How to Do Hamstring Curls At Home: 6 Variations to Add to Your Routine

Why Do It: This is an open-chain variant of a glute bridge. The “added resistance” in this hamstring exercise is just keeping the ball in control as you roll it back and forth.

How to Do It:

1. Lie supine on the ground (on your back).
2. Place your heels on a stability ball and lift your butt off the floor so your legs are in a straight line with your body.
3. Contract your abs, glutes, and hamstrings to roll the ball toward you until your knees make a 90-degree angle.
4. Roll the ball back out until your legs are fully extended again.

Why Do It: Sometimes I just don’t want to get up off the ground, but I need to do some kind of hamstring exercise for lower body assistance before I leave the gym. Enter the ground-cuddling hamstring curl… I mean prone position hamstring curl.

Lying flat on your chest (the prone position) in a straight line really makes it hard to cheat, which means the contraction at the point of greatest flexion (and greatest band resistance) can be intense, but not as intense as a Nordic hamstring curl².

How to Do It:

1. Lie face down on the ground with your legs fully extended.
2. Loop a resistance band around your power rack or other large, immovable object, and loop the other end of the band around your left foot.
3. Squeeze your hamstring hard and bend your left leg until your heel touches your butt (or as close as you can).
4. Return to the starting position and complete all reps, then switch legs.

Why Do It: This is my go-to hamstring pump exercise when I’m in my home gym. It takes 3 seconds to set up, and it doesn’t take long to knock out enough repetitions to mentally put a “Finished” stamp on another leg day.

How to Do It:

1. Loop a resistance band around a power rack, tree, or other heavy object.
2. Stand upright with your back straight, facing the anchor.
3. Place your left foot inside the band loop so the band tightens as you pull your leg away from the anchor point.
4. Balance yourself, then bend your knee until your left foot touches your butt (or as close as you can get).
5. Return your left foot to the starting position.
6. Complete all required reps, then switch legs.

Why Do It: This is a little harder to pull off than you’d think. A machine seated leg curl is simple, and has a specific type of pump people usually enjoy or loathe. This banded version requires more stability and a weight bench or chair with an appropriate height. 

You need something with a conventional seat-and-post design; a plyometric box won’t work. You need something that allows your feet to go underneath your body at peak flexion.

How to Do It:

1. Sit upright on a bench or chair.
2. Loop a resistance band around a power rack or other immovable object.
3. Loop the open end of the band around your left ankle. Be sure to be sitting far enough back that the band is taut when your knee is fully extended.
4. Grab onto the bench for stability, and bend your knee under you as far as you can.
5. Allow the band to pull your left leg back into the starting position.
6. Complete all reps, then switch legs. You can also perform with both legs at once.

Why Do It: This is essentially a lying leg curl, but instead of moving a weight stack or resistance band, you move your whole body instead. This is the most intense true curl exercise, and requires a ton of hamstring strength to pull off without cheating. It has also been shown to potentially reduce hamstring injuries³.

Strong hamstrings or no, I would go ahead and cheat just to take a little pressure off the bottom of the movement. You can use a reverse band, have a friend assist you in forced reps, or use a pole to help you “climb up” the movement.

This is a very difficult addition to your leg workout, and will take time to build the total-body strength required to execute them correctly.

A nice little commercial gym hack is to do these on the lat pulldown machine, but you can use a Smith machine, a heavy piece of furniture, or have a friend hold down your ankles.

How to Do It:

1. Lie in a prone position with your feet hip-width apart.
2. Place your feet under your implement of choice.
3. Keeping your body in a straight line, hinge from your knees and engage your hamstrings to lift your upper body into a vertical position.
4. Descent slowly back to your starting position.

Why Do It: This is great as a warm-up or a finisher for all the muscle groups of the lower body. Use a really lightweight band and shoot for super high reps—at least 50-100.

How to Do It:

1. Loop a band over your shoulders and under your feet. You should look like you’re standing inside an oblong hula hoop.
2. Stand with your feet hip-width apart.
3. Hinge your hips back and try to bring your upper body into a 90-degree angle with your lower legs.
4. Explode back up into a standing position.