Romanian Deadlift
Trains the Hamstrings.
- Equipment
- Barbell
- Mechanic
- Compound
- Force
- Pull
- Level
- Intermediate
How to do it
- Set a barbell in a rack at mid-thigh height, or deadlift it into a standing position — a Romanian deadlift starts at the top, not the floor.
- Stand tall with the bar against your thighs, feet hip-width apart, overhand grip just outside your legs.
- Set a soft bend in your knees and keep that same bend for the whole set.
- Pull your shoulder blades down and squeeze your lats to hold the bar in against your legs.
- Push your hips back and let the bar slide down your thighs, keeping your back flat.
- Lower until you feel a strong stretch through the hamstrings — usually somewhere between mid-shin and just below the knee. The stretch, not a fixed height, is the bottom.
- Drive your hips forward to stand back up, squeezing the glutes at the top without leaning back.
Common mistakes
- Bending the knees more as you descend, which turns it into a deadlift and takes the stretch off the hamstrings. Set the knee angle at the start and hold it.
- Letting the bar drift away from the legs. It should stay in contact or nearly so the whole way; every inch forward loads the lower back instead.
- Chasing the floor. The bottom of the range is where the hamstrings stop allowing the pelvis to rotate — going lower means the spine is rounding to get there.
- Skipping it in favour of leg curls. Curls train knee flexion; this trains hip extension at long muscle lengths, which is where the hamstrings do most of their useful work.