Women and not lifting heavy, when will the myths FINALLY die?

Posted on | December 22, 2008 | 7 Comments

Women shouldn’t lift heavy.

OK, this one is nothing terribly new, but some of the places I’m still bumping into it are driving my crazy. Where does this nonsense where women are afraid they’ll look like a female contest bodybuilder come from? Seriously. I’m tired of it.

There are circles where I expect people to not know any better. I won’t fault them for that. But I’ve seen women who are students in an exercise physiology graduate program doing this. I saw a girl working on her MS in Exercise Phis. deadlifting 30lbs for a set of ten the other day. She’s told me in the past that she “lifts pretty heavy” and I know she does not have an injury preventing her from moving a weight that might require her to breath heavily.

I’m increasingly seeing fitness blogs and articles around the internet extolling the virtues of women lifting. This is good, really good. I’m really glad to see this step in the right direction. But all too often those same pieces feature pictures of some woman curling ten pounds. So, just this once, I’m going to stop being critical and try to produce something helpful. If one person sees this and decides to stop playing with weights, and start lifting them I’ll consider it time well spent. Along these lines, my suggestions are below.

The overwhelming majority of people will benefit from completely ditching the isolation exercises. These are specialized movements that are beneficial to a bodybuilder preparing for a contest. Weather you are interested in functional real world strength, or aesthetics you’ll benefit much more big compound movements. These are exercises where you can move a significant amount of weight, and that use more than one muscle group. Good examples are the squat, deadlift, bench press, shoulder press, pull-ups and barbell rows.
Yes, this means stop worrying about your biceps and triceps. Trust me, if you get stronger doing pull-ups your biceps will be stimulated. If your bench or shoulder presses goes up by thirty pounds, your triceps strength will have improved a lot.
It seems a lot of women really have no idea what “heavy” means. Now everyone has to start somewhere. I’m not an overly strong person naturally. By being completely stubborn I’ve gotten most of my lifts to the intermediate level or slightly higher, which is not really anything impressive, so I do understand this. Wherever you start is fine, but just to provide an idea of what reasonable values are I’m linking to a compiled list of weightlifting skill standards, sorted by gender and weight. To quote the source “The standards (not norms) presented in the linked tables below represent a 1RM performance (in pounds) that can be reasonably expected of an adult athlete at various levels of training advancement using standard full range-of-motion barbell exercises with no supportive wraps or suits.”
http://www.exrx.net/Testing/WeightLifting/StrengthStandards.html
Along the lines of the post above. Wherever you start is fine, but the weights need to be going up. The goal here is to get stronger. More weight on the bar doesn’t necessarily mean stronger. More weight on the bar, for the same number of reps, with identical or better form does. Doing the same weight and rep scheme day in and day out will not lead to progress beyond the first few workouts. If you’re not getting stronger, you’re doing something wrong. Figure out what it is, and fix it.
If you’re unsure of how to do an exercise correctly ASK. The only think worse than seeing someone lifting toy weights, is seeing someone trying to pull a 1RM deadlift with their back completely bent, or screaming as they do quarter squats. Guys, with their macho egos seem to be more guilty of this one, but you CAN screw yourself up seriously if you don’t the the movements correctly. The link above (exrx.net) has some excellent explanations of safe form. I’d also strongly suggest a book called “Starting Strength” by Mark Rippetoe for people new to the lifts and new to strength program design.
Another women specific one. You WILL NOT GET TOO BIG easily. When you see bodybuilders (male or female) you’re seeing people who are genetically predisposed to gain muscle easily, AND take insane amounts of steroids and other drugs and are fanatic about their training and diet. Even if you’re a genetic freak who can gain muscle very easily it will not sneak up on you.
A full discussion of program design and rep ranges is beyond the scope of this particular disjointed rant, but I will say that this is another area where if you are unsure, do your homework and learn. For most people’s purposes, there will be periods of heavy lifting (where only 1-6 reps can be completed with the weight) and perhaps some periods of lighter lifting (where muscular failure occurs around 8-12 reps). Higher rep ranges have their place and purpose but this isn’t it.
A lot of “pro trainers” at big box gyms don’t have any idea what they’re talking about. If you’re new to all this, having an experienced teacher is a great idea. However don’t assume that someone is experienced just because they hold a trainer card from somewhere. The IFLift has a great article about this.

Ok, to wrap things up I’m posting youtube links to a personal example of this. About eight months ago my girlfriend ended up in the hospital on IV fluids for two days and was unable to train with anything heavy for five months. During this period, the ONLY activity she did was very light rock climbing (nothing overhung or powerful). After being deconditioned from this, she started a basic liner progression barbell program (basically what was outlined in Starting Strength, the book I recommended above).

The videos below are her 1 rep max efforts after three months of this. I personally would like the squat to be a bit deeper, but it’s passable. She’s about 125lbs here.
I’m posting these to provide an example of a woman who has been training seriously (but not obsessively) for a few months and the results. It’s also worth noting that she’s pushing respectable weights here, and doesn’t look like a science experiment.
Both videos are being posted with her permission.

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Comments

7 Responses to “Women and not lifting heavy, when will the myths FINALLY die?”

Jake Briskin
December 23rd, 2008 @ 5:07 am

It’s so great to see a woman lifting seriously. If only more women would watch those videos and realize you don’t need a she-hulk frame to throw around significantly more than your own bodyweight. (DISCLAIMER:) I’ve been training with barbells for all of about fifteen months, and it’s only for the last five or so that I’ve really known what the hell I’m doing, so please take everything I say lightly. (END DISCLAIMER) If the deadlift and the squat are really being measured at their max, in any normally proportioned person who has been training for more than a few weeks, the DL should be a lot higher. (Sorry for pointing out the obvious.) I agree that her squat could use another healthy dose of depth, although this is just from looking at one single lift. Also, on the deadlift, even if she doesn’t feel that her grip is slipping, she could probably add a good amount of weight right away just by chalking liberally and using a mixed grip.

By the way, I love your blog. Please keep posting for years to come!
Amy
December 31st, 2008 @ 4:23 pm

Thanks for this post. I’m a beginner at lifting weights, but I’m already seeing a lot of benefits to doing so. I can’t wait to get buff and strong, and I’m not afraid that I’ll get “bulky.” Although honestly, I’d rather be bulky from muscles than fat. I think a female body builder is WAY more attractive than a female on the “plate to mouth armcurls and sitting on the couch” program any day. But yes, unless you’re some genetic freak, women won’t get that big unless they’re doing something extra to help that along. I love your blog! Keep up the honest and good work

-Amy
chris
January 5th, 2009 @ 8:16 pm

Apologies for the delay in responding guys. I’ve been out of town climbing for a week or so over the holidays and am just now catching back up.

Jake -
I agree on all counts. I’ve noticed the same thing on my deadlifts. I can pull close to 50lbs heavier with an over-under grip, as opposed to a dual overhand. Even when it doesn’t feel like the grip is the limiting factor, that so often helps.

She’ll be pulling another 1RM deadlift in the next week or two, so we’ll see if we can get things up a bit higher.

Amy -
Thanks for the comments. I checked out your blog and you seem to be well on your way to transforming yourself. It’s really cool to see someone actually making positive changes in their life. I hope this success continues for you.
Scott
March 12th, 2009 @ 11:01 pm

THANK YOU I hate seeing women curling 1 lb dumbbells for 50 reps. Women have about 1/20 the amount of testosterone men have so no ladies you wont get huge, lift heavy get functional. /rant
Gubernatrix
March 13th, 2009 @ 12:49 pm

Great article, it’s good to get the message out. There are still not nearly enough role models out there, although a side effect of the success of Crossfit is the strong female role model element, so hopefully this situation will improve.

I try to provide this with my own site but much of the time I am preaching to the choir as I rarely reach women who *don’t* lift weights already.

Still, the time will come.
Jo
May 26th, 2009 @ 3:47 pm

Amen, man. Nothing makes me happier than when I see other women throwing the weights around.
Project Swole
July 8th, 2009 @ 2:08 pm

I too have been promoting the virtues of women lifting heavy for many years now. I have personally trained no less than 3 women who have lifted heavy (1-5 reps) alternating with moderate (8-12 reps) weights for 3 or more months. It’s amazing, but all three of them ended up getting stronger and obtaining the body image they were shooting for. One even won 2nd place in a figure competition.