Nordic Curl
Hamstring injury prevention — the #1 AFL injury
How to do it well
The set-up and the rep in full, then the cues the app shows on the exercise card — the short version, for the moment you are standing in front of the bar.
Set-up
Kneel on a pad with the ankles held — under a partner's hands, a loaded bar, or a fixed pad. Body upright from knees to head, arms crossed or hands ready in front of the chest.
The rep
Lean forward from the knees as slowly as you can, keeping the hips extended so the body moves as one straight line. Resist the whole way with the hamstrings. When you can no longer hold it, fall into a push-up catch, then push off the floor just enough to get back up and let the hamstrings finish the return.
On the exercise card
- Slow eccentric
- Push back up
- Tempo
- 3–5s lower
What goes wrong, and the fix
| What goes wrong | The fix |
|---|---|
| Bending at the hips | That lets the hamstrings off. Squeeze the glutes and keep the hips in line with the body. |
| Dropping fast after the first few degrees | The slow part is the exercise. Only count range you can control; a short slow lower beats a long fall. |
| Doing them the day before a game | They cause real soreness, especially early on. Keep them early in the week, and build the sets up gradually. |
Make it easier, or harder
- Easier
- A band around the chest anchored behind you to take some of the bodyweight, or a shortened range.
- Harder
- A slower lower, a pause partway down, or holding a light plate at the chest.
How Train Smart prescribes it
The sets and reps below are the authored starting point. The actual weight you see is calculated from your own last top set and the week you are in within your four-week block.
Nordic hamstring curls are the best-supported exercise for reducing hamstring strains — the evidence is listed on the sources page — which is why they appear in nearly every football-code prehab block. Volume is low because the eccentric load is very high.
What it trains, and who trains it
- Muscles worked
- Hamstrings
- Region
- Lower body
If you cannot do this one
Rack taken, kit missing, or it does not suit you. These are the swaps the app offers, matched by movement pattern and body region — each with the reason it is a fair substitute.
| Alternative | Why it works as a swap |
|---|---|
| Nordic Drop (slow descent) | Take as long as possible to lower — max-effort eccentric hamstring |
| Adductor Slider | Slide one leg out laterally — eccentric adductor loading |
| Lying Leg Curl Machine | Machine: direct hamstring loading, easy to scale |
| Seated Leg Curl Machine | Machine: hamstring isolation through full range |
| Standing Single-Leg Curl Machine | Machine: unilateral hamstring isolation |
| Single-Leg RDL | Unilateral: hamstring + balance + hip control |
This exercise, in a program that knows why it is there
Train Smart puts this movement in the right session, at the right point in your block, at a weight calculated for you — and swaps it automatically if you do not have the kit.
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