Double Leg Butt Kick
Also works: Abductors · Adductors · Calves · Glutes · Hamstrings
A maximal two-footed vertical jump where you snap both heels up to your backside at the top, then land with the knees only partly bent. The tuck adds nothing to the height — it trains how fast you can fold the knee in the air and reopen it before the floor arrives.
Own the movement
Set up first, then execute. Every cue below is something you can check on your next set.
Before the first rep
- Find a flat, non-slip surface with headroom. Low ceilings and this drill do not mix.
- Stand with feet hip- to shoulder-width, knees soft, weight over the mid-foot.
- Let your arms hang loose and ready — the arm swing contributes real height here.
- Do two or three submaximal jumps first to find the rhythm before going for height.
Every rep
Breathing & tempo — One breath per jump: inhale as you settle, exhale sharply as you leave the floor. The dip and reversal should take under half a second, with two to three seconds of standing rest between reps.
Sets, reps & load
Where to start, and what to change when it stops being hard.
Bodyweight only — a weighted vest kills jump height and makes the tuck impossible to time. Progress by jumping higher, not by adding reps or a load: mark your reach on a wall, note the best jump in a session, and treat that number as the thing you are training.
What goes wrong
The errors that show up most often, and the cue that fixes each one.
Jump for maximum height first and add the heel snap only once you are already rising. Have someone film you from the side and watch your hip height, not your feet.
Cue yourself to reopen the knees at the top of the arc. If you are consistently late, drop the tuck for a few sessions and just do maximal jumps until the timing settles.
Land with the knees already bent and keep folding as your feet touch. If the landing is loud or jarring, your legs are not absorbing it — stop the set and rest.
Keep sets to 3-5 jumps with 90 seconds of rest. Jump height is the quality marker; once it drops, the rest of the set is just impact with no adaptation attached.
Why bother
Two things happen in one rep. The takeoff is an ordinary maximal countermovement jump, which trains rate of force development. The tuck is a fast knee flexion followed by an equally fast extension, on a clock set by how long you are airborne — you cannot slow it down without landing badly.
Be clear that the heels touching your backside is not a measure of jump height. Someone can flick their heels up on a mediocre jump and someone can leave the floor hard without ever getting close. Judge the rep on how high your hips travel; treat the tuck as a coordination task layered on top.
Where it fits
First thing after the warm-up on a lower-body or sprint day, 3-5 sets of 3-5 jumps with 90 seconds of rest. It needs no equipment, which makes it the plyometric that survives training in a hotel room. One or two sessions a week is plenty; stop the moment your hips stop rising.
If this one isn't it
No kit, too hard, or too easy — here's where to go instead.
Same job, different kit
Start here instead
When this gets easy
Asked and answered
How is this different from a tuck jump?
A tuck jump brings the knees up to the chest; this brings the heels back to the backside. The knee tuck is a hip flexion drill and it is easy to fake by pulling the knees up on a low jump. The heel snap keeps the thigh roughly under you, so it trains knee recovery speed instead — closer to what sprinting asks for.
Do I need to touch my heels to my glutes?
No, and chasing the touch is how people ruin the drill. Hamstring length and hip position decide how close you get. Get the heels moving fast and back down in time; the contact point itself scores nothing.
Is this the same as the butt kicks in a running warm-up?
No, and confusing the two wastes the session. The running drill is a jog on the spot with loose heel flicks, done for minutes at low intensity to warm the hamstrings up. This is a maximal vertical jump with a fast heel snap layered on it, done for three to five reps with real rest. Same body part, opposite intent: one is a warm-up, the other is the hardest thing in the session.
Will these improve my vertical jump?
The takeoff will help a little, but the honest answer is that squats and heavy hip work move the vertical more for most untrained lifters. Use this to train the fast end and keep it alongside strength work rather than instead of it.