Weight training question

[SirenSongWoman]

I was doing some cleaning, going though some magazines I'm preparing to toss and ran across something in the January issue of Oxygen that got me wondering. A fitness model/trainer was explaining she's trying a routine with lighter weights at higher reps because she's decided she wants to "take some size off" her lower body. She gives us her new routine and says of her legs that after a "few month's" they "tightened up quite a bit and (I) broke down some of that stubborn muscle." So that got me wondering something I'm not educated enough about weight training to figure out on my own, which is If you alternate routines featuring heavy weights with lower reps and routines with light weights and higher reps what would be the result? Would you get the best of both worlds or would the two approaches conflict in some negative way?

I'm also wondering which approach STS will use or if STS will combine approaches over the entire system. Anyone?

 

[maddiesmum]

STS uses both systems, progressing from higher reps, lighter weight in mesocycle 1 through to heavy weights, lower reps in Mesocycle 3. SNM's explanation for including both approaches was that you need two things to make a successful weight training program: muscle confusion (endurance and strength work, changing things up, not sticking with any one approach exclusively for too long) and progressive overload (moving from lighter to heavier weights, always challenging the muscle.)

Who knows what that fitness model/trainer meant: perhaps she didn't know either? Breaking down stubborn muscle? I don't think it's like sending the breakers in to break up the ice on Lake Ontario......

Clare

 

[Vee]

Hi!

I remember reading some months ago in Muscle & Fitness about a competitor who changed training styles after she stopped competing in body-buidling, in order to do more work as a fitness model. She too used hi-rep, lo-weight training to downsize her lower body muscles. The article had before and after pictues, and in both she appeared to have larger muscles than Cathe and her crew.

The size of a body part comes from two main contributors. The first is muscle and the second is fat. Individual goals vary, but for most "average" women who include weight-training in their fitness routine, the goal is to build/maintain muscle and keep fat% low, thereby creating/maintaining a body that looks more taut and less jiggly. When body composition changes (more muscle %), your metabolism rises. So even at rest your body will need (and therefore burn) more calories. Building muscle leads to burning fat.

For most people downsizing a body part by reducing muscle is not an issue. Long before we get there, we have to gain adequate muscle. Women are genetically, and with their hormonal make-up not created by nature to be prone to buidling large muscles. Nutrition too plays a huge part in building muscle, and the average "clean" diet is very far from that of a woman body-builder.

STS will help you build lean muscle and gain muscle definition.

There is no risk that a woman who trains with STS will end up looking like Mr Olympia in drag. As Cathe has said in the STS forum, STS will not make women "too bulky".

Hope this helps.

~* Vrinda *~

 

[Sunshine 1528]

Sounds like a "freestyle" approach to training.

 

[SirenSongWoman]

Thank you ladies for responding. I think I get it. That article just got me wondering about what I'm doing and if I'm doing anything wrong for where I'm trying to get. I'm also reading Tosca's workout book and that, too, has me questioning my method. Thanks so much for your thoughtful replies. I swear, I can't wait for STS so I can stop questioning everything and just do it.

 

[LauraMax]

Sirensong, Sunshine mentioned the freestyle method & you should definitely check it out. It's one of the first training methods that came up w/the low weight/high rep routine. If I remember correctly it was somewhere around 1995, & I recall it being marketed as "the first weight training routine developed specifically for women."

There is a book about it, also I think Carole/McMain followed it & had really amazing results. I'm sure if you PM her she'd be happy to share her thoughts.

 

[tneah]

Vrinda, you explained it better than I ever could have! Very good. And very true.