Weight lifting is a very important part of maintaining your weight. Along with helping to sculpt your body and give you definition, lifting weights keeps your body constantly burning fat because it helps to build lean muscle mass. The more lean muscle you have on your body, the more fat your body will constantly be burning. When you lift weights, your metabolism stays fast. However, if you are overweight you should focus on a lot more cardio versus weight lifting at first. Once you lose all the weight, weight lifting is the next step. You don’t want to build muscle on top of fat because that will make you look bulky. You want to be at a healthy weight and then strength train because that will make you cut, and everyone wants a nice cut look.
For women, strength training (weight lifting) will not make you look masculine or give you big muscles. Our bodies are not designed to build muscle the way men do, so you don’t have to worry about that. There are many women who refuse to lift weights because of that specific reason, that’s why I am touching on that subject. They don’t realize that they can use light weights and do more reps to get a nice, toned body. They will not bulk up at all unless, for example, they were curling real heavy weight like 90 pound dumbbells. Women should curl no more than 15 pound dumbbells for nice, well defined and cut arms.
Muscle burns fat and that goes a long way. It takes a lot of calories to feed lean muscle, so that gives you a little leeway in your diet. When I was overweight at 225 pounds, I ran until all the fat was off and then I was ready to tone up. Even though I lost the weight, I wanted my body to be tighter. I wanted cuts, so I started lifting weights, and after about a month I immediately started seeing results. Results come quick when you lift weights, if you’re doing everything the right way. The key is to get the extra weight off with cardio, then tone up your body with weight lifting. Then, you can switch off each day between the two to maintain a thin, toned, AWESOME body!
The workouts I do feel great and I really feel the burn. The burn makes you know you’re doing it right and that awesome results are on the way! When it is my weight lifting day, I do my back, triceps, legs and stomach. For my triceps I do 3 exercises. The first exercise is the “skull crusher” with the 30 pound long bar weight (weight will vary according to your own body goals). The “skull crusher” exercise is when you lay down on the bench and you hold up the weight straight across your body, with your arms parallel and you bend your arms back until the bar just nearly reaches your forehead. Then come back up and repeat this 10 times. I do four sets of ten reps for this exercise.
Next, is the behind the head lift. Take the free hand weight (30 lbs) and sit in the chair that has a straight back. Hold the weight with both hands up behind your head and lift up and down ten times. Do four sets of ten reps for this one as well. The last triceps workout is the rope pulley. Pull down with both hands on the rope and spread your hands out when you get to the bottom. You’ll get the maximum effect when doing that and this one really burns on the last few reps.
For your legs you should do your hamstrings, calves, and inner thighs. Do four sets of 10 reps for each exercise you do, and put it on whatever weight makes the last set hard to do. For your stomach you should do leg lifts, crunches with a medicine ball, and side leans with a 25 pound weight. For my stomach, I do 3 sets of 12 reps for each workout except for the side leans, which I do 3 sets of 20 reps. On my second weight training day, I replace my back and triceps with biceps, and I do my stomach and legs as well. For the biceps, there are only 2 exercises I do. I sit and do curls with 10 pound weights. I do 4 sets of 10 reps. Then I stand up and curl the 20 pound long barbell for 10 reps for 4 sets. Once you’re finished with your workout, you should drink 2 glasses of milk within the half hour after your workout. You can also make protein shakes or anything along those lines to help rebuild your muscles. It is very important that you drink protein during that half hour after your workout because that’s when you’ll get the best results!
