Can squats or lunges make your butt bigger?

 If you look for the best exercises to make your butt bigger you will get many suggestions, and sure there are a great number of good butt exercises. But which ones are the best? Squats and Lunges are often mentioned to be among the most effective butt exercises around but Can squats or lunges make your butt bigger or should you quit doing them altogether and  find other butt building exercises instead? Well, we'll take a look at the squat and lunges and what these exercises do for your lower body.

 

 

Lets start with the squat. The squat is a classic strength and muscle building exercise. The squats is performed by a great number of athletes such as body builders, power lifters, sprinters, fitness people and all kind of sport people who work out in the gym. 

The Squat is a basic exercise which train all of lower body at the same time. Thus working the hamstrings, thighs, calves and Buttocks at the same time. It is said that the Squat makes your whole body grow and give you both volume and strength and therefore it is a very popular exercise.

However, does it really make your glutes bigger? It certainly puts some strain on your booty and it makes it firmer but if your aim is to make your booty look bigger is it a good exercise for this purpose? Yes and No and here comes the explanation. The squat does train your booty and propably makes it a little bigger as well, but the main purpose of the squat is to train your thighs. 

Your thighs are doing most of the work and they will grow the most. Now the glutes will also grow a little but this will not be noticed as much since your thighs and hamstrings also will grow. So if your aim is make your butt look noticably bigger without makeing your thighs bigger then the classic squat is not the best exercise. There are others which will give you better results. 

 

However, There are other variations of the classic squats which will target the buttocks a lot more. One example of this is the Sumo Squat. As you can see on the photo the difference between a a classic squat and a Sumo Squat is the stance. When performing a Sumo Squat you stand with your legs further apart and your toes pointing outward. You will see how to perform it on the video below and below you will find detailed instructions on how to do the Sumo Squat.

 

 

1. Stand with your feet wider than shoulder-width apart, toes pointed out at a 45-degree angle, and your back straight.

2. Engage your core by pulling your belly button in towards your spine.

3. Bend your knees and hips, lowering your body down towards the ground. Keep your weight on your heels and your chest up.

4. Lower yourself until your thighs are parallel to the ground. Make sure your knees don't extend beyond your toes.

5. Push through your heels and return to a standing position, squeezing your glutes at the top.

6. Repeat until you feel the strain in your buttocks and legs

   You can add of course add a weight to increase resistance but if you are new to this exercise then I propose you start out without weights and concentrate on doing the exercise slowly and with correct form. As you get stronger you can increase the number of repetitions and eventually add some weights.
   

 For  increased resistance you can add a weight. Put a barbell on your shoulders or hold dumbells in your hands. Anything that weighs a little will add to the resistance of the exercise.

Lunges

Lunges is another "classic" lower body exercise. Like Squats, Lunges work your entire lower body such your thighs, hamstrings, glutes and core. Lunges is an excellent exercise which easy to perform and can be done everywhere. However is the Lunges a good exercise for building a great booty? Not quite. Lunges do work the buttocks (a sore butt the day after doing them is pretty common) but like the classic squat the main muscles targeted by lunges is the thighs (they are great for the inner thighs)

But there are (just like with squats) variations of Lunges that will put more emphasis on your butt. On such variation is reverse lunges. Below you will find a description on how to do reverse lunges and also a video showing you how. 

 Stand with your feet hip-width apart, take a big step back with your right foot and lower your body until your left thigh is parallel to the ground and your right knee is almost touching the floor. Push through your left heel and step back up to the starting position, repeating the movement. This exercise places more emphasis on your glutes and hamstrings and can help improve your posture.

Here is the video on how to do reverse lunges. This exercise can be done with or without weights but when starting out it is better to do it without weights.

 

 

 So, there you go. Lunges and squats can be good for building a bigger booty but you have to tweek them a little to put more strain on your glutes instead of your legs. There are also other variations of Lunges and Squats which are good for building a really juicy and well shaped behind but I will leave that for my next article.

I wish you the best of luck

Jojo