Women Resistance Training Series

Women resistance training is not much different than men resistance training; the musculoskeletal systems of women are nearly the same. Men's bodies in general have different areas of fat tissue predisposition than women's bodies do, and other minor gender-differences which I will dedicate an entire article about in the near future.

But because of these minor gender-differences AND culture stereotypes (most of it is not true) the women resistance training was instituted.

As a personal trainer, myself I had my share of resistance training with both men and women.

Women resistance training series- article and the others that will follow were born to cater women's needs and their priorities of specific body areas (arms, thighs and more) to improve upon.

For the last several years, I have trained numerous women clients and heard these women complaining and seeking advice about specific body improvements. So, if I may-I would like to share with you those common scenarios and they go like this:

1) I need to lose weight; especially my arms "you know" the back of my arms because they wiggle.

2) How can I firm my inner thighs, I have tried everything? Really!

3) Hey Moe, what can I do about strengthening my upper body so that I can do push-ups?

4) Hey Moe, let me ask you this. Why can't I do chin-ups? They are too hard-I can't do even one!!

These were the most common, repeated good requests and legitimate questions I've heard from these women; and I have to say most of these clients, if not all, trained hard and were consistent with their workouts.

But still there were things missing from their workouts for improving these certain body areas!

I have concluded, based on my experience that many women did indeed (and still do) need improvement in these areas. And these areas again are:

-Losing weight around the inner thighs:

Generally, women more than men have a tendency to build fat around their lower body more noticeably than the upper body. Perhaps this is because of physiological reasons and hormonal changes in the woman's body.

-Firming and strengthening the inner thighs :

Firming these specific body areas requires certain exercises that target those specific muscles, but many keep missing by training the unintended muscles with the wrong exercises.

Also, knowing how many repetitions, sets, speed of movement and other variables can make the exercise more effective (more on that later.)

-Toning and losing fat around the arms, particularly in back of upper arms:

Many women don't want to exercise their arms "too much" fearing that they'll look like guys!

So they learn to exercise their arms "minimally and lightly" to keep the arm muscles from growing too big. Believe it or not, this "universal myth" still circulates among a large population of women.

So let me break the news to you regarding your fear of performing resistance training thinking you will become bulky and muscular and you will lose your femininity.

This will not happen unless you spend hours in performing resistance training, and taking supplements/steroids to enlarge your muscles in a freakish way, but I doubt it very much.

It's a well-known fact that women has less testosterone and more estrogen than men, so that's a big factor that women most likely will not get muscular by following natural resistance exercises and diet, period.

Part 2 of Women Resistance Training Article