When it comes to losing weight, cardio-heavy workouts are the go-to response in ubiquitous running/cycling/swimming mélange. Cardiovascular exercises undoubtedly have their place in any well-rounded fitness routine.
However, strength training too often seems to be neglected unnecessarily and carries out an impressive claim for weight loss.
In this article, I want to examine the association of strength training with weight loss and dispel some myths while revealing facts backed up by scientific research.
Myths About Strength Training in Weight Loss
Strength training is often surrounded by misconceptions that can deter individuals from incorporating it into their fitness routines. Here are some prevalent myths and the truths behind them.
1. Weight Gain from Strength Training Is Normal, Not Obesity
The biggest myth of strength training is it will essentially add muscle to an epic proportion and the average person (particularly women) who lifts weights becomes a thick, huge, hulking beast. This belief has turned many off to strength training as a result.
Fact:
It is almost impossible for a woman to be “too muscular” #SwoleNotSorry Fact: Despite connotations that women will become bulky if they lift weights, the truth of building significant muscle mass (to get even close to looking like She-hulk) requires determination and dedication most people do not have. It involves a certain number of heavy lifts (bodied and powered) along with high caloric intake that typically requires substantial quantities, often leading to obesity. Most people, especially women with strength training get a leaner and more toned body as opposed to the bulkiness that is typically associated with lifting heavy.
Muscles are denser than fat, so obviously it’s going to take up less body space. Your body becomes denser from all that muscle you’re building and fat losing, so even if the scale doesn’t budge much your physical clothes size does. Moreover, muscle is metabolically active tissue, so it helps to use up more calories even at rest compared to fat. That means an increase in metabolism and the potential for lifelong weight loss.
2. Cardio Is Your Best Bet to Torch Calories
Cardio is known to be more effective than lifting weights when it comes to burning calories and therefore losing weight. A lot of people think the sweat they’ve been churning during a long run or that sweaty spin class translates into more fat loss.
Fact:
Long after your gym session ends, strength training continues to burn calories. This is known as Excess Post-exercise Oxygen Consumption (EPOC) or more commonly — the Afterburn effect. Once you finish your strength training session, the calories continue to be burned at an increased rate while your body is busy repairing and rebuilding muscle fibers over the next 24-48 hours.
In addition to that, training itself will expand the amount of muscle which is what fuels your resting rate of metabolism. It will increase the speed with which you burn calories naturally, i.e. even when he did not exercise during rest rightly all day). In comparison, cardio activity typically increases calorie burning over only a short period while doing exercise.
3. Lifting Weights Only Works for Building Muscle, Not Losing Fat
It is also a very common misconception to think that strength training has little to no influence on fat loss and it is reserved for people who are only looking forward to building muscle. This is only partly true; the misconception could fall that punishing weights alone does not create a calorie deficit that you need to lose some fat.
Fact:
Strength training is a requirement for fat loss (specifically when tied together with practical dieting and calorie management). Weightlifting helps to promote muscle growth…but this also applies to how it can lead to fat loss, as we explained above.
- Increased Caloric Expenditure: When muscle mass increases, the restive metabolic rate increases as well. This means that you are burning more calories all day, even when you aren’t working out.
- Maintaining Lean Muscle: If you are in a caloric deficit, then with fat there can also be muscle loss. The good news is that strength training plays a large role in preserving lean muscle while losing weight, meaning most of your weight loss should come from body fat instead of reduced muscle.
- Better Body Composition: By reducing fat loss and muscle gain, strength training can make a dramatic impact on your body even if it does not show up much lower in the weight scale. This results in a firmer and more toned body.
4. High Reps, Low Weight to Lose Fat
Many still believe doing lots and lots of reps with minimal weight is the most effective way to lose fat and get ripped. My best guess is that lighter weights/higher reps are less scary sounding than heavy weights and make everything more ‘toning.
Fact:
High Reps, Low Weight Much has been said about high-rep, low-weight training in the fitness industry — and most of it revolved around it not being a particularly effective method for weight loss. Strength training with heavier weights and low reps can be more beneficial for fat loss, as this helps to increase muscle hypertrophy (growth) which boosts the metabolic rate of your body.
Heavier weights also stress the body more than lighter weights and make bigger adaptations possible with time. That said, you do not have to strike high-rep workouts altogether as long as your routine incorporates a mix of rep ranges and weights.
5. Strength Training for Older Adults
There is a misunderstanding that strength training cannot be performed by older adults and only the younger ones can do it as older people carry more risks of injury or other health-related issues.
Fact:
The reality is that we all – but even more so as we get a little older – need to lift weights. We all experience what is called sarcopenia, the natural loss of muscle mass and bone density as we age. The loss of muscle can decrease strength, range of motion, and quality of life.
Consider strength training as a means for combating these age-related declines, because it preserves and even increases muscle mass and bone density. Enables better balance and coordination so older folks are less likely to fall or be injured. So, from 20 to 70+ years old, everyone can benefit from strength training for health, fitness, and how you look.
The Truth About Strength Training and Weight Loss
Now that we have covered some of the most common myths regarding strength training and fat loss, here are pertinent facts to prove just how important these workouts truly are for both getting down into a healthy weight as well as remaining there.
1. Increased Metabolic Rate
We already know that muscle is more metabolically active than fat. This means the more muscle you have, the higher your resting metabolic rate (RMR) can be. Your RMR is the number of calories you burn at rest and it accounts for how many calories your body requires to sustain basic physiological processes such as breathing, circulation, and cell production.
Weightlifting: Working your muscles increases muscle mass which in turn raises RMR, meaning you burn more calories even at rest. This helps in consuming fewer calories and maintaining a caloric deficit, that is necessary for weight loss.
2. Improved Insulin Sensitivity
Strength training has also been found to enhance insulin sensitivity (2), the body’s ability to use insulin more effectively hence control blood sugar. Increasing insulin sensitivity can also help protect against and manage type 2 diabetes — a disease that often results from being overweight.
Being more insulin-sensitive means that your body can better manage the glucose (sugar) in your bloodstream, escorting it into cells where this sugar can easily be used for energy. This is because it decreases the chance that extra glucose gets stored as fat, converting it into fat tissue.
3. Reduced Visceral Fat
Visceral fat, another name for abdominal fat, is the kind of body fat that is located beneath your abdominal muscles. Visceral fat is considered to be more harmful than subcutaneous fat, which is the fat directly beneath the skin. This is because visceral fat surrounds important organs and is specifically associated with high-risk chronic conditions like type 2 diabetes and coronary heart disease.
Yes, you can see a reduction in visceral fat with strength training even if it is not accompanied by large-scale weight loss. Strength training is therefore a form of exercise that can contribute to better health and the avoidance of lifestyle diseases, even if you do not lose weight.
4. Enhanced Hormonal Balance
One thing that is worth considering when it comes to strength training and hormones, however, does swing in its favor, is the positive effects of improved body composition on hormonal balance. The processes behind this belief revolve around improved metabolism (thanks to an increase in lean muscle mass) along with appetite regulation being controlled more efficiently due to regular exercise reducing over-activation… but hey no one said lifting wasn’t work. Strength training can lead to an increase in the production of growth hormone and testosterone which are both related to muscle growth as well as fat loss.
Furthermore, strength training can help manage and control cortisol a stress hormone which when chronically elevated causes increased fat deposition mostly on the belly by equipping us to balance these hormones, strength training supports a hormonal profile that is more conducive to working out and healthy weight management.
5. Confidence and Improved Mental Health
Though not directly associated with weight loss, the mental benefits of strength training should also be considered. Making it a habit of pushing yourself in the gym, lifting heavier weights, and hitting new PRs can be fantastic for your self-esteem but an equally important benefit is mental strength.
When it comes to dropping your body mass, altering other areas of lifestyle to better ones always has a ripple effect positive or negative. The more positive, energetic, and enthusiastic we feel about our bodies wherever they are right now — that there is hope (if not certainty) of improvement with effort over time; the better chance we have to do what needs to be done to get ourselves on track.
6. Long-Term Weight Maintenance
The main problem after losing all that weight is how to keep it off people. This is why most people gain the weight they lost back because they lack any real plan for going from being at a “normal” weight.
Strength training is important for keeping the muscle you built during weight loss because it can help long-term with maintaining your body fat percentage. And because of this, you can keep your metabolism in check which means theoretically maintaining weight without having to double or triple up on cardio and cutting calories right down.
Including Strength Training in Your Diet to Lose Weight
If you are uncertain how to add strength training for weight loss into your workout routine yet realize the proven benefits of it, here is a guide on tips that can help motivate and encourage even more women especially mummies out!
- Go with compound movements: Because these exercises work for several muscle groups at the same time (squats, deadlifts, or rows) and that plays a big role in working muscles while you burn calories. This will become the base on which to build out your strength work.
- The rule of progressive overload: As one of the best — if not only — but ways also to drive hypertrophy is by increasing resistance or weight as months pass, focus on this principle. Doing this will ensure you keep working your muscles so they can adapt and grow, which ultimately creates more strength & fat loss. You try to progress, either in terms of weight lifted or volume 2–4 weeks.
- Change up your routine: You should regularly change the exercises you perform, the rep ranges, and the weights that are used for each exercise to avoid hitting a plateau in your workouts. It will bring about new muscle shocks, and you are going to go on doing your lateral raises.
- Combine cardio with strength training: Although strength training is important for weight loss, doing cardio along with it can skyrocket your results. A mix of high-intensity interval training and steady-state cardio will give your body the variety it needs to ensure you’re adequately fit.
- Recovery: Recovery is as important as the workout itself. Ensure you are sleeping enough and staying hydrated, with proper nutrition to support muscle repairs/growth.
- Seek professional advice: If you are a beginner at weight lifting, engage the services of an accredited personal trainer who may direct you on how to start your training method according to your goal and athletic level.
Conclusion
The strength training weight-loss benefits are endless — it’s not all about bulking up. Strength training is an excellent way to lose weight long-term by increasing your metabolic rate, improving insulin sensitivity, reducing visceral fat, and balancing hormones Plus much More.
Strength training has a whole host of benefits aside from the ones mentioned above, and if this is news to you, then the myths surrounding strength training have been holding you back unfairly.
Lifting heavy weights on a tractor tire or performing bodyweight exercises at home, strength training can take you from praying mantis to the hulk of your dreams.
So, the next time you think of calling off those weights for a day on the treadmill instead – remember that strength training does play an essential part in weight loss and health!
