For Women Weight Lifting is Essential, Here's Why

Weightlifting has long been the domain of men. For women, there are a lot of barriers to heavy lifting. Sure, most of your clients will be willing to pick up the five- or eight-pound weights and do some easy reps in the hopes of thinning their arms or doing a few squats to try to lose thigh inches, but not many are open to the idea of real, heavy lifting.

Lifting can seem intimidating, especially in a gym where the weight section is dominated by big dudes. And women often fear heavy lifting will make them look like those men.

Trainers know better, though, and it's up to us to show our female clients how beneficial weightlifting is. Bust their long-held myths, support them as they get started to ensure safety and good form, and help them feel confident in the weight section of the gym.

Benefits of Weightlifting for Women

As the trainer, it's your job to convince your skeptical lady clients that lifting is the next important challenge to tackle. Women, and anyone of course, get so many benefits from regular weight lifting sessions: added strength and confidence, stronger bones, fat burn and weight loss, better athletic performance, and fewer injuries. It's a win-win-win-win. Here are just a few of the facts you can share with clients to get them to try it.

1. Builds Strength and Muscle Tone for Women

Weightlifting helps women build strength by challenging muscles to work against resistance, which stimulates muscle growth and increases muscle power over time. When you lift weights, your muscles experience controlled stress, causing tiny tears in the muscle fibers. As the body repairs these fibers, they grow back thicker and stronger, a process called hypertrophy. This not only increases muscle mass but also improves the efficiency and strength of the muscles, making them capable of handling greater loads. Additionally, strengthening muscles makes everyday tasks—such as carrying groceries, lifting children, or climbing stairs—easier and less taxing.

This increase in muscle not only helps you lift heavier weights over time but also leads to improved muscle definition, which gives the body a more sculpted appearance. For women, weightlifting helps target areas like the arms, legs, and core, leading to a more toned physique without the fear of bulking up unless the goal is bodybuilder-level hypertrophy (which requires specific training and nutrition). Since muscle tissue burns more calories at rest than fat tissue, building muscle through weightlifting also boosts your metabolism, helping you maintain a healthy weight while enhancing overall strength for everyday activities.

2. Expect to Burn Fat

A big motivation women have for working out is burning fat. Cardio has long been considered the ultimate fat-burner, but there is mounting evidence that weight lifting not only burns fat but may even do it better than cardio.

In one study researchers found that adults who walked for exercise lost as much weight as those who walked and did weight training. But, those who only walked lost lean mass, while those who included lifting lost fat and maintained muscle. (1) Additionally important for most women, lifting is better than cardio for losing belly fat.

3. Lift to Burn Calories Too

Again, cardio is always thought of as the holy grail of calorie burning, but strength training is important for burning them up too. In fact, you may actually burn more calories from doing heavy lifting. Yes, an hour of cardio burns more calories than an hour of lifting, but it's after the fact that the magic happens.

The secret is that lifting causes an increase in the body's resting metabolic rate—the rate at which it burns calories when you're doing nothing—for hours after the workout. A study with young women found that those who worked out by lifting weights for 100 minutes saw a 4.2 percent increase in resting metabolism for 16 hours after the fact. (2)

4. Improves Bone Health and Prevents Osteoporosis

Weightlifting plays an important role in improving bone health and preventing osteoporosis for women, especially as they age. Osteoporosis is a condition where bones become weak and brittle, increasing the risk of fractures. For women, the risk of osteoporosis rises after menopause due to a decrease in estrogen, a hormone that helps maintain bone density. Regular weightlifting can help combat this decline and even reverse some of the effects of bone loss.

When you lift weights, the muscles contract and exert force on the bones. This stress stimulates bone cells (osteoblasts) to build new bone tissue, a process called bone remodeling. This process not only strengthens existing bone tissue but also increases bone density, making bones more resistant to fractures. The more resistance you apply to the bones—whether through heavy lifting or bodyweight exercises—the greater the effect on bone health.

Studies have shown that weightlifting can help increase bone mineral density, especially in areas that are more prone to bone loss, such as the spine, hips, and wrists. For women, this is especially important as they tend to experience more rapid bone density loss after menopause. Research indicates that even moderate weight training can significantly improve bone mineral density, helping to slow or stop the progression of osteoporosis. (3)

5. Weightlifting Enhances Mental Health and Confidence

Weightlifting can have a profound impact on women’s mental health and confidence in several key ways:

• Boosts Mood and Reduces Stress: Weightlifting stimulates the release of endorphins, the body’s natural "feel-good" hormones. These endorphins help improve mood, reduce stress, and alleviate anxiety. Regular strength training has been shown to reduce symptoms of depression and anxiety by promoting a sense of well-being and relaxation after workouts. (4)

• Improves Body Image: As women build muscle and strength, they often experience improvements in body composition, which can lead to a more positive perception of their physical appearance. Weightlifting helps women tone their bodies, increase muscle definition, and reduce body fat, contributing to a healthier body image and greater self-acceptance.

• Enhances Self-Efficacy: Successfully lifting heavier weights and mastering new exercises boosts self-efficacy—the belief in one’s ability to accomplish tasks. This sense of accomplishment in the gym often translates to other areas of life, helping women feel more capable and empowered in their daily activities.

• Increases Confidence: As women see tangible progress in their strength and fitness, it builds their confidence both in and out of the gym. Overcoming physical challenges and achieving fitness goals fosters a sense of empowerment, helping women feel more confident in their abilities and more comfortable in their own skin.

• Provides a Sense of Control: Weightlifting gives women a way to take control of their health and fitness. As they work toward personal strength goals, they gain a sense of mastery over their bodies, which can enhance feelings of independence and self-worth.

• Social and Community Support: Many women find motivation and encouragement through fitness communities, whether in-person or online. Being part of a supportive group or having a workout partner can boost morale and create a positive, uplifting environment that reinforces confidence and mental well-being.

6. Improves Athletic Performance and Functional Fitness

Weightlifting helps women prevent injuries and enhance mobility through several key mechanisms:

• Improved Muscle Strength and Joint Support: Weightlifting strengthens the muscles around critical joints, such as the knees, hips, and shoulders. Stronger muscles provide better support for the joints, helping them move more efficiently and reducing the risk of strain or injury during daily activities or other physical exercises.

• Better Balance and Coordination: Weightlifting exercises often involve stabilizing the body while lifting, which enhances coordination and balance. This can help women improve their overall body control, which is crucial for preventing falls and injuries, particularly as they age.

• Increased Flexibility and Range of Motion: Many weightlifting exercises, especially compound movements like squats, pull-ups, and deadlifts, require full-body movement and flexibility. These movements help improve range of motion in the hips, shoulders, and knees, promoting better mobility and reducing the risk of stiffness or injury from tight muscles or restricted movement.

• Correcting Postural Imbalances: Strength training can address muscular imbalances that often lead to poor posture and injury. For example, strengthening the core and back muscles can improve posture and alleviate stress on the spine, reducing the risk of back pain or other postural-related injuries.

• Enhanced Bone Density: Weightlifting increases bone density by stimulating bone growth, which can prevent fractures and other bone-related injuries, especially in areas prone to osteoporosis such as the spine, hips, and wrists.

7. Get Better at Other Sports

Not all your female clients are athletes, but you probably have some who are really into certain activities and sports: running, cycling, soccer, or dance, for instance. It's easy to get into one particular type of activity and really focus on it. This is not a bad thing, but amateur athletes need to understand that they will get better at that sport by adding weights. A couple of days a week of lifting will help your clients become faster runners, crush their PRs, and become all-around better athletes.

What's Keeping Your Client from Lifting? Bust These Women Weight Lifting Myths

To get female clients into lifting you will need to address some common myths. These are untruths that keep a lot of women out of the weightlifting gym. From being afraid to look like the muscle-bound men that populate the gym to thinking that smaller weights are adequate, it's time to correct the wrong thinking too many women have about heavy lifting.

Myth #1 - Lifting Makes Women Bulky

This may be the biggest myth holding women back from lifting, and it needs to be busted. Anyone who has been lifting and strength training for a while knows that lifting with heavy weights doesn't bulk you up. In fact, those really big guys pushing it in the weight section have worked very hard, spending hours and hours there to get so bulky. They eat seriously restricted diets and a ton of protein to get there.

A typical person working with a trainer, doing a few weekly sessions of heavy weight lifting will not get bulky. What she will get is leaner and more defined. The real result of moderate weight training is losing fat and developing muscle tone.

Send your skeptical clients to this ISSA blog post to read more about why lifting doesn't lead to unwanted bulk.

Myth #2 - Lifting Gyms are Intimidating

This isn't technically a myth because how a gym makes you feel is subjective. But, the big and serious people working out with the weights aren't trying to scare others away. They're just working really hard. As with any other sport, the participants are generally warm, welcoming, and inclusive of all ability levels.

Women interested in starting weight training, but who are intimidated, really need the right guide. A good trainer teaches form and sets up a reasonable starting routine that builds and develops as she gets stronger is the key to helping her feel more confident. Lifting is for everyone and is scalable, even for beginners who are coming straight from the couch.

Myth #3 - Lifting is Not for Older Women

Older women likely have the intimidation factor to the extreme when it comes to lifting, and you're more likely to be able to convince younger female clients to give it a try. But don't make the mistake of not pushing the older ones.

Of course, the ranges of motion and the weights used are likely to be smaller for older clients, but they still can and should lift. As we get older we lose both muscle and bone mass and lifting can slow or even reverse that. One study of post-menopausal women found that those who engaged in twice-weekly, high-intensity strength training increased bone density, muscle mass, strength, and balance. (5)

Lifting is for kids and teens too, but you have to know how to do it correctly and safely. Check out this ISSA post to find out how.

What About Weight Loss and Cardio?

By pushing lifting so much your female clients may mistakenly think you want them to ditch cardio and focus on weights only. Make sure you aim for a good balance, especially when starting out with weights. As trainers know, there is a place for both cardio and strength training.

For women, especially those trying to lose weight, cardio is a big draw. Their fitness monitors tell them they're losing a lot of calories doing it, and they can feel it too—cardio makes you sweat and breathe hard and feel like you're really doing something.

But as we know, cardio is not the magic bullet for weight loss. Yes, it burns calories while it's happening, but as soon as the cooldown is done and the heart rate is back to normal, so is metabolism and calorie burning. With heavy lifting, on the other hand, the body continues to burn more calories than normal for hours, up to 24 hours, after the training session.

Cardio is great for calorie burn, endurance and fitness, and, of course, heart health. It is also an important part of an overall weight loss or maintenance plan, but it isn't everything. Women get the most health benefits, weight loss, and fat burn from doing both cardio and strength training, while of course also eating a sensible diet.

How To Get Started Lifting Weights

Another myth that could be added to the list is that you need to get into some semblance of decent shape before beginning lifting. This activity is highly scalable, which means that anyone at any fitness level can get started. As a trainer, you are the guide who will start clients out at their current level and help them build up to heavier weights and more technical lifts.

More than anything else, women need guidance and that push to get started in heavy lifting. To start lifting with no prior experience is overwhelming for anyone, but especially for a woman who rarely, if ever, sees someone who looks like her in the weight section.

Elevate Your Fitness Education

You're ready now to answer all the questions and address the doubts your women clients have about lifting. Armed with all the benefits of heavy lifting and the information to bust the myths you can get them started on a weightlifting journey they won't regret.

If you want to learn more about serious bodybuilding and coaching, check out the ISSA's comprehensive course for Bodybuilding Specialists.

Click HERE to download this handout and share with your clients!

References

1. Beavers, K.M., Ambrosius, W.T., Rejeski, W.J., Burdette, J.H., Walkup, M.P., Sheedy, J.L., Nesbit, B.A., Gaukstern, J.E., Nicklas, B.J., Marsh, A.P. (2017) Effect of Exercise Type During Intentional Weight Loss on Body Composition in Older Adults with Obesity. Obesity. 25 (11) 1823-1829

2. Osterberg, K.L, Melby C.L. (2000). Effect of Acute Resistance Exercise on Postexercise Oxygen Consumption and Resting Metabolic Rate in Young Women. Int. J. Sport Nutr. Exerc. Metab. 10 (1) 71-81

3. Shojaa, M., Von Stengel, S., Kohl, M., Schoene, D., & Kemmler, W. (2020). Effects of dynamic resistance exercise on bone mineral density in postmenopausal women: a systematic review and meta-analysis with special emphasis on exercise parameters. Osteoporosis International, 31(8), 1427–1444. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00198-020-05441-w

4. Noetel, M., Sanders, T., Gallardo-Gómez, D., Taylor, P., Del Pozo Cruz, B., Van Den Hoek, D., Smith, J. J., Mahoney, J., Spathis, J., Moresi, M., Pagano, R., Pagano, L., Vasconcellos, R., Arnott, H., Varley, B., Parker, P., Biddle, S., & Lonsdale, C. (2024). Effect of exercise for depression: systematic review and network meta-analysis of randomised controlled trials. BMJ, e075847. https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj-2023-075847

5. Nelson, M.E., Fiatarone, M.A., Morganti, C.M., Trice, I., Greenberg, R.A., Evans, W.J. (1994). Effects of Hig-Intensity Strength Training on Multiple Risk Factors for Osteoporotic Fractures. A Randomized Controlled Study. JAMA. 272(24) 1909-14