Today we hear from Personal Trainer Sarah Bremner on a hot topic!
MYTH—LIFTING WEIGHTS WILL NOT HELP ME TO LOSE BODY FAT, ONLY CARDIO WILL.
This is completely untrue. In fact if a decrease in body fat is your goal, weight training is going to have a huge impact on the achieving this! Increasing your muscle mass will increase your metabolism, which means your body will burn more energy all throughout the day and night, even while you sleep! Muscle is much more dense than fat and burns three times more calories than fat, so replacing 1kg of body fat with 1kg of muscle will mean you are getting smaller and your metabolism is getting faster, win-win!
MYTH—LIFTING WEIGHTS WILL MAKE ME BIG AND BULKY.
Women’s bodies do not produce enough testosterone to stimulate large bulky muscle growth in the same way that men do. Men produce 10 times more testosterone than women, which is why it is comparatively easier for them to bulk up. Even for a man, for muscle growth to occur they need to be consuming sufficient calories for growth, that is more than the amount of calories required for maintenance, and they certainly wont see muscle mass increases if they are in calorie deficit. You see it all the time, men who are training properly at the gym but are not seeing an increase in muscle size because they aren’t feeding their muscles properly. For women to bulk up it is even more vital that they are consuming enough (a lot) of the right calories at the right time and even then it is so much more difficult because we simply don’t have the same hormone levels. A lot of the hugely muscly women you see may have taken substances to assist their muscle growth. So don’t worry about getting bulky! And besides, nothing is going to happen over night! If you do see your body slowly start to change in a way which you don’t like, you can easily change up your routine to get different results.
Resistance training has countless proven benefits for women! These include an increased metabolism, increased fat loss, creating a nice shape to your body (some people refer to this as looking ‘toned’) improving sleep quality, heart health and bone health just to name a few! You may also find that it is more motivating and enjoyable to set strength related goals and work towards them each session, rather than just doing your usual repetitive hour on the treadmill or bike every time you exercise. If you are new to weight training, or if you need some tips for the most effective ways to stay motivated and get the results you are after, stay tuned for my next post —“Four Tips for Getting Results in the Gym”."
Sarah xx
MYTH—LIFTING WEIGHTS WILL NOT HELP ME TO LOSE BODY FAT, ONLY CARDIO WILL.
This is completely untrue. In fact if a decrease in body fat is your goal, weight training is going to have a huge impact on the achieving this! Increasing your muscle mass will increase your metabolism, which means your body will burn more energy all throughout the day and night, even while you sleep! Muscle is much more dense than fat and burns three times more calories than fat, so replacing 1kg of body fat with 1kg of muscle will mean you are getting smaller and your metabolism is getting faster, win-win!
MYTH—LIFTING WEIGHTS WILL MAKE ME BIG AND BULKY.
Women’s bodies do not produce enough testosterone to stimulate large bulky muscle growth in the same way that men do. Men produce 10 times more testosterone than women, which is why it is comparatively easier for them to bulk up. Even for a man, for muscle growth to occur they need to be consuming sufficient calories for growth, that is more than the amount of calories required for maintenance, and they certainly wont see muscle mass increases if they are in calorie deficit. You see it all the time, men who are training properly at the gym but are not seeing an increase in muscle size because they aren’t feeding their muscles properly. For women to bulk up it is even more vital that they are consuming enough (a lot) of the right calories at the right time and even then it is so much more difficult because we simply don’t have the same hormone levels. A lot of the hugely muscly women you see may have taken substances to assist their muscle growth. So don’t worry about getting bulky! And besides, nothing is going to happen over night! If you do see your body slowly start to change in a way which you don’t like, you can easily change up your routine to get different results.
Resistance training has countless proven benefits for women! These include an increased metabolism, increased fat loss, creating a nice shape to your body (some people refer to this as looking ‘toned’) improving sleep quality, heart health and bone health just to name a few! You may also find that it is more motivating and enjoyable to set strength related goals and work towards them each session, rather than just doing your usual repetitive hour on the treadmill or bike every time you exercise. If you are new to weight training, or if you need some tips for the most effective ways to stay motivated and get the results you are after, stay tuned for my next post —“Four Tips for Getting Results in the Gym”."
Sarah xx