The Benefits of Weight Training

There is actually a long list of why you should include strength training in your program.

MUSCLE FIGHTS FAT

Want to eat that extra piece of pizza without feeling guilty? Lift weights. Type II muscle fibers, the kind you build when you lift weights, improve whole-body metabolism. An increase in type II muscle fibers can reduce body fat without changes to diet and might be effective in the fight against obesity. Also, you burn calories during strength training, and your body continues to burn calories after strength training, a process called “excess post-exercise oxygen consumption” or EPOC.

FIGHT OSTEOPOROSIS

As you age, you naturally lose muscle and bone mass. This is of special concern for women, whose bones are smaller to begin with and can become dangerously weakened by age. Weightlifting can help fight this. Just as your muscles adapt to the stress of weightlifting by becoming bigger and stronger, your bones also adapt.

LOWER DIABETES RISK/BETTER BLOOD SUGAR CONTROL

You probably know that living a healthy lifestyle — including managing your weight, eating a healthy diet, getting regular exercise and abstaining from tobacco use — can help you prevent becoming a statistic, but you may not know that weightlifting, specifically, plays a significant role in reducing your risk. Weight training encourages the growth of muscles, which aids in lowering blood glucose because it uses glucose for energy.

PREVENTS BACK PAIN

If you work in an office, you know that sitting at your desk all day can wreak havoc on your lower back, leading to stiffness and pain. Weightlifting may help strengthen the muscles of your core — those that support your spine — to lessen the discomfort and undo some of the damage caused by sitting all day. But what are the best exercises? Squatting, step-ups and hip extensions are a few examples. Start with just your body weight and then add resistance to increase the challenge.

IMPROVED BALANCE

Aside from your major muscle groups, like your pecs and hamstrings, your body has various smaller muscles called stabilizer muscles. These muscles do exactly what you would think: They help stabilize you. Although you might lift weights to flatter your flexing muscles, each time you work out you’re indirectly targeting those little muscles that help keep you upright and take care of everyday tasks such as balancing on one foot to reach a high shelf or stopping yourself from falling on an icy surface. This is especially important for people as they age.

LADIES, YOU WON’T GET BULKY

Stop fearing the weights — lifting them is not going to turn you into a muscle-bound freak. Building huge muscles is intentional and takes a great amount of work, including lifting heavy weight at a high volume many times a week, following a weight-gain diet with copious amounts of lean protein each day and taking supplements. Lifting weights and eating a healthy diet will result in a fit and lean body, not a big and bulky one.

Lifting weight doesn’t make women huge, cupcakes make women huge ;)

IT WILL MAKE YOU MENTALLY STRONGER

Weightlifting teaches you the skill of perseverance, the ability to overcome discomfort and challenge yourself. Weight training teaches you to push yourself when everything tells you to stop, when your muscles start to give out and it burns and it hurts. When we get into those high-intensity situations, we have a choice, we can either stop everything or try to return to our comfort level, or decide that this level of discomfort is worth the reward. That decision — that it’s worth persisting through that uncomfortable situation 100 percent contributes to successful situations in other parts of our lives. Strength training will elevate your level of endorphins, which lift energy levels and improve mood.

YOU’LL LOOK AND FELL BETTER

Plain and simple, weightlifting is the best way to get a lean, toned, fit body — for both men and women. You can do all the cardio you want, but without some form of resistance training to challenge the muscles, you won’t get those toned muscles in all the right places, the ones that shape your body.

GENERAL SAFETY GUIDELINES

1. Only use safe and well-maintained equipment. Faulty equipment will significantly increase your risk of injury.

2. Warm up and cool down thoroughly. Incorporate slow, sustained stretches.

3. Wear appropriate clothing— natural fibers ‘breathe’ better than synthetics.

4. Don’t forget to breathe — exhale at the point of greatest exertion rather than holding your breath.

5. Control the weights at all times — don’t throw them up and down, or use momentum to ‘swing’ the weights through their range of motion.

6. Make sure you use correct lifting technique. Incorrect technique can slow your progress, or even cause injuries.

So, I am not telling you that lifting weights is easy, I am just telling that it’s WORTH IT … :)