Nothing quite beats the feeling of a satisfying burn from an intense workout. Sessions that target my leg and butt muscles, especially, make me feel like I’m at the peak of my power. ISSA-certified personal trainer Annabelle Hayes‘s “Booty- & Leg-Building Kettlebell Workout” brought the intensity and the glute burn I was hoping it would, so I recommend trying it ASAP.
You’ll do the majority of the 11 exercise sections for 40 to 45 seconds with 15 seconds of rest in between. Hayes suggests completing three total rounds. Moves include the following: kneeling squats, regular squats, Romanian deadlifts, kettlebell swings, narrow squats, glute bridges, staggered Romanian deadlifts, split squats, and lateral lunges. Hayes uses a 45-pound kettlebell, then opts for a single dumbbell for two of the moves. I, on the other hand, used a 24-pound kettlebell.
When I first followed this workout, I only finished one 10-and-a-half-minute round due to my looming bedtime and a mean cold I was getting over. The staggered Romanian deadlifts were my favorite — they prove that a modified version of the single-leg deadlift can still target your muscles big time — and the one round alone brought the heat! I felt it mainly in my glutes, quads, and hamstrings, but my core and arms were also engaged throughout just from holding the kettlebell in place while moving through the exercises.
Three days later, I did Hayes’s session again, this time for the recommended three rounds; once the video finished up, I simply replayed it twice more. Completing one round is a workout in itself, but I suggest doing all three for a heart-pumping lower-body strength routine that lasts over half an hour. Did I wish for the minutes to count down faster? Maybe. But it was a good kind of torment that drives you to keep going — it’s not painful; it’s powerful.