Barbell Good Morning
The barbell good morning is a hip hinge with the bar on your upper back: you push your hips back, tip your torso forward with a flat back and stand up again. It trains the hamstrings and the spinal erectors, with the glutes finishing each rep, and teaches you to hold a neutral back while your hips do the work.
How to do the barbell good morning
Set the bar in a rack at upper-chest height and step under it so it rests on your upper traps, as for a high-bar squat.
Grip the bar just outside your shoulders, pull it into your back and walk out with two short steps, feet about hip width apart.
Unlock your knees a little, take a big breath into your belly and brace your trunk.
Push your hips straight back and let your torso tip forward, back flat and the bar over the middle of your feet.
Stop when your hamstrings are on a strong stretch or just before your lower back starts to round.
Drive your hips forward to stand tall, breathe out at the top and brace again before the next rep.
Bar position and setup for the good morning
Put the bar where you would carry it for a high-bar squat: on the meaty part of your upper traps, not on the bony top of your spine. Take a grip just outside your shoulders and pull the bar down into your back so it cannot move once you tip forward. Stand with your feet about hip width apart and your weight spread over the whole foot. Learn the movement with an empty bar or a broomstick first; the hinge feels unusual at the start because the bar travels forward with your torso.
Bracing and breathing
Breathe in deeply before every rep and hold the air while you hinge and while you stand up. Together with a firm trunk, the held breath keeps your lower back in the position you started in. Breathe out at the top, take a new breath and brace again. If you need to breathe out halfway down, the set is too long or the bar is too heavy.
The hip hinge: how far to go
Think of closing a car door with your backside: the hips move straight back, the shins stay almost vertical and the knees keep the small bend you set at the start. Your torso tips forward only because your hips travel back. Go down until your hamstrings are on a strong stretch or your back is about to lose its flat position, whichever comes first. Flexible lifters get close to parallel to the floor; most stop higher, and that is fine.
Tempo and range
Lower yourself under control, hold the stretch for a moment and stand up by driving the hips forward, not by lifting the chest first. Use the same depth on every rep, so your reps stay comparable from one session to the next, and add load only while your knee angle and back position hold through the whole set.
Muscles worked by the barbell good morning
- Primary
- Hamstrings
- Lower back
- Secondary
- Glutes
- Adductors
The hamstrings and the spinal erectors carry the good morning. The hamstrings lengthen as your hips travel back and pull your torso up again, while the erectors along your spine hold your back flat against a bar that sits far from your hips. The glutes join in as you drive the hips forward, and the adductors help extend the hip. In an EMG study with trained men, hamstring and erector activity tended to rise with the load; in another, the inner hamstring worked harder than the outer one in the good morning and three other hamstring exercises.
Common good morning mistakes
Rounding the lower back
Once the lower back loses its position, the hamstrings stop getting the stretch and your back holds the bar in a shape it cannot brace well. End the rep where your back is still flat, even if that is higher than you hoped.
Turning it into a squat
Bending the knees more and more lets your hips drop and takes the stretch off the hamstrings. Keep the soft knee bend you set at the start for the whole set.
Loading it like a deadlift
The bar rides on your back, far in front of your hips at the bottom, so the lever is long. Pick a weight you can control through the full hinge, well below your squat or deadlift.
Letting the bar roll toward your neck
A bar that creeps up presses on your neck and pulls your upper back round. Squeeze it into your traps with your hands and keep it in the same spot from the first rep to the last.
Throwing the head back
Looking up at the ceiling bends your neck out of line with your spine. Keep your gaze on the floor a little ahead of you so your head moves with your torso.
Good morning tips from the Muscla training logic
- Muscla's training logic counts the good morning as a compound lift. Turn on “Warm-up sets” for it in your routine: Muscla then ramps you up from the empty bar to your working weight in a few lighter sets.
- End working sets with about two reps in the tank, two to three when you train for strength and one more if you are new to training. Going to failure adds little or no extra muscle, but more fatigue.
- Rest 2 minutes between sets when you train for strength and 90 seconds for muscle and every other goal.
- Muscla's plan does not schedule the good morning, so add it to your own routine and choose its progression there, for example Double progression: once every set reaches the top of your range, the weight goes up by 5 kg (10 lb) unless you set your own step, and the reps start again at the bottom.
- Keep it off the days you deadlift or do Romanian deadlifts. Muscla's plan never puts two variants of one movement pattern on the same day, and the good morning is a hip hinge too.
Barbell good morning sets, reps and rest
| Goal | Reps | Rest |
|---|---|---|
| Strength | 8–12 | 2 min |
| Muscle | 6–10 | 90 s |
| Lose fat | 6–12 | 90 s |
| Fit | 8–12 | 90 s |
| Comeback | 8–12 | 90 s |
These are the ranges Muscla's plan uses for this kind of exercise; in your own routine, you pick your range.
Muscla's training logic counts the good morning as a compound lift, so the rows below show the compound ranges Muscla's plan uses; pick the one for your goal for your own routine. There, Double progression lowers the weight by about 10% after three sessions without progress.
Estimate your good morning one-rep max
Filled in with example values. Replace them with yours.
Estimated 1RM
Brzycki 112.5 · Lombardi 117.5
Epley: 100 × (1 + 5 ÷ 30) = 116.7 kg
Load 117.5 kg on the bar →| Reps | Weight | % of 1RM |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | 117.5 kg | 100 % |
| 2 | 110 kg | 94 % |
| 3 | 105 kg | 91 % |
| 4 | 102.5 kg | 88 % |
| 5 | 100 kg | 86 % |
| 6 | 97.5 kg | 83 % |
| 7 | 95 kg | 81 % |
| 8 | 92.5 kg | 79 % |
| 9 | 90 kg | 77 % |
| 10 | 87.5 kg | 75 % |
| 11 | 85 kg | 73 % |
| 12 | 82.5 kg | 71 % |
Barbell good morning alternatives
Good morning exercise questions
What muscles does the good morning work?
Mainly the hamstrings and the spinal erectors along your lower back. The glutes and adductors help extend the hip, most of all as you stand up.
Is the good morning bad for your back?
The good morning trains your back muscles to hold your spine still under load, which is the point of the exercise. Keep the back flat and the weight moderate, and end the set when you can no longer hold your position.
How far should you bend in a good morning?
Only as far as your back stays flat and your knees keep their soft bend. Your hamstring flexibility sets the limit, not a fixed angle, and the range usually grows with practice.
Good morning or Romanian deadlift: which is better?
Both are hip hinges. In an EMG comparison of four hamstring exercises, the Romanian deadlift produced more hamstring activity than the good morning, so it makes the better main lift; the good morning works well as a lighter second hinge.
How heavy should a good morning be?
Clearly lighter than your squat or deadlift. In a study with trained men, heavier loads made lifters bend their knees more and shortened the hamstring stretch, so choose a weight that lets you keep your knee angle steady.
Train it with Muscla
Muscla plans your sets, reps and rest, and sets the next weight after every session.
Coming to the App Store. Free to start.
Sources
- Vigotsky AD, Harper EN, Ryan DR, Contreras B. Effects of load on good morning kinematics and EMG activity. PeerJ. 2015;3:e708. PubMed
- McAllister MJ, Hammond KG, Schilling BK, et al. Muscle activation during various hamstring exercises. J Strength Cond Res. 2014;28(6):1573-1580. PubMed
- Refalo MC, Helms ER, Trexler ET, et al. Influence of resistance training proximity-to-failure on skeletal muscle hypertrophy: a systematic review with meta-analysis. Sports Med. 2023;53(3):649-665. PubMed
- Schoenfeld BJ, Pope ZK, Benik FM, et al. Longer interset rest periods enhance muscle strength and hypertrophy in resistance-trained men. J Strength Cond Res. 2016;30(7):1805-1812. PubMed