Women and weight training: A winning combination

For quite some time a myth that women will get bulky if they weight train has been circulating.  Slowly this myth is dying as more and more ripped women are walking around as the result of hard weight training.  On the other hand the old guard of women "just doing cardio" is resulting in the same old flabby women still walking around talking about how weight training will make them too big.  Well I don't want to ruin their good time but weight training will actually make you smaller, toned and muscular, but the bottle of wine they are drinking every night is what will really make them big.  There are several reasons why weight training is so beneficial for women and in this blog we are going to talk about some of them.


1. Women don't have the hormones to be big.  
Women are estrogen dominate and men are testosterone dominate.  Testosterone is what helps builds muscles and since women don't possess a large amount of it, they can't effectively put on muscle.  Some women point to female bodybuilders as having a lot of muscle but what these uneducated people don't realize is that professional female bodybuilders supplement with extra testosterone to achieve the over muscled look that they possess.  Because women are naturally estrogen dominate, that predisposes women larger fat deposits.  Estrogen actually is a big cause of the increased fat in women compared to men.  Combine this with the fact that fat has a mass 7x larger than muscle and it means that the primary way women get bigger is through fat gain, not muscle gain.  So next time a female tells you they got bigger from weight training, ask them if they had their body fat tested when they made these assumptions.  I would bet a lot of money that they did not and they are blaming their "bigger" condition on the weights instead of putting the blame on their poor diet, improper training habits and lack of dedication.  Women have used weights as a scapegoat for sometime in gyms because it's much easier to blame the "weight training" for their ever expanding back side than it is to admit that they are lazy and eat poorly.

2. Weight training improves women's hormone profile.
The ironic thing here is that proper weight training actually improves the likelihood that a female will be lean by positively affecting their hormone levels.  Proper weight training (I'm not talking about cardio class with 10lb. db's, that is not weight training, that is added resistance cardio) helps improve insulin sensitivity, which directly correlates to less belly fat.  It also helps raise growth hormone and testosterone levels which are two of the primary hormones that are responsible for making women not only lean but for providing an overall feeling of well being.  Proper weight training also has a positive effect on thyroid hormone levels which regulate your metabolism.  So in all, you are actually making things almost impossible by not engaging in proper weight training.

3.  Osteoporosis
Every aging women knows the risks of Osteoporosis and how this disease can negatively affect their life as they age.  The number one way to prevent Osteoporosis is by moderate to heavy weight training.  Again, the 10lb db work that women typically do with cardio class is not real weight training and does nothing to help prevent Osteoporosis.  Squatting, Pressing, Pulling, and weighted carries with a moderate to heavy external resistance is the best defense against this disease.  It is actually a good offense too as studies have shown that resistance training can actually help add bone density back after it has been lost in elderly women.

4.  Functional Strength
One of our goals here at The Spot Athletics is to make our clients functionally strong.  This means that no matter what tasks you come across in your life, you are plenty strong enough to do them and feel good doing them too.  I can remember my grandma asking me to get can goods down out of cupboards and I know that this really bothered her as years before she could do this with ease.  Simple tasks such as carrying a basket up the steps or doing yard work becomes harder as you age and lose the strength you once possessed.  Proper weight training can stop and even reverse this from trend and allow your quality of life to be very high for a long long time.

5. Empowerment
We here from a lot of our female clients how they never thought they could do some of the things they have done at our facility.  I believe that training hard and overcoming mental obstacles is not only good for ones constitution but it bleeds into other parts of your life.  I know that my daughter will grow up weight training because I want her to always feel that she can do anything she puts her mind to.  Proper weight training helps to instill this feeling by empowering females to accomplish things they never thought they could do in an environment that has been typically male dominated and I feel that this positively affects every part of a female's life.

So if you still think women shouldn't do heavy weight training then come give us a few months and I guarantee you will be stronger, leaner, more confident and look better than you ever have in your life.