How to Do Romanian Deadlift Perfectly: Benefits, Variations & More

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The Romanian deadlift is not an unknown name to gym enthusiasts. In fact, there are many people who consider it one of the best exercises to strengthen your core and lower body. In case you are interested in knowing more about this exercise, this article is for you.

The Romanian deadlift is a strength exercise in which you lift a barbell the traditional way. It effectively works on your posterior chain muscles namely hamstrings, erector spinae, adductors, gluteus maximus, etc.

What makes Romanian deadlifts different from the regular deadlift is that it works specifically on those muscles that extend your knees and hips from the posterior part of your knees. On the other hand, quad-dominant exercises and regular deadlifts require you to put most of the pressure on the anterior part of your knee.

Romanian Deadlift Muscles Worked

What exercises you choose in your workout totally depends on the types of muscles you want to strengthen. Here is a complete list of Romanian deadlift muscles worked that will help you decide whether this exercise will be helpful for you or not:

Trapezius
Forearms
Glutes
Middle and Upper Back
Lower Back (also called Erector Spinae)
Hamstrings

How to Do Romanian Deadlift: Step-by-Step Guide

To reach the perfect Romanian deadlift form, you have to learn and practice it gradually. We have jotted down a step-by-step guide on how to do Romanian deadlift the perfect way. Follow the guide and enjoy all the benefits of this strength exercise:

Stand straight with your feet at a distance of hip-width to each other.
Hold the barbell with both hands; your hands should be a little wider than your thighs.
Bend your knees slightly, roll the shoulder back and keep them the same way throughout the Romanian deadlifts.
Now, inhale and lean forward towards the ground, pressing your hips back. It should be mentioned here that to get to the perfect Romanian deadlift form, your focus should be on pressing the hips back instead of leaning forward.
While you hinge forward from the hips, roll your shoulders back and pull the barbell near your thighs.
The moment you experience a stretch through your hamstrings, stop hinging from the hips. It is okay if the barbell does not touch the ground. You should perform this exercise according to the flexibility of your body.
Now, exhale and try to pull the torso back by engaging both your glutes and hamstrings.

Romanian Deadlift Variations

There is no doubt that the dumbbell Romanian deadlift is very efficient as a strength training exercise. However, some people get bored of doing the same exercise for straight weeks. If you are one of those people, you should try variations of Romanian deadlifts.

Most Romanian deadlift variations work on the same set of muscles as that of the Romanian deadlift. This means that you can replace this exercise on some days with variations. Here is a list of some of the most common Romanian deadlift variations:

Kettlebell Romanian deadlift
Single leg Romanian deadlift
Resistance Band Romanian Deadlift
Dumbbell Romanian Deadlift

We discussed how you can easily replace the Romanian deadlifts with various other exercises. This does not mean that all these exercises have similar benefits. Let’s understand the difference between these exercises in detail.

Single leg Romanian deadlift is different from Romanian deadlifts in the sense that it is a unilateral exercise. If you want to improve the balance of your body along with increasing strength, you should definitely try it.

If you want to focus more on your quads, you should try other types of deadlift such as kettlebell Romanian deadlift. This exercise also requires you to engage your quads while Romanian deadlift demands the engagement of mostly hamstrings and glutes.

Tips On How To Perfect Your Romanian Deadlift Bar Game

Your first preference should be perfecting the dumbbell Romanian deadlift pose instead of increasing the weight. Here is a list of some tips that will help you in perfecting your Romanian deadlifts game:

While the hips push behind you, you need to make sure that your body is balanced. And how do you ensure that your body is balanced? By equally distributing your body weight on the heels.
When you are at the bottom of the Romanian deadlift, your hips are going to be the farthest from your body. While elevating your hips back, you must engage the glutes.
If you want to activate your glutes and hamstring to the maximum level, you will have to push your hips as far as possible from your body.

Benefits of Romanian deadlifts

As you can guess, the huge list of Romanian deadlift bar benefits makes it one of the most loved exercises of gym-goers. Down below, we have compiled the four most important benefits of Romanian deadlifts:

Improves Your Pulling Strength: Be it practical uses of pulling things or you want to lift more weights in the gym, there are a lot of benefits if you improve your pulling strength. And Romanian deadlift is the perfect exercise for this. In fact, this exercise is even better than the traditional deadlift if you want to increase the strength of your hamstring, glute, and back.
Boosts Your Athletic Performance: Who doesn’t want to increase his or her athletic performance by doing workout at home? Along with increasing your strength, the Romanian deadlift also helps you in increasing your athletic performance. It does so by working on your posterior chain and increasing your overall leg strength.
Increase Your Hamstring Mass: Some people like to have a lean body while others want to increase their muscular mass. If you fall in the latter category, Romanian lift can prove to be helpful for you. By enhancing hamstring hypertrophy, this exercise increases the size of your lean muscle.
Increases Your Weightlifting Movements Performance: If you check the workout of CrossFit's athletes and Olympic weightlifters, you will surely find an emphasis on the Romanian deadlift. You ask why? Well, that is because this exercise helps in boosting the hamstring strength and back strength of the athletes.

That’s enough reading for one day. Now, it’s time for you to move your body and get in the much-desired shape with the help of Romanian Deadlift.

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