reckonerDumbbell Romanian deadlift
The same hinge as the barbell version with a dumbbell in each hand instead. The weights sit beside your legs rather than in front of them, which makes the path easier to keep close and makes it far easier to start with something light.
Hinge to the hamstring stretch, no further.
- Pattern
- Hinge
- Trains
- Hamstrings, glutes
- Kit
- Dumbbell
- Loading
- A weight you choose
- Reckoner prescribes
- 4 sets of 5 to 8 reps at RPE 8
- Progression step
- 2 kg once the top of the range is clean
- Skill
- Some technique
- Recovery cost
- Moderate
- Not prescribed if you have declared
- Lower back
Muscles worked
How to do it
Stand tall with a dumbbell in each hand
Arms hanging, weights resting against the front of your thighs, feet about hip width. Pull your shoulders back and keep them there.
Soften the knees and hold that angle
A small bend and then no more. The knees should look about the same at the bottom of the rep as at the top. Everything else happens at the hip.
Push the hips back
Hips travel backwards, chest comes down. Let the dumbbells run down the outside of your thighs and stay close to your legs the whole way.
Hinge to the hamstring stretch, no further
That is the cue on your wrist. Stop when the hamstrings run out, not when the dumbbells reach the floor. Then drive the hips forward and stand tall.
What goes wrong
Letting the dumbbells drift forward
Held at your sides they want to swing away from you, and the further out they get the more of the load lands on your lower back. Keep them brushing your legs. If they are drifting, your hips are not going far enough back.
Turning it into a squat
It is very easy with dumbbells at your sides to just bend your knees and lower them straight down, because nothing stops you. Then it is a poor squat rather than a hinge, and the hamstrings do very little. Watch the knee angle.
Assuming lighter dumbbells mean a smaller exercise
The hinge trains the same muscles in the same pattern whatever is in your hands. What the dumbbells change is the ceiling and the grip, and grip is usually what gives out first. That is a reason to use straps or a barbell, not a reason to think the movement is doing less.
How Reckoner progresses this lift
Six weeks of this lift, from 22.5 kg, run through the real engine. Nothing below was typed in: the prescription, the decision and the sentence beside it all come from the same code that writes your week.
| Week | Prescribed | What it did |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | 4 x 5 at 22.5 kg | More reps 5 → 6 repsYou finished every set at RPE 7, with room left in the range, so the reps climb before the load does. |
| 2 | 4 x 6 at 22.5 kg | More reps 6 → 7 repsYou finished every set at RPE 7, with room left in the range, so the reps climb before the load does. |
| 3 | 4 x 7 at 22.5 kg | More reps 7 → 8 repsYou finished every set at RPE 7, with room left in the range, so the reps climb before the load does. |
| 4 | 4 x 8 at 22.5 kg | Load up 22.5 kg → 25 kgYou hit the top of the range at RPE 7, so the bar goes up 2.5 kg to 25 kg and reps reset to five. |
| 5 | 4 x 5 at 25 kg | Deload 40% of sets offFive weeks of building, then one week lighter. About 40% of the sets come off. The load holds and your reps stay where you earned them, so you keep the strength and lose the fatigue. |
| 6 | 2 x 5 at 25 kg | More reps 5 → 6 repsYou finished every set at RPE 7, with room left in the range, so the reps climb before the load does. The lighter week is over, so this is back to four sets. |
Real engine output, not an illustration. Every row was produced by running the engine itself when this page was generated.
The full rule, and why the reps move before the load does, is in how Reckoner decides to add weight.
Questions people ask
Dumbbells or a barbell for Romanian deadlifts?
The barbell if you want to load it heavily and you have one. Dumbbells if you are starting out, training at home, or want the weights beside you rather than in front. Both are in the library with their own records, so you do not lose history by using either.
Should the dumbbells touch the floor?
No, and they usually should not get close. The bottom of the rep is where your hamstrings stop you with a flat back. Reaching further to touch down means the extra range came from your spine.
Will Reckoner give me this with a lower back restriction?
No. Lower back is the one restriction recorded against it. The barbell version records lower back and hip, so this one stays available slightly more often.
Similar movements
Reckoner eases the load first when this lift stalls, and offers one of these only if it stalls again after that. A lift already as light as your kit goes has no load left to ease, so the offer comes straight away. Each of them has a page.