Who Should Do?

Bodybuilders

Training as a bodybuilder requires resistance training to improve physical appearance. With a well-rounded routine, you can improve symmetry and muscular proportions. This refers to the way your muscles flow together and look when viewed as one unit.

Bodyweight single-leg deadlifts work seven lower-body muscle groups using a functional movement pattern with no equipment needed. These include the gluteus, hamstrings, and erector spinae as the primary movers. As a bodybuilder, this makes it a versatile bodyweight exercise for a 3-day workout split to develop lower-body musculature.

Functional Fitness Athletes

Performing movements that resemble functional everyday patterns helps to improve mobility and performance during activity and exercise. The hip hinge is a functional movement that resembles many daily activities. When done correctly, it can help to improve posture and reduce injury risk.

Because bodyweight single-leg deadlifts use a hip hinge as the primary movement pattern, they’re great to program into a functional fitness routine. Add them as needed to increase training volume or to improve exercise variety. 

People Who Work Out At Home

With working hours increasing and the cost of living going up, the popularity of working out at home is increasing. Whatever your training goals, at-home workouts offer more convenience with less time commitment. Furthermore, you can build your home gym around your goals and exercise needs.

The bodyweight single-leg deadlift requires only one thing — your body weight. It’s an excellent deadlift alternative that requires no equipment. This makes it great for people who want to work out at home using a minimal setup.

Who Should Not Do?

Advanced Powerlifters

At the advanced stage of powerlifting, several years have been spent training and adapting to different exercises. With the rate of adaptation slowing down, advanced powerlifters need to periodize their training. This refers to the planned manipulation of different training variables.

Advanced powerlifters who already have muscle strength, balance, and coordination need to perform weighted exercises at a high intensity. This allows them to progress, building on the solid foundations that they have already developed. 

The bodyweight single-leg deadlift is a great lower-body exercise. However, it doesn’t offer enough exercise intensity for advanced powerlifters who already have many of the skills needed. In this case, use the weighted version instead.

Those With Chronic Knee Issues

In today’s society, chronic knee issues and injuries are a huge problem. Even in young sports players, the prevalence of knee pain is 10.9%.

Knee osteoarthritis is a common knee issue that causes pain and reduced function. This is a wear and tear injury that causes the protective knee cartilage to wear down. This resulting joint stress can cause pain during movement and exercise.

While the bodyweight single-leg deadlift doesn’t involve weight, it does require a large degree of knee stabilization. This is because of the single-leg movement pattern. For those with chronic knee issues such as osteoarthritis, this may cause added pain and possible injury.

Benefits Of Bodyweight Single-Leg Deadlifts

Increases Functional Strength

Functional strength is the ability of the body to perform everyday movement patterns. It involves factors such as muscular strength, balance, muscular coordination, and posture. Building functional strength requires suitable exercise stimulus that replicates common movement patterns.

The bodyweight single-leg deadlift uses a functional hip hinge movement pattern. This is the act of lowering the torso down so the angle between the thighs and torso decreases. Examples of everyday activities that use a hip hinge include picking something up off the floor and sitting in a chair. 

Even as a bodyweight exercise, the single-leg movement pattern increases the movement difficulty and intensity. When performed correctly, this provides a suitable strength-building stimulus providing enough volume.

Builds Lower Body Muscle

When working against resistance, the body responds to the unknown stimulus by building new muscle tissue. This is an adaptive response to better deal with it the next time the stimulus occurs. 

For this to happen, a suitable resistance stimulus is needed. Determinants of resistance training that decide this include training volume. This is the amount of work performed.

Bodyweight single-leg deadlifts isolate the hamstrings, glutes, and erector spinae. This provides a suitable amount of training volume for these muscle groups. 

Because it’s a bodyweight movement that offers less training intensity, it works well following weighted lower-body movements to increase overall volume. Alongside this, it’s great as a superset. This is where you perform one movement after another. 

Addresses Muscle Imbalances

Resistance training offers several well-documented benefits. These include increased muscle growth, better strength, and improved function. As with most things, it can also have drawbacks. 

One of these possible drawbacks is muscle imbalances. This occurs when one side of the body is stronger than the other. Because of this, the stronger side tends to work harder when performing movements that use both sides

The bodyweight single-leg deadlift is a unilateral movement pattern that works each leg separately. This helps to identify possible muscular imbalances and work to address them. Use it alongside normal movements for a well-rounded program. 

Frequently Asked Questions