What Is the Difference Between Male & Female Weight Lifting?

Weight training for men and women should be almost identical.

Weight training books, articles, blogs and general advice often are geared towards men, as weight lifting is typically seen as an exclusively male activity. Contrary to this bias, weight training can be beneficial to anyone looking to improve her health and wellness, as it increases the amount of lean mass and makes it easier to burn fat and keep it off. Both women and men can benefit from similar programs, although slight adjustments must be made for each to achieve maximum results.

Basics

Whether a beginner, intermediate or advanced weight lifter, you must always emphasize the basics. Time-tested compound movements such as the squat, deadlift, military press, chin-up, pull-up, push-up and plank will deliver a full body workout most effectively and in the least time. Weight training sessions should last no longer than 45 minutes, while testosterone production is highest. Both women and men can perform these compound movements given that they will not aggravate any pre-existing conditions or injuries.

Sets

The optimal number of sets to perform of any given exercise should be slightly higher for women than it is for men. While men who are beginner lifters should perform three different exercises for four to five sets per workout, women should perform the same amount of exercises for five or six sets, as a woman's body can recover faster during a workout. Once you are an intermediate or advanced lifter, you do not need to perform as many sets, which helps you get used to proper form. Immediate and advanced male lifters should perform instead three sets of five or six exercises per workout, while women should perform four sets of five or six exercises per workout.

Repetitions

For the same reason, women should perform slightly more repetitions per exercise. For example, if a man is doing weighted squats for five sets of five to eight repetitions, a woman should adjust that to six sets of 8 to 12 repetitions.

Recovery

Women need less recovery time between sets than men do. While men should wait 90 to 120 seconds between each set of an exercise, women should wait only 45 to 60 seconds between sets.

Weight

Whether male or female, you should always use progressive overloading to increase and maintain lean mass gains. Progressive overloading is simply increasing the amount of work you do at each training session. If a man squats 300 pounds for five sets of eight repetitions at a workout, he will want to either increase the weight he uses or the amount of repetitions he performs with the same weight. Once a man can perform any lift for five sets of eight repetitions, he should be increasing the amount of weight for that lift, and drop back down to five repetitions. The same applies for a woman that can perform any lift for five sets of 12 repetitions. For advanced lifters, the sets would drop down to three or four.

Conclusion

Weightlifting should be performed almost identically for both women and men. Women and men can use the same lifts to build muscle, given there are no pre-existing injuries or conditions that will be aggravated. The best moves anyone can use to gain lean mass are basic, compound, full body movements, of which squats and deadlifts are perfect examples. Repetitions, sets and recovery periods should be adjusted according to gender, but otherwise identical programs can be used to achieve results for both men and women.

References

• "Muscle Gaining Secrets"; Jason Ferruggia; 2004
• "Burn the Fat, Feed the Muscle"; Tom Venuto; 2003