FOÍNIKAS FITNESS

6 WEEK GLUTE BUILDER

6 WEEKS OF
HIGH INTENSITY,
GLUTE SCULPTING
WORKOUTS
 INTRODUCTION

The legendary gluteus maximus, a staple in the workout regimen of any seasoned female and some brave men.
The glutes are one of the major muscle groups in the legs, and can often be one of the bigger muscles in the
body. One may train the glutes for two main reasons: looks and strength. Firstly, the glutes are considered to
be the aesthetic staple for women, and a quick scroll through Instagram will confirm this. Few things are as
appreciated, particularly amongst the male crowd as a developed gluteus maximus. The other reason is the
strength which the good ol glutes are packing. Glutes are heavily engaged in many core movements such as
squats and deadlifts, but also a very functional muscle group for everyday activities such as running, jumping,
and walking.

The aim of this program is to increase muscle hypertrophy and build strength in the glutes at the same time.
Although this program is primarily aimed at female trainees, it can certainly be used by men too.
This program uses RPE (rate of perceived exertion) scales, so it can be used by trainees of all skills, however,
beginner and intermediate individuals will see the best results from this program. You have probably been
training regularly for 2 – 18 months, but you have not really run a full program before with a specific duration
and goal.

The training is relatively intense, and may feature some training variations which you have not done before. The
program features 5 days of training for 6 weeks, with 2-3 days per week being glute specific and the other days
featuring training of other body parts. This will allow the trainee to get adequate volume while still working
towards having a well-rounded physique.

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 THE TRAINING

The training will be split into 3, two-week phases to make this program a total of 6 weeks. The program will
utilize different splits, rep ranges, RPEs and techniques in order to expose you to as many different fitness
concepts as possible. Larger muscles such as the glutes tend to respond well to volume, meaning that the more
cumulative weight you lift over time, the more muscle will be put on. Due to this fact, this program will focus
on making sure that you are doing a lot of specific volume throughout the week, while still incorporating some
heavy sets to make sure that you are a well-rounded athlete.
The training will be relatively intense, especially if you have not run a program before. Each of the weeks will
have 5 training days, so make sure that you are pushing yourself on each of those days, and that you focus on
lifting the weight with good form.
The program will have 2-3 days of cardio per day. At least one of these cardio sessions will be on the StairMaster
or on the cross-trainer if your gym does not have a StairMaster. The other cardio sessions you can choose
yourself how you will be doing it.

TRAINING CONCEPTS
Supersets
Chances are that you are familiar with supersets since they are one of the most common variations of an exercise
in the gym. Basically, what it involves is combining two or more exercises into one exercise by skipping the rest
in between them. For example, if you are super setting skull crushers and barbell curls, it would mean that you
start off by doing you skull crushers set, then you move straight to barbell curls and rest after that.

Pyramid Sets
Pyramid sets or pyramid exercises are where you increase or decrease the number of reps which you are doing.
For example, set 1 may be 25 reps, set 2 is 20 reps, set 3 is 15 reps and the last set is 10 reps. During these you
will also be changing the weight, making it heavier if the reps are getting less numerous and vice versa.

AMRAP
AMRAP stands for As Many Reps As Possible, which is pretty self-explanatory. It means that you will go until
absolute failure, which is when you cannot do any further reps with that weight.

Dropsets
A drop set is a variation of an AMRAP. More specifically, this is when you do a set with a given weight until
failure. Upon hitting failure, you switch to a lighter weight, typically 20-40% lighter, and you go until failure
again with that weight.

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Eccentric Focused Reps
An eccentric focused rep is where you really control the downwards movement of the weight. For example,
when you do a bicep curl, you first lift the weight and then you lower it again. If you really focus on the lowering
of that weight and control that part of the rep, then you are doing an eccentric focused rep. In this program,
when you will do eccentric focused reps the sole focus will be on the negative part of the rep. I do not care how
you get it up, just make sure that when you lower it down again you do it in a slow and controlled manner, where
you really feel the muscle.

RPE
Most of the exercises will make use of RPE (Rate of perceived exertion), which is a scale that is used to train at a
given level of effort. For example, one exercise might be done at an RPE of 8, which would mean that at the end
of that given set, you should roughly be able to crank out another 2 reps with that weight. It is therefore your
responsibility to pick a weight where you will finish at the correct RPE, meaning that you choose a weight, given
the exercise and rep range, that you know you could lift for the number of required reps, but not more than 10
minus the given RPE.

DIET
For fitness, and bodybuilding in particular, diet is extremely important, just as important as your training if you
are looking to achieve a specific goal. As a beginner or intermediate trainee, your main focus should be on your
caloric intake. If you are on the skinny side, then you need to have a high intake of calories during this program.
If you are on the larger side, then you need to decrease the number of calories that you consume. Research has
shown that as a beginner, you can lose fat and gain muscle as well relatively easily, so do not worry about being
in a caloric deficit and not being able to make gains.
In order to determine what your caloric intake should be, simply find a “TDEE calculator” online and input your
metrics. At the start, the focus should be on the caloric intake, not necessarily the composition of the calories.
To a large extent, calorie intake affects your body composition and the different macro splits (protein, fat, and
carbohydrates) affect function. Therefore, do not limit what you eat excessively, but use common sense to
determine what is something a healthy individual would consume. More simply, your calories should not come
form 4 milkshakes and 2 burgers, but from a balanced diet. What many see as the most difficult thing in the
beginning is tracking their calories. To know what you eat, you need to track it, there is no getting around that.
The good news is that its simpler than ever. Download the app “MyFitnessPal” (or any other food tracking app)
and start tracking. It will be the most rewarding thing you do.
At the end of the day, you do not need to follow this everyday for the rest of your life, nor do you need to track
everything you eat. If you’re consistently inconsistent, you’ll find what works for you and it won’t be a problem.
Be smart with how you eat if you’re feeling excessively hungry - eat more. If you’re feeling excessively full - don’t
eat more. Listen to your body and use common sense. If you are not seeing the results you wish after a few
weeks, consider re-evaluating your TDEE or how many calories you eat. Remember, it is your program, and
you make the decisions. For more information on nutrition or any other terms mentioned above, please refer to
https://www.nal.usda.gov/fnic/macronutrients.

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 HOW TO USE THE PROGRAM

The program comes with an excel file which contains the workout split for each week. Utilize the things that the
program gives you and work according to the program. Be honest when picking weights that fit different RPE
levels so that you are not lifting weights that are too light ot too heavy. I suggest downloading excel or Google
Sheets on your phone and then emailing the excel sheet to yourself so that you can follow the workouts on your
phone.

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