Glute Building Workout Plan PDF
February 07, 2024
So, you’ve been on a mission to grow your booty. You’ve tried countless influencer workouts, but none have yielded any real results.
The thing is, these workouts perform well on social media and get lots of likes and comments because they look cool – but in reality, they don’t do much for glute growth.
So you’re left wondering whether you’re destined to always have a flat butt.
Well, we’re here to tell you this isn’t the case, and we can help you.
Our 6-week glute-building workout plan PDF is here to challenge and force the glutes into new growth. The program has been designed to follow each of the glute-building training principles so that you can grow the glutes as efficiently as possible and add some noticeable size to the rear.
Let’s get into it!
Download Glute Building Workout Plan PDF
| Table of Contents |
| 10 steps to growing the glutes |
| Glute building workout plan pdf |
| What’s next for glute building |
| Final thoughts |
How To Grow The Glutes
We’re going to be cheeky here and still our facts from our recently published article “How to grow the glutes, Backed by science”. This article is over 4000 words long and covers both the training and nutrition principles you need to follow to add some size to the butt, all backed up by reputable research studies.
Today we’ll touch on each point briefly, but we recommend reading the guide mentioned above for the full explanation.
1. Chose The Best Exercises
When training to add size to the butt, it’s imperative we utilise the best exercises.
70% of our workout should be focused on heavy compound movements like your squats, hip thrusts and lunges and the remaining 30% should be focused on isolation exercises eg. Seated Hip Abduction and Glute kickbacks.
Keep the compound exercises at the start of your workout as when you’re fresh and have the most energy as these are the key exercises that add mass to the ass’.
2. Progressive Overload is Key
If you’re not familiar with the term ‘Progressive overload’ it simply means that you need to make your workouts more difficult each week.
Our bodies are adaptive in nature. When you introduce a new stimulus (A workout) the body will adapt to be able to meet the demands of the workout. This adaptation will come in the form of strength and size gains.
If we do not continually push the boundaries, the body will no longer see a reason to adapt, and our progress will grind to a halt.
Continual progression is therefore needed for continued progress.
The easiest way to implement said progression over the 6-week training plan is by using rep ranges. Don’t worry if you’re not familiar with the concept of rep ranges, we have gone over it in detail just under the workout section towards the end of the article.
3. Moderate Rep Range for the Win
Research has shown that you can build muscle using heavy weights, and you can also build muscle using lighter weights – so which should we choose?
We recommend sticking within the moderate rep range ie. 6-15 reps for most exercises.
The reason being is that when using heavy weights you’ll increase your risk of injury, and when using lighter weights you’ll need to perform additional reps which adds to the duration of your workout.
Moderate reps are therefore a good balance between the two.
4. Don’t Overdo the Volume
Contrary to the belief of some people, muscles aren’t built in the gym, they’re broken down when you’re working out and built when you’re resting.
Lifting weights causes microscopic tears in your muscle fibres. It’s during the times of rest that your muscles repair and rebuild themselves to become stronger and thicker. If you don’t allow enough time for recovery then you may be sacrificing the rebuild time which can have a negative effect on muscle building.
Going over the top on volume would significantly increase our recovery times. It’s therefore recommended that we stick to between 10-20 weekly sets per muscle group to prevent overtraining.
5. Don’t Fail On Every Set
You may think that to get the most out of your workouts you need to be pushing yourself to failure on every set – I mean “No pain, No gain” right?
Wrong.
There’s no need to push yourself to failure on every single set. Aside from the obvious safety implications, training to failure on every set is not necessary for muscle growth.
Keeping 2-4 reps away from failure has been found to provide comparable levels of motor unit recruitment and muscle protein synthesis as taking sets to failure. In other words, stopping sets 2-4 reps away from failure is enough to promote a hypertrophic response.
Plus, taking sets to muscular failure increases muscle damage, which increases recovery time and could hurt your following workouts.
6. Twice A Week is Best
In note 4 we learned that 10-20 weekly sets per muscle is optimum for muscle hypertrophy. What we didn’t discuss was whether we should bang these out in one session or split them amongst multiple sessions.
Well, researcher James Krieger notes that performing over 6-10 hard sets on one muscle group has no additional benefit regarding muscle building.
For that reason, we suggest splitting your weekly glute volume up into 2 sessions – and that’s exactly what we have done with this workout plan.
This way there will be no ‘Junk Volume’ and all sets should have a positive impact on building the booty.
7. Stick to a Routine
Sticking to a routine shouldn’t be underestimated. A routine is the best way to implement progressive overload. It allows you to look back at the previous workouts and have an idea of how many reps (or additional reps) you should be aiming for in this workout.
Not sticking to a routine and changing up our workouts willy-nilly makes it difficult to implement progressive overload, which is obviously not ideal as Progressive overload is a key driver of muscle hypertrophy.
On the other hand, we don’t want to stick to the same routine for too long. As we mentioned earlier, the body is an adaptive force and it will soon adapt to cope with the same workouts. That’s why we recommend sticking to the plan for 6 weeks and substituting some of the exercises for alternative glute-building exercises.
8. Calorie Surplus for Muscle Building
The most important nutrition principle when it comes to building the glutes or building any other muscle for that matter is eating in a calorie surplus.
A calorie surplus is when you eat more calories than you burn on a daily basis. This provides the body with the energy it needs to maximise muscle growth.
Failure to eat in a calorie surplus will mean failure to build muscle – it’s that simple.
You could be optimising every area of your training, but if you’re not eating enough – then you won’t build muscle (well this is true for 99% of people, there are rare exceptions).
We recommend an additional 200-400 calories on top of your maintenance calories each day to aid with the muscle-building process. To find out exactly how much you should be eating to build the butt – check out “How much should I be eating to build muscle?”.
9. Eat Protein
Protein is the key macronutrient for muscle building. Yes, carbohydrates and fats are also important, but protein is king.
During our workouts, our muscles are broken down. The role of protein is to repair and rebuild muscle tissue.
Failing to eat adequate amounts of protein will result in sub-optimal gains.
Research suggests that we should be consuming between 0.7-1g of protein per LB of body weight (1.6-2.2g per KG) each day to maximise potential muscle building.
Opting for a complete protein source is advisable as these have a complete amino acid profile. Complete protein sources are mainly animal products such as Beef, Chicken, Turkey, Dairy etc.
Alternatively, if you follow a vegan diet, it’s a good idea to consume varied protein sources so that over the course of the day you ingest enough of each of the 9 essential amino acids.
If you’d like to learn more about protein, complete proteins and amino acids we recommend the in-depth article “How to build the glutes: Backed By Science.
10. Utilise Supplements
The truth is, you don’t need supplements to build muscle – but they can help. As the name suggests, you should use supplements to “supplement” your diet.
The first supplement worth considering is protein powder. As we mentioned above, protein is the key macronutrient that builds muscle.
Eating for muscle growth requires us to eat a fairly large amount of protein daily. Each such quantity is not always easy for some people, so turning to a shake can help you on your way to hitting your daily protein goals.
A typical serving of protein powder can deliver over 20 grams of protein which is comparable to a tin of tuna.
A protein supplement is also super convenient. Say you’re at work, or driving a long-distance journey, you can’t exactly whip out a Tuna jacket potato and start munching on it – but you could probably have a protein shake hassle-free.
Lastly, protein shakes are affordable. Depending on which brand you opt for, a typical serving can cost less than $0.85/£0.50. That’s a fraction of the price that you’d spend on the alternative.
To see what other supplements are worth considering, check out the "The best supplements for building muscle".
Glute Building Workout Plan (With PDF)
The following 2 glute/lower body workouts have been designed to incorporate the training principles we have learned above.
Both workouts should be performed each week, leaving 2-3 days between each workout to allow enough time for recovery. On these days you can hit your upper body or utilise a rest day. Between 3-5 training sessions a week is considered optimum for most people.
Each of the workouts heavily targets the glutes, but you’ll also be hitting the entire lower body including the quads, hamstrings, and calves. This has been done on purpose, remember point 6? Basically, dedicating a whole workout to one muscle group is unnecessary.
Remember, before any workout, a thorough warm-up is essential. And when it comes to glute training, it’s worth considering a glute activation routine before we start with the big weights.
Glute Workout 1
|
Exercise |
Number of Sets |
Number of reps |
|
Squats |
4 |
6-8 |
|
4 |
8-10 |
|
|
4 |
8-10 Each leg |
|
|
Leg Extension |
3 |
12-15 |
|
Glute Kickback |
3 |
10-12 Each leg |
|
Smith Machine Calf Raise |
3 |
12-15 |
Glute Workout 2
|
Exercise |
Number of Sets |
Number of reps |
|
Front Squats |
4 |
6-8 |
|
4 |
8-10 |
|
|
4 |
10-12 |
|
|
Leg Curl |
3 |
10-12 |
|
Seated Abductor Machine |
3 |
12-15 |
|
Calf Raise Machine |
3 |
12-15 |
Download Glute Building Workout Plan PDF
Rep Ranges
As discussed earlier on in the article, rep ranges are an ideal way to implement progressive overload. If you’re not familiar with using rep ranges then have a look at the following example:
Looking at the first exercises in workout 1, we have Squats for 4 sets of 6-8 reps.
Here we should start with a weight that allows us to perform 8 reps on the first set. As we work our way through the sets and our muscles begin to tire, you’ll likely no longer be able to perform 8 reps in each of the 4 sets. Your reps may look something like this: Set 1 = 8 reps, Set 2 = 7 reps, Set 3 = 7 reps, Set 4 = 6 reps.
This is good, we’re working within the rep range.
The goal for the following weeks is to perform more reps. Once we hit the higher rep range number (in this example it would be 8 reps) for the required amount of sets (in this case it would be 4 sets, then it’s time to increase the weight we’re using.
The cycle then continues. Upping the weight will likely see us drop back down to 6-7 reps for each set. Over the next few weeks, try and progress these numbers so that you can increase the weight again.
What Next For Glute Building?
So, what happens after the 6-week program is up? Does that mean we’re finished with our glute workouts?
Not so fast.
Depending on your training status, you can expect to see some results after 6 weeks – maybe a couple of inches depending on your genetics. But for a complete butt transformation, we’re probably looking between 1-2 years to build your dream derriere.
Wow, that’s some time.
You’re right, it is, but nothing worth having comes easy.
So, in answer to the question – we need to keep working out to continue our glute-building progress.
After the 6-week program is done, we recommend changing up the exercises. To build a well-rounded butt we need to be hitting the glutes from different angles and different planes of motion.
No one exercise can build a complete backside, so we need to utilise other exercises. When swapping in/out exercises a good rule of thumb is to stick with the bread-and-butter compound glute movements (Hip thrusts, squats, lunges etc) but change some of the smaller isolation movements (leg extensions, glute kickback, abductor machine etc).
We can also re-jig the order in which exercises are performed so that different exercises can benefit from being the first exercise in the workout where we’re fresh and have the most energy.
If you’re stuck for exercise ideas, check out “The 10 best exercises for a bigger butt” for some inspiration.
Final Thoughts
There we have it, our 6-week glute-building workout plan backed by science. Stay dedicated in the gym and consistent with your diet and you’ll be rewarded with booty gains.
Once the 6-weeks are up, it’s not time to stop! As we mentioned, swap some of the exercises and continue with your glute-building journey! Be sure to monitor your progress with pictures so you can look back at where you started to see how far you’ve come – enjoy!
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Thomas D
Author
Thomas is a dedicated fitness enthusiast with over 12 years of experience in the gym. As a level 2 qualified gym instructor, he combines his passion for working out and nutrition to help others achieve their fitness goals. Thomas stays up to date with the latest fitness research and follows the work of top experts in the field. With a balance of textbook knowledge and real-life experience, he provides practical guidance to help others reach their full potential.