Strength Training for Women by Personal Trainer, Ben Singh
There are a few understandable reasons as to why weightlifting can be difficult for some men and women to get into - such as not knowing what you should be doing, or feeling intimidated by the gym giants watching over the weights. This fear of the unknown should never stop you from reaching your fitness goals though, so it's time to learn how to lift. It's time to tackle strength training for women so that you can start to see results.
By doing a weights workout, you could begin to lose fat and also gain strength if this is coupled with a balanced and nutritious diet.
Here are some more reasons you should love lifting weights:
- Allows for higher calorie consumption.
- Improves bone density.
- Stimulates muscle growth to sculpt curves.
- It can boost your confidence.
- It's fun and empowering.
- Improves overall strength.
Strength Training for Women
Firstly, it's time for some myth-busting on strength training for women. You may have heard that lifting will make you bulky, but this is anything but true. Differences in hormones between men and women have a large say in that. This is because men have higher natural levels of testosterone than women, which helps encourage muscle growth — and I’m sure you know a lot of men who weight train without gaining as much muscle as they’d like to, so you shouldn't worry about bulk.
Some of the female bodybuilders you might have seen images of usually workout most days, if not twice a day, have an extremely strict diet, and in some cases supplement heavily in order to achieve the desired look. So, don't think you'll be sporting bulging muscle after a few squats or press ups — this body type is a choice and not a necessary result of weight training.
Here’s a deal I like to make with any of my female clients who worry about this (and there’s been a LOT!):
“We’ll keep lifting weights until you get too bulky; the minute you don’t like your physique, we’ll stop adding extra weight”
SPOILER: In over three years no one has taken me up on this yet!
The Weekly Workout Split
So now we’ve briefly gone through why weight training will benefit you, let’s move onto how to start. First of all, you need to decide how many times you can workout every week based on your lifestyle and other commitments. That means consistently fitting weight training in around your job, kids, family, friends, etc. A good target is 3-4 times per week.
The next step is to decide what to include in your workout plan on each day. One very popular way of training is to split the body into muscle groups and train one or two each session e.g. chest and arms, or back and shoulders. However, this will mean that you're only targeting each muscle group around once per week, whereas studies have shown that 2-3 times is much more effective.
So here are two better options for you based on strength training either 3 or 4 times per week:
3 times per week – 3 x full body workouts
4 times per week – 2 x lower body, 2 x upper body workouts
Hopefully now you've realised that strength training for women is a lot easier than you first thought. Now you’ve got an idea of how to set up your workouts, it’s time to decide which exercises to include. Let’s go through the different categories of exercises you need to include in your training programme, with a few examples, along with an explanation for the technique of one exercise from each.
