Are you looking to grow your glutes? This 45-minute glute workout for women focuses on the best glute exercises to maximize your booty gains without spending hours in the gym.
Have you set a goal of building the butt of your dreams? Well, you’ve come to the right place.
This 45-minute glute workout for women is specifically designed with the best glute exercises for growth so that you can build stronger more powerful glutes in just 45 minutes per workout.
Glutes are the largest muscle in the body meaning that it takes intentional and consistent effort to start seeing gains.
The secret? Stick to a routine that focuses on the best compound glute movements, perfect your form and progressively add more weight week after week to gain strength and confidence.
In this guide, we’ll go through the key exercises for glute growth, how to perform them properly, and exactly which muscles they target. Plus, we’ll be spilling the tea on additional tips & tricks to help you in your perfect peach journey.
Contents
- The Science Behind Glute Growth
- The Anatomy of the Glutes: The Main Muscle Groups
- The Ultimate 45-Minute Glute Workout for Women
- Final Thoughts
The Science Behind Glute Growth
There’s so much misinformation out there when it comes to growing your peach. Influencers and celebrity trainers preach bodyweight and resistance band workouts, but when it comes to maximizing glute growth, there’s only one way to do it: progressive overload.
To grow a bigger butt, you need to build stronger glute muscles. And in order to get stronger, you need to continually push your muscle strength to its limit.
This is called progressive overload and it’s all about building strength slowly over time.
The best way to accomplish this is through consistent strength training workouts where you practice the same exercises week after week, slowly adding repetitions or weight to push yourself to your limit, and set new personal records.
The glute workout for women shared here is a simple 45-minute routine that includes 5 targeted exercises. For best results, we recommend repeating this workout 2 to 3 times per week. Each week either do more reps or add extra weight.
You should take it at your own pace, and never go further than your limit and risk injury but if your goal is gains, then slowly getting stronger and stronger is the way to do it.
The Anatomy of the Glutes: The Main Muscle Groups
In order to be effective in growing your glutes, you need to make sure that you are targeting the right muscles, and to do that, we first need a short anatomy lesson.
There are three main muscles that make up the glutes and together they support our movement, stability, and strength.
Here’s a breakdown of the three main muscles in your glutes:
- Gluteus Maximus: The gluteus maximus is the largest (and most powerful) muscle in the whole body. It’s responsible for all kinds of movements from thrusting to external rotation. It’s also the muscle that creates that round shape of the butt.
- Gluteus Medius: The gluteus medius is on the side of the hip and is mainly responsible for stabilization and abduction. By targeting this muscle, you can enhance the rounded shape of your glutes and even possibly reduce hip dips (though your anatomy plays a much larger role in this!)
- Gluteus Minimus: The smallest of the three muscles, the gluteus minimus stabilizes the pelvis and assists with internal rotation of the hip. It doesn’t play a large role in size but it helps to ensure proper form.
When aiming for growth, training the gluteus maximus is the priority. However, the smaller muscles will also engage during the compound movements helping to improve stability and prevent injuries.
The Ultimate 45-Minute Glute Workout for Women
Warm-Up (5 Minutes)
When it comes to lifting heavy, ensuring you are properly warmed up is essential to having good form and avoiding injury. Just imagine you’re four weeks into your perfect peach journey and an injury takes you out for the foreseeable future. Before you know it all your gains are gone and you’re back to where you started.
No. No. No.
This 5-minute warm-up routine is designed to activate your glutes and get them warmed up for the heavy lifting ahead.
- 2×10 Bodyweight Glute Bridges
- 2×10 Banded Clamshells
- 2×10 Banded Lateral Walks
- World’s Greatest Stretch with Hip Opener (30 seconds per side)
Together, these exercises wake up all three main glute muscle groups as well as slowly raising your heart rate and getting your body warmed up.
Strength Training (35 Minutes)
This section is the meat of your workout and it’s where the magic happens. It includes the 5 best compound movements for glute growth and is designed to target all three glute muscles so that you can build strength and size.
1. Barbell Hip Thrusts (4 Sets x 8-12 Reps)
The hip thrust is the main movement when it comes to building glute strength. It’s the most pure form of hip hip extension meaning that it engages the glute maximus more than any other exercise. This isolation allows for high weight training making it the ultimate booty building exercise.
How To Perform It: Find an area with enough space for a bench and a barbell. There might already be one set-up in your gym. Sit on the floor and position yourself so that your bra line is in contact with the bench behind you. Pull the barbell over your legs to that it rests across your hips.
Then plant your feet hip-width apart so that when you fully lift your hips your quads and shins form a 90-degree angle.
To perform one rep, drive through your heels and push your hips up until your upper body forms a straight line from your shoulders to your knees. Ensure that your core is braced. Keep this core contraction as you lower your hips until you almost return to your starting position. Ideally, you should lower as far as you can without curving your lower back.
Form Tip: Keep your chin tucked into your chest, shins perpendicular to the floor, and focus your mind-muscle connection by squeezing your glutes and bracing your core.
BTW, Brett Contreras is the foremost expert when it comes to glute growth. He’s been researching and studying the topic for over 10 years and trains many of the world’s fittest people. When possible, we’ll include his videos on technique and form so you can learn from the expert himself.
2. Bulgarian Split Squats (3 Sets x 10-12 Reps)
In every lower body routine, it’s super important to include a unilateral movement or a movement that is performed on each leg. It helps to build stability and ensure a balance between both legs. Bulgarian Split Squats are a super intense workout that targets the glutes and also gets the heart pumping.
How To Perform It: All you need for this exercise is a bench. Start by sitting on the bench and extending both legs in a straight line to the floor in front of you. Where your feet land is also where your working leg should be planted when you perform the exercise.
So from the position, plant one foot and extend the other leg behind you so that your foot is resting on the bench.
Keep your torso slightly leaned forward as you lower your back knee down to the floor while driving through your front foot.
Form Tip: This exercise is a killer so start with bodyweight and slowly build up the weight with a dumbbell in each hand.
3. Kettlebell Romanian Deadlifts (3 Sets x 8-12 Reps)
Deadlifts are an essential movement when it comes to targeting the glutes. There are all kinds of variations but one of the most classic versions is the kettlebell Romanian Deadlift. It follows a very similar movement pattern to the hip thrust but in a standing position.
How To Perform It: Hold a kettlebell in each hand and stand in a straight-up standing position with a slight bend in your knees.
Slowly hinge forward dragging the kettlebells down your quads and shins while pushing your butt back and hinging at the hips. When you feel a stretch in your hamstrings, drive through your heels to return to a standing position.
Form Tip: Keep your back straight and your core braced. Keep your focus on moving your hips back toward the wall behind you instead of down as you would in a squat.
PS – We find kettlebells more comfortable but dumbbells work just as well.
4. Cable Kickbacks (2 Sets of 12-15 Reps per Side)
To isolate the glutes for a great finishing exercise, we recommend a couple of sets of cable kickbacks. They are a great higher-volume exercise to fatigue the glutes fully at the end of your workout.
How To Perform It: Attach an ankle strap to each ankle and turn to face the cable machine. Slide the cable to the lowest position and attach the hook to your ankle strap.
You can bend forward slightly to hold onto the machine for added balance and support. Extend your working leg behind you in a slow controlled motion. Focus on squeezing the glutes for an extra second at the top of the movement. Slowly return to the starting position and keep repeating.
Form Tip: Keep your torso upright and brace your core to avoid putting stress on your lower back. When focusing on the mind-muscle connection, visualize squeezing the glute and not the hamstring.
5. Glute Hyperextensions (2 Sets of 15-20 Reps)
To finish your workout, you’ll do two sets of glute hyperextensions which are a great burnout exercise for the glutes and also help to strengthen the back and core.
How To Perform It: Set up the hyperextension bench so that the pad ends just below your hip bones. Brace your core and slowly hinge forward while keeping your back straight. Once you reach about 45 degrees squeeze your glutes to return to the starting position.
Form Tip: Focus on your glutes and keep your core braces and back straight. As you get stronger you can hold a dumbbell or plate for added resistance.
Cool-Down (5 Minutes)
If you did this glute workout routine correctly, you are going to wake up feeling super sore and tight the next day. That’s why it’s essential to take a couple of minutes to stretch out your muscles to aid in recovery and prevent injuries.
- Pigeon Pose (1 Minute Per Side)
- Seated Forward Fold with Crossed Legs (30 Seconds Per Side)
- Hip Flexor Stretch (1 Minute Per Side)
And you’re done! Time to enjoy the endorphins and refuel your body with protein and hydration.
Final Thoughts
If your goal is to grow your glutes, the name of the game is progressive overload doing compound movements that target the gluteus maximus.
This 45-minute glute workout for women focuses on combining the most effective compound movements for glute growth so that you can make gains without spending hours in the gym.
We recommend completing the routine 2 to 3 times per week for at least 6 weeks. Because the glutes are such a large muscle, it takes consistency and time before you’ll see significant changes.
For some, this can mean two to three months while for others it can take closer to a year to get the results you’re after.
But with each workout, your strength and confidence will grow.
With love,
A small note to my readers โ Over here at VLHhealth, we occasionally include affiliate links in our posts. This means that if you purchase using our links, we will earn a small commission at no extra cost to you.
Other Posts Related to Deep Core Exercise:
- The 7 Best Deep Core Exercise Moves For a Smaller Waist
- 9 Gym Workout Tips To Take You From Beginner to Badass
- The 10 Best Somatic Exercises to Release Trauma
Leave a Reply