I realize this seems like a sexist article, but I am going to be dealing with generalities and what most women I talk to seem to care most about in their training. Obviously, there are women that are incredible in all areas of sports and love all kinds of workouts and body types. This article is going to focus on the typical women that ask me for help with their weight training routines. These are usually women that care about having a nice firm butt and legs. They want to be fit and are not looking to be bulky or super strong. So if that sounds like you, then this will be be some good information. If not, then you probably already know exactly what you are doing.
The truth is, the basic principles for getting in shape are pretty much exactly the same for women as they are for men.
Most differences in workouts between men and women are due to body shape preferences. There are physiological differences between men and women, but the basic principles apply to both men and women.
The basic concept for building muscles is to force your muscles to work harder and harder over time. This is done through increasing the weight or the amount of repetitions with the same weight.
The main difference between men and women workouts is that women typically want a fuller, perkier butt and shapely legs and men typically want bigger arms, shoulders and pecs. The truth is, women’s goals take much more effort. Upper body workouts are easy compared to leg day. We’ve all seen the memes about how you should never skip leg day. Well, every gym in the world is full of dudes that love to skip leg day. The main reason is because leg day is hard! Working your legs is the best way to achieve overall fitness and boost your metabolism. Leg day uses much bigger and stronger muscles. So it burns more calories during the workout and helps you continue to burn more calories throughout the rest of the day!
I am writing this article as if I were telling my wife exactly what to do. Obviously, I never get to tell her anything, so this article is totally hypothetical. 🙂 Truth is, Jen is very independent, but she does a great job of listening and doing things in a way that she feels most comfortable and motivated. She likes to do yoga a lot. So she mixes in cardio and yoga into her week as well. Whatever she’s doing, it’s working, because she’s smoking hot!The most important thing is to make sure you do things you know you can be consistent with. That is the key to long term results.
My recommendation is what’s called an upper body/lower body split. So you can probably guess that this divides your workouts into one that focuses on the lower body and another that focuses on the upper body.
I reccomend doing 4 weight workouts per week. So two lower body days and two upper body days. What seems to work best for most women is lower body day on Monday and Thursday and upper body days on Tuesday and Friday.
Obviously this means you focus on all the muscles of your lower body (including your quads, hamstrings, glutes, lower back and calves) on your lower body days. Then on upper body days, you’ll train all of the muscles of your upper body (including your chest, back, shoulders, and arms)
I recommend starting each week with lower body day. It’s harder and it’s nice to hit a hard workout after a day or two of rest and recovery. Start with the hardest exercises first. I recommend Squats or deadlifts to begin each leg day. On upper body day I recomend seated cable rows or lat pull downs.
This is exactly what I would recomend:
Monday: Lower Body
-Start with a 10 minute warm up. I recommend a brisk walk on a treadmill set at 10 degree incline.
-Squats (4 sets of 12 to 20 repetitions. Final set should be as difficult as you can make it, while still being able to do close to 12 reps)
-Deadlifts (4 sets of 12 to 20 repetitions. Final set should be as difficult as you can make it, while still being able to do close to 12 reps)
-Lunges (4 sets of 12 to 20 repetitions. Final set should be as difficult as you can make it, while still being able to do close to 12 reps)
-Box Jumps, or box step ups (4 sets of 12 to 20 repetitions, this would be with each leg on steps ups. Final set should be as difficult as you can make it, while still being able to do close to 12 reps)
-Stretch and go home and drink a protein shake for best results!
Tuesday: Upper Body
-Start with a 10 minute warm up. I recommend a brisk walk on a treadmill set at 10 degree incline.
-Seated Cable Rows (4 sets of 12 to 20 repetitions. Final set should be as difficult as you can make it, while still being able to do close to 12 reps)
-Lat Pull Downs (4 sets of 12 to 20 repetitions. Final set should be as difficult as you can make it, while still being able to do close to 12 reps)
-Incline Dumbbell Press (4 sets of 12 to 20 repetitions. Final set should be as difficult as you can make it, while still being able to do close to 12 reps)
-Seated dumbbell Shoulder Press (4 sets of 12 to 20 repetitions. Final set should be as difficult as you can make it, while still being able to do close to 12 reps)
-I recommend 5 to 10 minutes of crunches and planks on upper body day.
-Stretch and go home and drink a protein shake for best results!
Wednesday: Cardio
Thursday: Lower Body
-Start with a 10 minute warm up. I recommend a brisk walk on a treadmill set at 10 degree incline.
-Deadlifts (4 sets of 12 to 20 repetitions. Final set should be as difficult as you can make it, while still being able to do close to 12 reps)
-Squats (4 sets of 12 to 20 repetitions. Final set should be as difficult as you can make it, while still being able to do close to 12 reps)
-Lunges (4 sets of 12 to 20 repetitions. Final set should be as difficult as you can make it, while still being able to do close to 12 reps)
-Box Jumps, or box step ups (4 sets of 12 to 20 repetitions, this would be with each leg on steps ups. Final set should be as difficult as you can make it, while still being able to do close to 12 reps)
-Stretch and go home and drink a protein shake for best results!
Friday: Upper Body
-Start with a 10 minute warm up. I recommend a brisk walk on a treadmill set at 10 degree incline.
-Lat Pull Downs (4 sets of 12 to 20 repetitions. Final set should be as difficult as you can make it, while still being able to do close to 12 reps)
-Seated Cable Rows (4 sets of 12 to 20 repetitions. Final set should be as difficult as you can make it, while still being able to do close to 12 reps)
-Seated dumbbell Shoulder Press Press (4 sets of 12 to 20 repetitions. Final set should be as difficult as you can make it, while still being able to do close to 12 reps)
-Incline Dumbbell Press(4 sets of 12 to 20 repetitions. Final set should be as difficult as you can make it, while still being able to do close to 12 reps)
-I recommend 5 to 10 minutes of crunches and planks on upper body day.
-Stretch and go home and drink a protein shake for best results!
Saturday: Cardio
Sunday: Rest
This would be a great week of weight training. I would recommend doing cardio for about an hour on 2 of your rest days. Yoga, pilates, kickboxing or whatever you like is a great addition on the days you aren’t lifting. I like these lifts for women. There are lots of other great lifts. Leg day, you might substitute hip sled, hack squat, front squat, goblet squat, glute bridge, sumo squat and curtsy lunge. Upper body you could mix in overhead barbell press, bent over rows, dumbbell flys, upright rows or curls.
The key to getting lean and mean is to get to the gym and push yourself. The more you push yourself, the faster you’ll see results!
As always, have fun, kick some butt and don’t forget to take your Nanohydr8 before your workout!
Adam Legas
Founder/ CEO Nanohydr8
Discount Code “adam”
www.nanohydr8.com
Squat
Deadlift
Lunge
Seated Cable Row
Lat pull down
Incline Dumbbell Press
Seated Dumbbell Press
