Poliquin Step Up: How to Do It, Benefits and Progressions

The Poliquin step up is a short, heel-elevated step up (really more of a controlled step down and back up) that puts almost all of the work on the front of your thigh. You stand on a low step with your working heel raised on a wedge or small plate, lower your other foot slowly towards the floor while your knee slides forward over your toes, then press back up. It's named after Charles Poliquin, the Canadian strength coach who popularised it, and you'll also see a near-identical drill called the Peterson step up. Physios use it for cranky knees; lifters use it to build quads without loading the spine. Here's how to set it up and do it properly.

Setup: a low step and a heel wedge

You don't need much. The two pieces that matter are a low, stable step and something to raise your heel.

The step. Aim for roughly 10 to 20cm. A bottom stair, an aerobic step or a solid stack of bumper plates works. Anything wobbly is a bad idea, since you'll be balancing on one leg with your knee well forward. If you'd rather use a box, a low setting on a plyo box is fine, though most are taller than you need here.

The heel lift. Somewhere between 2 and 8cm of heel height is the usual range. A 2.5kg or 5kg plate placed under your heel does the job, and so does a squat wedge. The Gravity Fitness rubber squat wedge is a small pair of blocks that stack to 3, 5 or 8cm, which suits a low step because the footprint (19.5 by 12cm) actually fits on top of one. A full-length slant board is usually too long to sit on a step.

Put the wedge at the back of the step so your heel sits on it and the ball of your foot sits on the step itself. Your non-working leg hangs off the front or side of the step, ready to lower.

How to do a Poliquin step up

1. Stand tall on the working leg. Heel on the wedge, whole foot pressing down, other leg just off the edge. Hold a wall, rack or door frame lightly with one hand for the first few sessions.
2. Lower slowly. Bend the working knee and let it drive forward, past your toes, while your torso stays upright. Take 2 to 3 seconds. Your free foot drops towards the floor in front of or beside the step.
3. Tap, don't land. Touch the floor with the heel of your free foot (barely any weight on it) at the bottom. If your heel thumps down and you shift onto it, you've lost tension and turned it into a step off.
4. Press back up. Push through the whole working foot and straighten the knee fully, squeezing the quad at the top. Keep your hips level so your pelvis doesn't hitch up on one side.
5. Finish all reps on one side. Then switch legs and match the reps.

Your knee should track in line with your second and third toes the whole time. A slight inward drift on the last couple of reps is a sign the set is done.

Sets and reps: rehab versus strength

The same exercise covers both goals; what changes is load, tempo and how far you push it.

• Rehab or prehab: 2 to 3 sets of 12 to 20 reps per leg, bodyweight only, 3 seconds down. Keep the range short enough that pain stays at a mild level you'd rate 3 out of 10 or lower, and doesn't linger into the next day. Most knee programmes run three times a week.
• Strength and quad size: 3 to 4 sets of 8 to 12 reps per leg holding dumbbells, 3 seconds down and a controlled press up. Two sessions a week alongside your main lower-body lifts works well, usually after squats or as a finisher.
• Warm-up before squatting: 1 or 2 easy sets of 10 per leg to get blood into the knees.

Rest 60 to 90 seconds between sets. When you can hit the top of the rep range on every set with clean form, add a little weight or raise the step slightly.

Benefits

It loads the quad hard with very little weight. Raising the heel and letting the knee travel forward increases the demand on the knee extensors and reduces it at the hip. Researchers measured this on a decline board during single-leg squats, a closely related setup: knee moment rose about 40% once the decline reached 15 degrees or more, while hip and ankle moments dropped (Zwerver and colleagues, 2007). The same study found patellofemoral forces climbed more steeply than tendon forces past about 60 degrees of knee bend, which is a good reason the Poliquin step up stays short.

It suits knee rehab. You choose the depth, the load and the speed to the centimetre, which is hard to do with a squat. That matters because exercise is the best-supported treatment for patellofemoral pain (pain around the kneecap). The 2016 international consensus statement recommends exercise therapy for pain and function and says combining hip and knee exercises beats knee work alone (Crossley and colleagues). So pair this with hip work rather than doing it on its own.

The evidence for supervised programmes is real, but modest. In a Dutch trial of 131 people with patellofemoral pain, a six-week supervised exercise programme reduced pain and improved function at three months compared with usual care, and the pain benefit held at 12 months, yet the difference in people reporting full recovery wasn't statistically significant (van Linschoten and colleagues, 2009). Expect gradual improvement, not a cure in a fortnight.

It's spine-friendly and needs almost no kit. No bar on your back and very light loads mean you can train your quads hard on days your lower back wants a rest.

One honest caveat: the Poliquin step up is often marketed as a way to "isolate the VMO" (the teardrop muscle above the inside of the knee). The quad muscles share a nerve supply and generally work together, and the case for any exercise singling out the VMO is weak. It's a good quad exercise. Leave it at that.

Common mistakes

Using a step that's too high. A 30 to 45cm box turns this into a normal step up. Drop to 10 to 20cm and let the knee do the travelling.

Sitting the hips back. If your bum drifts behind you, the glutes and hamstrings take the load. Keep your torso tall and push the knee forward.

Dropping onto the free heel. Crashing down and pushing off the floor foot halves the work. Tap lightly, then go.

Rushing the lowering. The slow eccentric is where most of the benefit lives, especially for knees. If you can't control 2 to 3 seconds down, the load or the range is too much.

Letting the knee cave in. Watch it in a mirror. If it collapses towards the midline, reduce the range or the weight and work on hip strength too.

Pushing through sharp pain. Mild, settling discomfort during rehab is usually acceptable; sharp pain, pain that builds through the session or swelling the next day isn't. Back off and get it assessed.

Variations and progressions

Progress one thing at a time, roughly in this order:

• Slower eccentrics. Go from 3 to 5 seconds down, or add a 2-second pause just above the floor. This makes bodyweight surprisingly tough.
• Add dumbbells. Hold one in each hand at your sides, or a single one in the hand opposite the working leg for an extra hip stability challenge. A pair of adjustable dumbbells lets you climb in small jumps.
• Raise the heel. Move from 3cm to 5cm to 8cm of lift to push the knee further forward.
• Raise the step. Go up a few centimetres once the heel height feels easy, but stop before your torso starts folding.
• Weighted vest or backpack. Handy if your grip gives out before your legs do.

When you've outgrown it, the sissy squat and the ATG split squat are the logical next steps for deep knee flexion under load. The Bulgarian split squat gives you more total leg loading with a bit more glute.

Poliquin step up vs normal step up

They look similar and train quite different things. A normal step up uses a box at roughly knee height, a flat foot and a strong hip drive, so it hits the glutes and quads together and lets you lift heavy. The Poliquin version uses a low step, a raised heel and an upright torso, so the knee travels far forward and the quad does the work through a short range. You'd use a normal step up as a main strength or conditioning lift and the Poliquin step up as a quad accessory, a warm-up or a rehab exercise. Plenty of people do both in the same week.

If knees are your main concern, our knee strengthening exercises guide has more moves to pair it with, including the hip work the consensus statement recommends.

Recommended reads

1. Step ups: muscles worked, form and box height
2. Knee strengthening exercises at home
3. Bulgarian split squat: how to do it
4. ATG split squat: how to do it
5. The best adjustable dumbbells in the UK