Women generally find it harder to strip body fat and increase strength when compared to men! In my experience of personal training in St. John’s Wood and personal training in Marylebone the key factor for clients to becoming lean and staying lean is the ability to add lean muscle tissue, and this entails increasing strength and producing the right hormonal output.
Women produce less testosterone and higher estrogen levels than men, putting them at a disadvantage when it comes to building lean muscle tissue… I know how unfair this sounds, but it’s also the reason that most women will not get bulky from total body splits based on resistance training! In terms of exercise selection, both male and females should of course incorporate compound movements such as squats, deadlifts, military presses, pull ups and tricep dips into their programs. There are no exclusive female or male exercises. The problem for novices and intermediate female trainees is that the majority of them will be lacking sufficient strength to elicit enough force to produce muscle gain in the same way a male would do. So, even if a woman is working at her maximal capacity, as she is not strong enough, she won’t be able to produce the same metabolic response as a male would.
In my experience of personal training in St. John’s Wood, women tend to shy away from weight training in the first place, as the general consensus is that it will make them bulky, which couldn’t be farther from the truth. Many women will spend far too much time jogging slowly or on the cross trainer while trying to eat less food. This will just lead to a slower metabolism by decreasing the functionality of key hormones needed to optimise fat burning such as leptin and ghrelin, while causing damage to the thyroid gland.
Here are some tips to help women strip body fat and stay lean. Enough of fad diets and pounding the pavements! Follow these pointers from your St John’s Wood personal trainer to feel great, look amazing and stay that way.
1. Make weight training the corner stone of your program
It won’t make you look more bulky or masculine but will help develop a lean toned physique. Add lean muscle tissue to increase your metabolism and become more efficient at burning body fat than ever before by making squats, deadlifts, pull ups and presses the corner stone of your workouts.
2. Use short rest periods in your training
An effective method for a novice or intermediate female trainer to be successful in striping fat is to shorten her rest periods between sets by around 30 per cent compared to that of their male counterparts. Women have better strength endurance levels and can recover quicker from maximal effort, making it possible for them to still gain strength. Shorter rest periods are a great way for beginners to increase intensity and workout capacity in a safe manner.
3. Increase overall sets
As women have a better recovery rate than men, they can enjoy shorter rest periods in between sets. This allows for more time during the session and the opportunity to add more sets, thus helping to get a higher amount of work volume completed.
4. Rep ranges
For novice and intermediate female clientele, I find that middle- to high-rep ranges are the most effective for progression and fat loss for several reasons. The first is technique – by completing more reps, they have a better chance of learning solid technique. Second, because of lower maximal strength levels, they cannot reach the intensity needed with lower rep ranges, and so its better to focus on volume.
5. Total body splits
Total body workouts are great for fat loss and building intensity. So, female trainees should look to use these in their programme rather than focusing on one body part per session, like a lot of males would do.
6. Stick to your programme
Beginners should have confidence in their programme and be able to stick to the same one for a longer period of time and still see results. They should add weight in small increments to challenge the muscles.
These tips are for female trainees who are at the beginner’s or intermediate level. Females who have great training experience would be more successful following training protocols similar to that of men.
Tom Winterbottom personal trainer in St. John’s Wood, personal trainer in Marylebone, personal trainer Baker Street.