I’m always teaching my clients how important it is to have a decent sized, functional butt.

Not having good glute (butt) muscles affects our posture and can often be the cause of back, hip, knee and even glute pain.

Many of us sit for long hours a day which can sometimes make the glutes inactive, lazy and often athrophy (muscles shrink in size).

Having a good working, strong and muscular bottom will help support the lower back and hip joints, therefore keeping the knee joints in alignment and helping us to walk properly.

We have multiple muscles that make up the glutes. They are glute max, min, med and the deep lateral rotators.

We really need a good, strong glute max – our biggest butt muscle. 

It helps us to stay upright and differentiates us from other primates. It also helps us when we walk by extending our hip, giving us the power to push our body forward as we push our leg through. 

The glute max sits between where the hamstring meets the bottom (in the crease) and goes up towards the lower back.

The glute medius and glute minimus muscles are located at the side of our hip. They help to open our leg to the side (abduct) and stabilise us when standing on one leg, stopping our hip swinging or dropping out to the side too much.

The deep lateral rotators help us to laterally rotate our legs. This means turn them out to the side, e.g. when you’re sitting crossed legged on the floor knees open, or getting out of a car, the first leg that opens out uses these muscles.

All of these glute muscles help to stabilise our hips, pelvis and back, therefore it is vital these muscles are in good working order.

Ideally we want to practice different types of glute exercises to ensure we stay strong in all the muscles.

On this note, it’s good to be aware that squats are not always the answer to strengthening your glutes. If your glutes are not active and the muscles are not firing well, then squats will not be effective. I will be going deeper into this topic in a future blog.

I have a great tutorial for learning how to activate your glutes correctly in my ==> Core Fit Club Membership.

Please try out try out a free glute focus workout here ==> Free Glute class

Password is ‘Glutes’

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