Dispelling The Glute Myth (I would copy and paste, but there are videos of the exercises included)
Thoughts?
I think it’s good stuff. The guy sounds like he knows what he’s talking about. Take some of it but don’t eat the buffet. I especially like Nick Tuminello’s superdog birddog variant.
He mentions that Usain Bolt could get faster if he did the hip thrusts?!
It’s easy to criticize. Usain Bolt already got faster doing leg extensions so…
Like Ben Johnson would, if he did this and that and the other…
Damn what about that groin machine I see all the women use. Im sure that will have him running a 9.4
Like reverse leg press and reverse hypers?
Sorry, mortac8, I didn’t get that… 
That is my counter-jab.
If anyone would actually read articles like this before poking fun at them, they might see that the author says that he has researched glute activity extensively… and that Charlie was ahead of his time prescribing such glute exercises as reverse leg press and reverse hyper variants. Give that, and his expansion on these exercises, how can this article be basically dismissed as worthless?
I see now! I absolutely agree and don’t dismiss the article at all -I am going through it right now! But there is no cause-effect relationship, as I am sure you are fully aware of. Charlie hasn’t been ‘Charlie’ by just prescribing similar exercises -he was ‘ahead of his time’, as the article says, for other reasons, too. Anyway, it was just a more general joke, targeting mainly the ‘suggestions’ Charlie had over the years on how to make Angela, Ben and others faster… 
http://www.higher-faster-sports.com/noglutes.html
A similar article that hits some of the same points.
Hip flexor tightness has been a huge issue for me and I’ve spent the last month stretching it daily. It was so bad at one point that everytime I would squat, clean or deadlift my hip flexors would ache and feel weird. To the point that I think it has been holding back my strength gains in those lifts as well as a possible speed detriment. Thats bad. Anyway, after this month of pure stretching I can start to feel my glutes being recruited more in those same exercises as well as sprinting itself. Lets see what another few months will turn out.
Good article. I personally am a big fan of all the glute activation/strengthening work.
I think I might start doing the pendulum quadrupled hip extension since I do not have access to a reverse leg press and the glute-hams in the weightroom suck
Reverse leg press is key- if you can replicate it with quadruped hip extension, do it.
Im suprised that with all the glute talk there was little to no mention of the piriformis. I would think that in addition to all of the benifits of optimally strengthening the posterior chain, femoral control via activating the glute med and strengthening the priformis would be mentioned more. In my opinion the goal of the sprinters performance would involve a balance of all these muscles, although I get his overall point. Good article.
Pirifomis is tiny compared to glute max or glute min. Piriformis is a “postural” muscle too so it’s usually tight rather than weak like the “phasic” gluteals.
Just a thought - perhaps it gets so tight sometimes due to being too weak for ones Posture. Tightens up in response to overly strong muscles elsewhere or overuse?
Make it bigger and or stronger and perhaps it might not tighten up so much?
A strength reserve for posture muscles.
This is what i have been doing for clients shoulders/upper back areas.
Think of doing Innies and Outies (rotor cuff work) Your not ever gunna see these tiny muscles or be pushing heavy weights with the exercises - however, working them does Magic after just a few short wks.
Mind you - check out PNF stretching on the piraformis! Its a stretch with an active movement. Perhaps thats all that muscle needs
piriformis is a b*tch
/piriformis topic
I agree with you Warrior.
However minor the piriformis may be compared to the gluteals, their in-ability to stabilize the hip cuff and control the femur (both in dynamic movements & in stabilizing movements) is paramount. IMO- the hips cannot be looked at from a spot training standpoint but in totality. So the psoas, piriformis, spinal erectors & abdominals all play a equally vital role in the athlete’s performance & therefore must be trained together.
I agree, there is merit in this, but does anyone know if his research has been published in a legit peer review journal? I would be interested to see his EMG placements.
None of it is peer reviewed (he even says this) and there are fairly obvious problems with his use of EMG as the primary means of measuring muscle “activation” that are likely beyond the scope of this forum and could use a journal on its own.