Why women should lift weights
Women and weight lifting – not always the prettiest picture comes to mind or even a picture at all. Well, I’d like to change that.
Why?
Because weightlifting is an amazing sport which has heaps of benefits to your body and mind.
1. Think of weight lifting as the new yoga.
So what is weight lifting? Weightlifting, in my view, is training various forms of Olympic Lifting. You know those strong people in the Olympics throwing hundreds of kgs above their head?
Pretty intimidating right? Well, hopefully not for long.
For me, weightlifting is different from just going to the gym and lifting weights. It is a real art and an extremely rewarding sport.
Gym training is for building muscles in isolation. There is not much skill and can get pretty repetitive and boring.
Weight lifting uses a combination of different muscles to move heavy loads in a variety ways which requires great skill, technique, and practice.
Consequently, it is a very therapeutic sport both physically and psychologically. Finally, it’s awesome for women!
2. The health benefits are uncanny
I think all women should lift weights.
Hopefully, this is not a biased opinion. I certainly love lifting heavy weights, pushing the limits and weight training, however, this is not the only reason I endorse it.
Yes, weight lifting does wonders for your physical health! Contrary to common thoughts weight lifting has the lowest injury rate of ANY sport – just let that sink in for a second.
So if your excuse for not weightlifting is ‘I don’t want to injure myself’ you’re more likely to do that running than weight lifting.
In turn weight lifting protects your joints from injury and is a great anti-aging tonic and it does this by improving your muscle strength and tone, not to mention it increases your bone strength, which decreases your risk of injury and keeps you away from osteoporosis.
Weightlifting enables you to maintain and improve balance, posture, and flexibility helping you remain independent with age. It also increases your stamina which means you won’t get so tired as easily and will enhance the performance of your everyday tasks!
So you see, weight lifting actually has lots of benefits especially as you get older! And is extremely safe too!
Personally, I find weight lifting extremely beneficial for your mind as it takes quite a lot of concentration to be able to perform the techniques correctly.
Everything else you are worried about goes out the window, you are there in that moment, lifting that weight with no distractions.
It really takes focus and determination, which is rewarded when you do a technically sound heavy lift. And it feels good to throw 60kg down on the floor after lifting it! Like any stress or anger, you might have is leaving your body as the bar hits the ground!
Wow, that’s a lot of health benefits! So why do so many women stray from weight lifting and turn to running, for example, to keep fit and healthy? (FYI, weight lifting would actually supplement your running to make you better at it and reduce your risk of injury and joint pain).
I believe women think they will become bulky when they weight train. However, I’ve seen this to be untrue.
And we know why.
Weight training increases your muscle mass it’s true, but as you gain muscle your body actually burns more calories at rest, as your new muscle's needs for energy increases.
This can actually prevent and control lifestyle diseases such as type 2 diabetes, heart disease, arthritis, back pain, depression and obesity and give you a banging bod!
Also, women who lift weights have been seen to have increased self-esteem and improved body image. Not to mention improved moods and self-confidence.
3. Find a coach!
So interested in trying weightlifting?
The best advice I can give is to find a good coach! There aren’t too many
There aren’t too many weight lifting studios, but many studios will do weight lifting and also a cardio session within the hour.
Make sure you give weight lifting about a month to start to understand the technique and get a real feel for it.
At the start it can be frustrating as you are getting your body to do things it has never done. However, once you get the technique and an understanding for the movements, it becomes very interesting and rewarding!