Glute Ham Raise
Also works: Calves · Glutes
On a GHD you fix your feet against the footplate with the knee pad just behind your kneecaps, then raise your body from horizontal to upright using knee flexion while the hips stay extended. It is one of the few movements that loads the hamstring at the knee and the hip in the same rep, and the eccentric is brutal.
Own the movement
Set up first, then execute. Every cue below is something you can check on your next set.
Before the first rep
- Set the knee pad so your kneecaps sit just off its rear edge. The further up your thigh the pad goes, the shorter your lever and the less hamstring you train.
- Push the balls of your feet flat into the footplate with your ankles roughly neutral, not pointed.
- Adjust the footplate distance so your knees are bent to about 90 degrees when your body is horizontal.
- Cross your arms on your chest for the easiest version; holding them overhead or adding a plate makes it substantially harder.
- Brace your abs and squeeze your glutes before the first rep so your hips do not fold.
Every rep
Breathing & tempo — Breathe in at the bottom, exhale as you pull yourself upright. One to two seconds up, three to five seconds down. Never rush the descent to fit more reps in.
Before you load it
- Keep your hands free and ready to catch the floor. Failing halfway down means dropping face-first from about a metre, and grabbing the pad is not an option.
- Expect severe delayed-onset soreness from your first few sessions. Start with two sets and build over three weeks rather than doing four sets on day one.
Sets, reps & load
Where to start, and what to change when it stops being hard.
Bodyweight is the starting load and it is enough for most people for months. Progress in this order: hands on chest, hands behind head, hands extended overhead, then a 5-10 kg plate held to the chest. Three sets of 8 with arms crossed and no hip break is a solid intermediate standard; adding a 20 kg plate is genuinely strong.
What goes wrong
The errors that show up most often, and the cue that fixes each one.
Squeeze the glutes hard before the rep starts and hold that squeeze the whole set. Have someone stand beside you and call out the first rep where your hips break — that rep is the end of your set.
Set a 4-second count on the way down and shorten the range until you can honour it. Assisted lowering with your hands on the floor is fine as a scaling step; uncontrolled dropping is not.
Move the pad until your kneecaps clear its rear edge. A pad under the mid-thigh shortens your lever and makes the movement feel easier while training far less hamstring.
Earn 3 sets of 8 clean bodyweight reps with a straight body line before holding a plate. Loading a rep that already breaks at the hips just loads a spinal extension you did not intend.
Why bother
The hamstrings cross two joints, and most training picks one. A leg curl works knee flexion with the hip fixed; a Romanian deadlift works hip extension with the knee fixed. The glute-ham raise asks the hamstring to flex the knee while it is simultaneously holding the hip straight, which is the loaded position it fails in during sprinting.
The eccentric is the part that pays. Lowering yourself from upright to horizontal under control is a long, high-force lengthening contraction, and this class of exercise has the strongest evidence behind it for reducing hamstring strain rates in sprinting athletes. Nothing else in the rack builds that quality as directly.
Where it fits
Place it after your main hinge or squat, twice a week, 3-4 sets. Do not pair it with heavy Romanian deadlifts in the same session for the first month — the soreness stacks and you will be limping into your next lower-body day. Two to four days between hard GHR sessions is realistic while you adapt.
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Asked and answered
I cannot do a single rep. What do I do?
Train the eccentric only. Start upright, lower over 5 seconds, then push off the floor with your hands to reset. Three sets of 4-5 lowers, twice a week, gets most people to their first full rep within four to six weeks. Band assistance looped around your chest and anchored above works too.
Is this the same as a Nordic curl?
Close cousins, not identical. A Nordic curl anchors the ankles with the hips extended and no footplate to push against; the GHD gives you a foot plate and a knee pad, so you can use the calves and adjust the leverage. The GHD is more scalable and easier to progress; the Nordic needs only a partner or a strap.
Should I feel it in my calves?
Yes, and that is correct rather than a fault. The gastrocnemius crosses the knee and contributes to knee flexion, which is why driving your toes into the plate helps you rise. If cramping stops your sets, cut the pointed-toe pressure slightly and check your ankle is neutral, not plantarflexed.
Does it replace leg curls?
It covers more, but the two are not identical. The GHR loads the hamstring at long lengths under high eccentric force; a seated leg curl loads knee flexion with the hip flexed, a position the GHR never reaches. If you have both machines, do the GHR first and use leg curls for extra volume.