[Kelly_S]

REALITIES & MYTHS:

Despite an overwhelming amount of information and evidence to the contrary, many women are still afraid that strength training will give them big muscles. Worrying about this makes as much sense as worry about becoming too happy, healthy, beautiful and rich. The female body just isn’t programmed to grow “manly” muscles. Genetics, hormones, body fat, and body type all prevent that. Even if you want to grow big muscles, you’ll soon discover that without dangerous steroids it’s virtually impossible.

HOW MOTHER NATURE GROWS MUSCLE ON WOMEN

Women’s muscles get leaner, not bigger, with an average increase in size of a quarter to half inch, even after years of training. Although women can get stronger indefinitely, muscles respond by getting denser, not bigger. Many women notice their waists, hips, thighs and buttocks get smaller as they get stronger. Shoulders may appear a bit larger and squarer (sometimes merely the result of improved posture) and arms may get more defined as less fat hangs off the underarm.

But stronger muscles weigh more. Because muscle weighs more than fat, some women notice that training makes them gain weight (and this is a though psychological barrier to break). A body-fat test is a more accurate measure of progress than a scale.

*Women with 15-20 percent body fat may notice an immediate weight gain after a few weeks of training.

*Women with a 20-30 percent body fat may maintain a steady weight for a while but notice their waistlines shrinking.

*Women with more than 30 percent body fat may experience an immediate weight loss.

Also remember: Lean muscles look bigger. AS body fat drops to between 15 and 20 percent, muscles start to peek out from under the protective glaze of body fat.

Some women still get bigger than they’d like, especially if they have an endomorphic or mesomorphic body type. A body-fat test can confirm if this size increase is muscle or fat.

*To shrink muscle, simply ease up on training for a while.

*To shrink fat, strength train more intensely, two or three days a week. Make cardio workouts longer and moderate (45-60 minutes) or more vigorous for 30 minutes so you expend more total calories.

WHY WOMEN CAN’T BUILD BIG MUSCLES

For a woman to succeed at building big muscles, without the help of anabolic steroids, she literally has to be a genetic freak. The chances of this happening are about one in a million.

*Most women have short muscles and long tendons. This makes it very tough to build large, curvaceous muscles, since too much of the limb is made of flat connective tissue. Very few mortals have long, full muscles and short tendons.

*Women don’t have enough testosterone. Although women’s bodies natural produce this male growth-inspiring hormone (just as men’s bodies produce female hormones), men have about 100 times more of it. Some women produce more testosterone than others. But that’s still not enough to give women a natural anabolic edge.

*Women have more body fat. Most women have between 20 and 30 percent body fat. Fat hides muscle. It also means that women possess a smaller ratio of lean muscle to fat, so less muscle mass is available for use (although women are as strong as men when compared, according to this percentage of lean muscle).

REST BETWEEN STRENGTH WORKOUTS

When you strength train, you create microscopic tears in muscle fibers, which take at least two days to heal. That’s why you shouldn’t train the same muscles two days in a row.

If you train too hard, you may need to take four or five days off (if muscles are very sore, gentle limbering moves and stretches can ease your pain). A good rule of thumb is to wait until soreness goes away before doing another intense workout. If your workouts aren’t that hard and you don’t get sore, you can come back sooner (or you might want to reevaluate your workouts and increase the intensity if appropriate).

The American College of Sports Medicine recommends strength training the whole body every other day, three times a week.

RESTING BETWEEN SETS

How long you rest between sets is usually based on how hard you’re working. The traditional belief about rest time is:

*15 to 20 reps of light weight (muscle endurance), rest for 20 to 30 seconds;

*8 to 12 reps of moderate weight (for building strength and size), rest for 30 seconds to a minute;

*1 to 6 reps of heavy weight (for building strength and power), rest for up to 5 minutes.

THE POWER OF REST

Progress is cyclical, not linear. Nobody can maintain high energy all the time and no one keeps getting stronger indefinitely. Strength curves, like learning curves, follow a natural rhythm. Sometimes we grow in spurts and learn quickly, other times we just have to process the information, rest and adapt.

Here’s how to tap the power of rest:
*If you’re making gradual strength gains over a long period of time, then you’re getting enough rest. Keep it up.

*If you’re stuck on a strength plateau, try building in an extra day or two of rest and increase the weight, at least for 8 reps.

*If you’re in a growth spurt, making big strength gains, don’t assume it’ll last forever. Pull back before you hit a burnout. Don’t go for more than three weeks of all-out intensity without taking at least a week or two of rest.

[Sweater Girl]

I am just bumping up this article!

Ali