Nordic Curls are OVERRATED (And Won't Make You a Freak Athlete) 💯
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- Опубліковано 12 вер 2024
- Nordic curls are overrated.
They're a fantastic tool for accomplishing what they accomplish, which is strengthening the knee flexion function of the hamstrings (maintaining strength balance between knee flexion, which is often neglected, and knee extension which is often heavily emphasized), adding a little bit of extra to the back of the thigh, and reducing the risk of hamstring strains while sprinting.
But they do very little to directly contribute to enhancing athleticism, or making you into a "freak athlete." Along with this notion, in the last couple of years their value within the larger program has been blown way out of proportion.
Let's appreciate them for what they are and what they do. Nothing more, nothing less.
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I’ve never heard anyone say that the Nordic Curls will make you a “freak athlete”. Only that they’re very good for knee strengthening and stability, something that very very many people could benefit from.
I think they're a fantastic exercise at what they do! But I've heard many random people thinking they're some kind of athleticism panacea ever since they've been overhyped in recent years. I'm just bringing the pendulum back to center.
@sonicnendezreally? I never saw anything where it emphasized it turning you into a freak athlete. Only that it’s a strong successful program. Seeing that the main guy went from being told he won’t be able to do anything virtually to dunking again. So weird how people get that, from the KOT guy. Also yuh gotta sell a product or an idea..kinda can’t be..look how mediocre my vertical is now! Lol
@@EnkiriEliteI thought it was simply emphasized for rehab purposes a great way to get yourself moving again in a different way. Not simply it’s the be all end all. Which is said numerous times in his videos
@@Jodallguys like kinobody hoped on the hype train but Ben Patrick has really only emphasized the longevity/bullet proofing
@@2jmajjic I took it as rehab to help get you moving again. Not becoming Lebron
Every head of the hamstring is hit by knee flexion, but not every head is hit by hip extension. So while it won't improve your deadlift as much as deadlifting would, there will be carryover, plus knee bulletproofing benefits. Plus, knee flexion is involved in activities like running.
But it shouldn't be the only exercise you do obviously.
Plus the hamstrings are considered to be the weaker of the hip extenders(the glutes being the stronger) and if hip extension is to be trained then the gluten should be slitchly more emphasized
Nobody is saying Nordic curls make you a freak athlete but they’re absolutely great for posterior chain strengthening, good for back pain, good for knee strengthening, etc. weird take to say this of all exercises is overrated lol. Do you go to all the bicep curl videos and say it won’t make you a pro body builder? Lol
It's overrated because in 2024 it gets more attention than the benefit it provides. Not a weird take. You just don't know what the word overrated means apparently.
Yeah but they also build strong hamstrings in the process, which can aid in hip extension. If you progressed a nordic for a couple years wouldn’t your RDL or good morning go up? They also majorly reduce hamstring tears which is one of the main athletic advantages.
No, having strong knee flexion capacity will have no impact on one's ability to hinge well or powerfully. I mentioned injury risk reduction as one of their primary benefits (in reality, probably the true main benefit they confer) in the video.
@@EnkiriElite That's not true either the same muscles that flex the knee excluding the biceps femoris short head aid in hip extension. There is definitely transferability.
@@EnkiriElite as for injury risk sprinting has actually shown be better injury prevention rates than Nordic hamstring curls in football players.
This is just survivorship bias. Freak athletes are strong enough to do the Nordic curls, they didnt made them strong in the first place
I agree with that with somebody like Tyreek Hill (shown in the video) who is just a straight up freak of nature. However, many people have progressed from not being able to do Nordic curls at all to being Nordic curl gods, and they didn't morph into athletic freaks in the process.
A lot of elite athletes, the best sprinters can't even do Nordics so this is not even true. It's a skill and leverages thing like any other calisthenics movement. I can do them easily because I'm light and I have the set up nailed. If I was 10kg heavier up top or 4 inches taller they would be exponentially harder. I might have tried them once or twice and given up because I wasn't able to do a Nordic Curl with 10kg the first time I tried it.
You really don't need to be a freak athlete to do Nordics it's the same difficulty as a pull up I would say. Just it's more novel and harder to set up people don't know how to do it. I can do more Nordics reps than pull ups at body weight. I can't lift the same weight when adding an external load but that's slightly different because one is a lever there other is mostly just adding weight linearly.
Not true , i started nordic curls and the moment i could do 1 my ex girlfriend called me saying its time to have a baby
I truly cannot argue with that. 😂
Counterpoint: the fact that you picked up indicates you left too many reps in reserve.
No single exercise will make anybody into a freak athlete but being weak on key exercises will prevent them from ever becoming one.
That’s how I see Nordic curls. If one cannot do them then that is a red flag that their posterior chain has a weak link that needs to be addressed.
But no, being able to do 25 perfect Nordic curls with 225 across their shoulders will not automatically turn anyone into a great athlete, just a great Nordic curler and so other aspects of training should not be sacrificed for better performance on Nordics.
good way to put it!
Nobody in this chat can do nordics curls so they are bashing them like they are worthless…. 😂😂 yall be the same ones trying to give out fitness advice but have 20% body fat 😂
dumb comment
@EnkiriElite Nordics allowed me to dunk a basketball I digress
Interesting share , thanks man!
So when overall athleticism and injury prevention is the main goal and I train full body twice a week, would you say I’m good with that:
Session A:
BB RDLs
DB Split Squats
Session B:
KB Front Rack Squats
Seated Leg curls
Of course both sessions include other exercises for the upper body but this would be my lower body work next to running
The “I’m just saying it’s overhyped” is annoying for some reason, maybe I’m subconsciously annoyed at myself for caring
That's called shooting the messenger. I ain't the one who overhyped it.
Because it says nothing valuable. "Too many people are saying this thing is too good". People could be saying drinking a gallon of water a day gives you laser vision, that's pretty over hyped. Should still drink water though.
Pretty sure if you strengthen the muscle through either of its two functions it will be stronger in general on both functions.
Cool. Try it and report back.
Hinging exercises tend to rely on strong glutes and spinal erectors. You will not get that from loaded knee flexion.
@@EnkiriElite That was me reporting back. I was informing y'all of my findings.
@@FalconsSB190 Right but it will cover the hamstring portion of the hip extension. I'm not saying don't do glute work.
Your lame AF😅@@MatteoFitness
They're a great exercise for sure, but they're also overly trendy rn.
Agreed!
Isometrics aren't counterintuitive to hypertrophy if they're on the long side.
This applies less to Nordic curls but moreso straight leg stiff leg deadlifts. With enough heel elevation you can keep the knee joint completely extended and still have a lordodic spine.
That means you can flex the hips while the knees locked. This is inverse of seated leg curls where the hip is isometrically stretched (good) and the knee is the mover. It would train the distal hamstring head significantly unlike bent knee stiff leg deadlifts.
Can you make a guide on how to run faster and jump higher?
I just released s vertical jump video last week.
Sprinting video will be coming soon
Nordics starting from the ground should bring a dynamic movement to the hips.. dunno if itll make an elite athlete out of you but if you do it that way itll include the plyometric glute activation that carries over to the athletics... thank you for bringing me to that realization.. im sure stability(iso hold) required in the hips to do the hamstring work is a thing but i def get ur point.. reset each nordic starting from the bottom using ur glutes as the prime mover would have the best athletic crossover tho imo
Everyone wants the shortcut to becoming a freak athlete. If you want to become a freak athlete you better start doing explosive movements.
And reprogram your DNA in every cell in your body.
It would be correct to affirm that being a strong athlete first will make your nordics easy to do.
Knees over toes guy loves them because they massively strengthen the knee, which is what he's all about. I get your point though; in the same way OH Press won't turn you into a world class boxer. Namaste x
So the issue is they don’t have dynamic knee flexion and hip extension in the same movement? Which exercise, other than running, does?
That's not what I said.
nordics are basically the opposite of a hamstring curl right?
No, the opposite of a hamstring curl would be a leg extension. Hamstring curl is knee flexion, leg extension is knee extension.
That said, leg curls and Nordic curls, while they both train knee flexion, so do so in slightly different ways (emphasis on shortened position with leg curls and emphasis on lengthened position with nordics). As such they are complementary movements and both should be trained
@@EnkiriElite Oh shit i meant in its resistance curve
You do them to avoid those painful hammy injuries 😢
that's their main utility, yes.
You got it backwards...There's a company named Freak Athlete that Makes equipment to do Nordic curls 😂
Hang power cleans
And good mornings ...work for me!!!!
Both are staples for sure bro
They made my hamstrings big though
Certainly hypertrophy benefits to be had, especially if that realm had previously been neglected (as it often is).
The amount of intensity required to master a Nordic curl means that a level of dedication far above and beyond the typical 3 sets of 8-12 leg curls was being put into the realm of knee flexion training.
That upping of the ante is almost certainly going to yield hypertrophy.
Doesn't negate anything i said here.
Also though, if I had to take a wild stab on the dark I would venture to guess that you were still improving your Jefferson curls (or something similar) concurrently. Which could be equally or more responsible for that hypertrophy.
What about incorporating this exercise with stiff leg rdl?
Yes
Would seated leg curls (machine) still provide knee protection in your opinion?
They are a useful tool for that as well. The difference between leg curl variations and ghrs/Nordics is that leg curls create the greatest muscular tension in the shortened (contracted) position, and ghrs/nordics create the greatest muscular tension in the lengthened position.
They are complementary. Do both.
The only thing I know is nordics strengthen your hamstring muscle and makes it less injury prone
OR you can do both - do a nordic curl to train the knee flexion role of the hamstrings (which includes the biceps femoris head which CANNOT be trained through hip extension at all!!!), AND a hip extension based movement like an RDL or good morning. none of this either/or stuff!
ua-cam.com/video/W5gCnZidFlo/v-deo.html
that video makes a little more sense to me, fair enough! i think context gets lost when you only have one minute to explain... to me it sounded like you said that training knee flexion was inessential compared to hip extension whereas i think that both are EQUALLY important to overall hamstring strength, size, and integrity, and should both be trained in any serious lifter/athlete. but in any case, i lay my weapons down!
Thanks for the intel! I do my Nordics by looping webbing around my torso, attaching it to my lat pull down cable and using it as a counterbalance. I can progress in (1/2) lb increments each session. It also works for standing ab roll-outs so you don't need complicated progressive schemes from the kneeling version. Sorry, to make your ab roll out video overrated... :-)
I wrote about using the cable stack to incrementally progress on nordics back in 2019.
I don't think ab rollouts are overrated. I think they're Underrated all.
Overrated vs Underrated is simply relative to the hype something is currently getting vs the actual benefit it confers.
What I don't understand is, how are Nordic curls exactly different than leg curls? They are just the negative part of the leg curls, using bodyweight instead of weight.
They're the positive part too if you're strong enough, use bands to assist or push yourself off the floor with as little force as you can get away with. I don't see how they differ from lying leg curls at all. In fact if you push yourself up which is slightly lighter and then lower yourself at heavier you're doing the most perfect exercise where the weight is hardest during the easier part
Didn't you promote them heavily at one point though? Odd with the flip flopping. But then again you do that on purpose all the time so people understand both sides 😂
I still promote them heavily! Further, all of my clients program cobtain various forms of knee flexion on and off (not JUST nordics).
I just their value as having been blown out of proportion in recent years. They give you stronger knee flexion capacity, and their benefits to fitness and athleticism are mostly indirect. They aren't magical or any more beneficial than other forms of knee flexion. End of story.
Nordics are overrated but you got a lot wrong here. In sprinting most research shows the most important function of the hamstrings is "eccentric" knee flexion at terminal swing phase. I added the quotation marks because technically speaking the actual muscle fibres aren't acting eccentrically but that's even more nuanced. The issues is more so that the Nordic Curl doesn't recruit the BF long head that well and also that it's not a dynamic movement the contraction is very different.
When did I say that eccentric knee flexion is not important for sprinting? The entire beneficial mechanism of Nordic curls for athletes is that they build eccentric knee flexion strength and reduce the incidence of hamstring strains. I never said otherwise.
@@EnkiriElite You said that hip extension is the main function of the hamstring in explosive movements. I never claimed you said it was not important, I said the MOST IMPORTANT function.
Also like ive mentioned in another comment nordics are not that beneficial at preventing hamstring strains. Simply doing sprints has better injury prevention rates. Different hamstring exercsies recruit different regions and heads of the hamstring. The biceps femoris long head is the most frequently injured in sprinting and from MRI studies the nordic hamstring curl mostly recruits the biceps femoris shorthead and the semtendinosus, only a small bit of the distal biceps femoris long head. A stiff leg deadlift actually activates the biceps femoris better. A lying leg curl even better. And again this is from MRI not EMG so its much more reliable.
NICE STRAWMAN
Bruh
Yes, it must have been a good one if it got you to click on the video. Thanks for watching!
oh yeah that's true, i mean NO exercise is just gonna turn ya into a monster so yeah. Nordic curls are still awesome
Eh well, I've gotten much faster doing them so.. A lot of the conventional lower body exercises will cover "hip extension". Nordic curls strengthen the hamstings so therefore it translates to movements that include the hamstrings. I feel like this video is just being contradictory just for the sake of it.
Not really
You keep running around like that and the cops are going to start to wonder what you've done wrong
They already have!! 😫
Kneed over toes guy: hold my beer
So... RDLs?
There's a lot of conflicting information online in the fitness side of things. Best to think for yourself, but I myself found great success with Nordics, a lot of the regular lower body exercises cover "hip extension".
keep doing them they are key to injury prevention and the eccentric movement teaches you better control over the muscle and getting better at stopping quickly
@@Adrik808 I always and still do both
Someone had to say it.
I do both 🗿
as you should
Finally someone said it
Maybe it's dogmatic thinking, and your just too weak to do them lol
Subscribed and liked, I’d pay for this information.
some people do lol
Quit actin like you be knowin Alec
You know me, actin a fool is the only thing I'm good for.
Knee flexion still works strength and function of the entire hamstring musculature
Flexing the knees makes the hips strong too. That's really the argument you chose? Lol
@@EnkiriElite not even close to what I said, I’m saying that every part of the hamstring is strengthened through loaded knee flexion
@@EnkiriElite well now that I think about it though, my hip extension feels stronger when my knee flexion is strong. Knee flexion strength/power certainly complements hip extension strength/power
Sounds pretty close to what he said @@agamjyotsingh5259
@@agamjyotsingh5259so you agree that flexing the knees doesn't make the hips strong. Let's follow to the finish line then...
How can "every part of the hamstring be strengthened through loaded lnee flexion" if the primary function of the hamstrings to extend the hip? @agamjyotsingh5259
I think people see someone like Ben Patrick (knees over toes guy) and believe that they too will yield the same athletic results, forgetting that he was an athlete before, just a broken down one with lots of weak points. Those were his limiting factors. He worked hard on them and they’re now his strengths, as we’re seeing the end result. If your limiting factor is your genetics, then you’re just💩 out of luck lol
That’s not a jab at Ben, quite the contrary. I think he’s been a great influence on the fitness industry.
What can I do to improve if my limiting factor is genetics?
His injuries helps him back psychologically. Now that they’re gone. He’s more comfortable putting greater forces
the nordic hyper machine by "Freak Athlete" would like a word with you @freakathleteco
I have the one by tib bar guy lol
Doesn't change what I'm saying in this video
@@EnkiriElite I know, I wasn't in disagreement