For Women Weight Lifting is Essential, Here’s Why
Weight lifting has long been the domain of men. For women there are a lot of barriers to heavy lifting. Sure, most of you will be willing to pick up the five- or eight-pound weights and do some easy reps in the hopes of thinning your arms or doing a few squats to try to lose thigh inches, but not many are open to the idea of real, heavy lifting.
Lifting can seem intimidating, especially in a gym where the weight section is dominated by men. And women often fear heavy lifting will make them look like those men.
Trainers know better, though, and I recommend seeing one to show you just how beneficial weight lifting is. Lets bust long-held myths, get started to ensure safety and good form, and feel confident in the weight section of the gym.
Major Benefits of Strength Training
Trainers want women to know that lifting is the next important challenge to tackle. Women, and anyone of course, get so many benefits from regular weight lifting sessions: added strength and confidence, stronger bones, fat burn and weight loss, better athletic performance, and fewer injuries. It’s a win-win-win-win. Here are just a few of the facts you should know:
Get Stronger
The most obvious benefit for anyone lifting weights is getting stronger. And, most important to building stronger muscles is to really push the weights. Some women are okay with doing some light strength training, and that’s great for muscle endurance, but real lifting actually builds strength. By real lifting we mean heavy weights and compound exercises like deadlifts, rows, and squats. Getting stronger makes everyday chores and activities—picking up the kids, taking out the garbage, cleaning—easier.
Expect to Burn Fat, a Lot
A big motivation women have for working out is burning fat. Cardio has long been considered the ultimate fat-burner, but there is mounting evidence that weight lifting not only burns fat but may even do it better than cardio.
In one study researchers found that adults who walked for exercise lost as much weight as those who walked and did weight training. But, those who only walked lost lean mass, while those who included lifting lost fat and maintained muscle.1 Additionally important for most women, lifting is better than cardio for losing belly fat.
Lift to Burn Calories Too
Again, cardio is always thought of as the holy grail of calorie burning, but strength training is important for burning them up too. In fact, you may actually burn more calories from doing heavy lifting. Yes, an hour of cardio burns more calories than an hour of lifting, but it’s after the fact that the magic happens.
The secret is that lifting causes an increase in the body’s resting metabolic rate—the rate at which it burns calories when you’re doing nothing—for hours after the workout. A study with young women found that those who worked out by lifting weights for 100 minutes saw a 4.2 percent increase in resting metabolism for 16 hours after the fact.2
Prevent Injuries
Weight lifting increases muscle strength, and that means every normal or athletic physical task becomes a little bit easier. It also becomes less risky. When you are stronger you can move in more efficient ways and that works in your favor to prevent injury. Runners for example, who also work on muscle strength, can prevent knee injuries. The stronger muscles supporting the knee joint promote good form and prevent pain and injury.
Get Better at Other Sports
Not all your females are athletes, but you are probably really into certain activities and sports: running, cycling, soccer, or dance, for instance. It’s easy to get into one particular type of activity and really focus on it. This is not a bad thing, but amateur athletes need to understand that they will get better at that sport by adding weights. A couple of days a week of lifting will help you become faster runners, crush your PRs, and become all-around better athletes.
Lifting Strengthens Bones, Not Just Muscles
Having muscle strength is so important, but the great thing about lifting is that it strengthens bones too. Women are especially susceptible to losing bone density and strength as they get older, and doing anything to combat it can prevent fractures and breaks.
Here’s how it works: just like with muscles, when your bones are impacted they respond by breaking down and building new cells. When you do a strength training move, such as a squat, the muscle that is contracting and extending pulls on the bones in the leg. This in turn causes the bone to make new cells. With consistent lifting and strength training bone loss can be prevented or even reversed.
Feel Good, Darn Good
The best reason of all for women to try lifting is that they will feel good. It’s a new challenge, and feeling and actually getting stronger is an empowering experience that builds confidence and self-esteem. Then there are the physical benefits as well. Lifting improves body composition, increases muscle tone, and burns fat. You will like how your body looks after consistent weight lifting, and that will only increase confidence more.
What’s Keeping You from Lifting? Let’s Bust These Women Weight Lifting Myths
To get more women into lifting, let’s address some common myths. These are untruths that keep a lot of women out of the weightlifting gym. From being afraid to look like the muscle-bound men that populate the gym to thinking that smaller weights are adequate, it’s time to correct the wrong thinking too many women have about heavy lifting.
Myth #1 – Lifting Makes Ladies Bulky
This may be the biggest myth holding women back from lifting, and it needs to be busted. Anyone who has been lifting and strength training for a while knows that lifting with heavy weights doesn’t bulk you up. In fact, those really big guys pushing it in the weight section have worked very hard, spending hours and hours there to get so bulky. They eat seriously restricted diets and a ton of protein to get there.
A typical person working with a trainer, doing a few weekly sessions of heavy weight lifting will not get bulky. What she will get is leaner and more defined. The real result of moderate weight training is losing fat and developing muscle tone.
Myth #2 – Lifting Gyms are Intimidating
This isn’t technically a myth because how a gym makes you feel is subjective. But, the big guys and serious ladies working out with the weights aren’t trying to scare others away. They’re just working really hard. As with any other sport, the participants are generally warm, welcoming, and inclusive of all ability levels.
Women interested in starting weight training, but who are intimidated, really need the right guide. A good trainer to teach form and set up a reasonable starting routine that builds and develops as she gets stronger is the key to helping her feel more confident. Lifting is for everyone and is scalable, even for beginners who are coming straight from the couch.
Myth #3 – Dinky Little Weights Are Enough
Some women will say they already lift, but it doesn’t really count unless it’s heavy lifting. Of course, this is relative and different for everyone, so it is important to figure out an appropriate place to start. For those who are not interested in serious bodybuilding but are willing to add some more intense strength training to her workouts, heavy lifting means using weights that allow her to do eight to ten reps in a row.
Myth #4 – Lifting is Not for Older Women
Older women likely have the intimidation factor to the extreme when it comes to lifting, and you’re more likely to see younger females give it a try. But don’t make the mistake of neglecting this as you age.
Of course the ranges of motion and the weights used are likely to be smaller for older women, but they still can and should lift. As we get older we lose both muscle and bone mass and lifting can slow or even reverse that. One study of post-menopausal women found that those who engaged in twice-weekly, high-intensity strength training increased bone density, muscle mass, strength, and balance.3
Be sure you are lifting safely and correctly!
What About Weight Loss and Cardio?
By lifting so much you may mistakenly think you want to ditch cardio and focus on weights only. Make sure you aim for a good balance, especially when starting out with weights. As trainers know, there is a place for both cardio and strength training.
For women, especially those trying to lose weight, cardio is a big draw. Their fitness monitors tell them they’re losing a lot of calories doing it, and they can feel it too—cardio makes you sweat and breathe hard and feels like you’re really doing something.
But as we know, cardio is not the magic bullet for weight loss. Yes, it burns calories while it’s happening, but as soon as the cool down is done and the heart rate is back to normal, so is metabolism and calorie burning. With heavy lifting, on the other hand, the body continues to burn more calories than normal for hours, up to 24 hours, after the training session.
Cardio is great for a calorie burn, for endurance and fitness, and of course for heart health. It is also an important part of an overall weight loss or maintenance plan, but it isn’t everything. Women get the most health benefits, weight loss, and fat burn from doing both cardio and strength training, while of course also eating a sensible diet.
Getting Started Lifting
Another myth that could be added to the list is that you need to get into some semblance of decent shape before beginning weight lifting. This activity is highly scalable, which means that anyone at any fitness level can get started. It is recommended to consult with a Trainer to ensure your current level and help you build up to heavier weights and more technical lifts.
More than anything else, a woman may need guidance and that push to get started in heavy lifting. To start lifting with no prior experience is overwhelming for anyone, but especially for a woman who rarely, if ever, sees someone who looks like her in the weight section.
Armed with all the benefits of heavy lifting and the information to bust the myths you can now get started on a weight lifting journey you won’t regret!
REFERENCES
Beavers, K.M., Ambrosius, W.T., Rejeski, W.J., Burdette, J.H., Walkup, M.P., Sheedy, J.L., Nesbit, B.A., Gaukstern, J.E., Nicklas, B.J., Marsh, A.P. (2017) Effect of Exercise Type During Intentional Weight Loss on Body Composition in Older Adults with Obesity. Obesity. 25 (11) 1823-1829
Osterberg, K.L, Melby C.L. (2000). Effect of Acute Resistance Exercise on Postexercise Oxygen Consumption and Resting Metabolic Rate in Young Women. Int. J. Sport Nutr. Exerc. Metab. 10 (1) 71-81
Nelson, M.E., Fiatarone, M.A., Morganti, C.M., Trice, I., Greenberg, R.A., Evans, W.J. (1994). Effects of Hig-Intensity Strength Training on Multiple Risk Factors for Osteoporotic Fractures. A Randomized Controlled Study. JAMA. 272(24) 1909-14