Hip Thrust Machine

Execution

1. Sit into the machine with your upper back against the pad, feet flat on the platform, and the hip pad sitting right at your hip crease.
2. Exhale and drive through your heels to push your hips up, until your body forms a straight line from shoulders to knees.
3. Squeeze the glutes hard at the top, without hyperextending the lower back to go higher.
4. Inhale and lower your hips back down under control, keeping the hip pad from sliding off your hip crease.
5. If you run out of strength, do not force another rep: lower your hips all the way so the pad settles onto the machine's bottom stop (flip the safety catch if the machine has one), then slide out from under the hip pad — never try to strip plates while you are still under it.
6. If the pad digs uncomfortably into your lower belly or your lower back hurts, end the set, reposition the pad or switch to a floor glute bridge.

Quick cues

• Hip pad right at the crease.
• Drive through your heels, not your toes.
• Stop at a straight line, don't hyperextend.
• Squeeze the glutes at the top.

Common faults

• Fault: Hyperextending the lower back at the top

  Fix: Stop at the point where the body forms a straight line from shoulders to knees, squeezing the glutes instead of arching for extra height.

• Fault: The hip pad sitting on the lower belly instead of the hip crease

  Fix: Reposition the pad right at the hip crease before adding weight; this is where all the load transmits.

• Fault: Pushing through the toes, causing the knees to cave in

  Fix: Shift the weight through the heels and drive the knees out toward the little toes.

• Fault: Dropping the hips fast and losing control at the bottom

  Fix: Lower over 2 seconds and ease into the bottom before driving up again.