROBIC EXERCISES FOR GLUTES
Running is an obvious one for maintaining powerful glutes. It has two downsides though: because it consists only of a forward-backward movement it does not train abductors.
Second (I know a few of my readers are going to hate me for writing this) running, especially at a brisk pace, is not an ideal sport for a lot of people over 40 because of the excessive muscular skeletal stress it imposes on the body, especially on the knees and back. In other words, running is NOT a low-impact aerobic exercise.
Therefore I have a strong bias in favor of riding a bicycle, which, in addition to being much safer for your knees and back (if you do not fall off your bicycle) can put more stress on the glutes than running, especially if you never stand on the pedals when going uphill. But then again, there is no miracle: riding a bicycle at 10 mph on a flat road with a tail wind will not accomplish much for your glutes. A certain level of resistance is required to have any effect on muscle growth.
Playing soccer provides an even better workout for your glutes because they are very strongly sollicited when kicking the ball. I am a former soccer player. Never were my glutes more powerful than when I used to play soccer on a weekly basis. Having said that, soccer is not the ideal sport for those over 40 (violent contacts may cause frequent injuries to the knees and ankles).
Alpine skiing
For those of you who are downhill skiers, this is also a good sport for glutes, but contrary to cross-country skiing (see below) it mostly works in an isometric way, which makes it a bit less efficient. Note that the leg and abductor press mentioned above are unsurprisingly the best resistance exercises for preparing a ski season.
At any rate, while alpine skiing is a lot of fun, cross-country skiing is a healthier (better cardio workout) and less hazardous choice, especially for those over 40. Accidents still happen but are general much less serious than with downhill skiing.
The king of glutes sports
In my opinion the king of all sports for glutes is roller-blading and its winterly cousin cross country skiing (skating style). I wish I had had more opportunities to ski this past winter. But come spring, I roller-blade on a regular basis.
I can't think of any other aerobic exercise that combine a forward leg movement (glutes) with a lateral one (abductor/adductor) in such an efficient, low-impact manner.
One final word of caution: roller-blading can be a fairly dangerous sport if practiced recklessly, mainly because slowing down will never be as efficent as when running or riding a bicycle . If you want to learn to roller-blade, then take classes and never roller blade without the appropriate safety equipment (wrist- knee- elbow guards and a helmet).
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