Glute Ham Raise

Muscles worked

The prime movers are the hamstrings, which extend the hip and bend the knee, frequently at both joints in the same repetition.

Because more than one joint is moving, the work does not stay in one place: the calves control the ankle and hold the heel position; the glutes finish hip extension.

Every exercise for:HamstringsCalvesGlutes

How this movement works

The load travels toward you and several joints bend to bring it there. The arms finish work the back starts, so grip and elbow flexors sit in the path of every repetition: when people stall on a compound pull, it is more often the hands giving out than the primary muscle running out of force.

It is filed under powerlifting — the squat, bench and deadlift family and their accessory work. Technique is judged by whether it survives a near-maximal single, not merely by whether the weight moves.

What you need

The machine fixes the path, removing the balance demand and letting you train close to failure without a spotter. The cost is the stabilising work a free weight would have made you do.

Every exercise using:Machine

These train the hamstrings too, using equipment this one does not:

• Good Morningbarbell
• Hamstring-SMRfoam roll
• Inchwormbody only
• Kettlebell Dead Cleankettlebell
• Stiff-Legged Dumbbell Deadliftdumbbell

Difficulty

Listed at intermediate level. It assumes you already own the underlying pattern and can hold position under load — if the position breaks before the target muscle tires, drop back to a beginner variation until it does not.

Of the 86 hamstrings exercises in this database, 35 are listed at intermediate level.