Do Women Get Big Muscles If They Lift Weights?

By Howe Russ


Should women lift weights in the gym? This is one of the oldest questions in fitness and it's amazing how much confusion it still causes today. Today we will give you the lowdown on this often debated topic.

The unfortunate thing about the health and fitness industry is that everybody, even non-professionals, have an opinion on what people should and should not be doing. Many of those opinions don't take any scientific research into consideration and this often leads people down a path of confusion.

In the early 1970's, during the heyday of bodybuilding characters such as Arnold Schwarzenegger and Lou Ferrigno, many mainstream gyms were to blame for starting a trend of encouraging ladies to stick to cardiovascular exercise while men hit the weights section. This was then set in stone with the emergence of home circuit style workouts which were released on VHS, encouraging ladies to use nothing more than a bottle of water or very light dumbbell as resistance.

Why? The belief was that if a woman touched a heavy weight she would grow big muscles and create a bodybuilder physique. Of course, if you have ever known somebody who has taken on a bodybuilding lifestyle you will know that this belief is pure nonsense. Bodybuilding is really a lifestyle and it's not surprising if a bodybuilder takes offence when they overhear somebody saying they don't want to touch a heavier dumbbell because they don't want to get huge. If only it were that easy.

Written below are a few of the major benefits to using resistance workouts as part of your fitness routine. Back in the early days a lot of opinions were based on very little evidence because it was all still relatively new, whereas nowadays we have the massive benefit of hindsight and years of scientific advancements.

* If you only perform cardiovascular workouts you will not build the lean physique most women want to achieve. Resistance training plays a major role here.

* Not only will your body build more lean muscle, you'll actually burn off more fat in the process.

* Your overall fitness will greatly increase, as will your metabolism.

* Resistance training has similar fat burning and lean muscle building effects to high intensity interval training.

The four points above should be enough to get you on the resistance machines the next time you hit the gym, but now we answer the top concern ladies have on this subject. Is it going to make you grow big muscles and appear bulky? No, it is not. Female's simply don't have enough testosterone in their body's to do that, which is why those who become female bodybuilders need to get their diet in check, figure out what supplements to take and consume things like testosterone boosters on a regular basis.

A lot of thought has to go into that type of lifestyle. It's not something you need to worry about, as it certainly cannot happen without deliberately aiming for it.

So what is the final verdict? Should women lift weights or should they avoid them? Of course, every lady who wants to lose weight or get leaner should really be performing resistance training at least a couple of times each week. Alongside learning what supplements to take this is probably one of the biggest sticky subjects in gyms around the world. Now you know the facts.




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