Weight Training for Weight Loss

Weight training or strength training as it’s often called, is incredibly important to maintain good health and fitness, and will certainly improve your weight loss results in the process.   Think about it – if you remain fit and strong you are able to do more exertive and continuous exercise which is great for your metabolism and ultimately for keeping your weight in check -  so using weight training for weight loss makes a lot of sense.

Remember, muscles use more energy than fat so the more muscle you have, the better your body burns calories and the easier it is to maintain a healthy weight.

So we recommend weight training for weight loss primarily because of its very real health benefits.  Of course you can lose weight simply by adopting the correct  ratio of protein, carbohydrates and fat in your diet (source: Myths, Lies and Exercise by Geoff Jowett and Dr Vicki Hillier) which will affect the powerful hormonal responses generated by food that control your metabolism, energy expenditure and ultimately your level of body fat.

But if you are interested in more than just weight loss – if you want to restyle your body, beat the midlife kilo creep and find new levels of energy and confidence then incorporating weight training into your exercise program is the way to go.

Did you know that from 30 onwards we start losing muscle power?  And by the time we’re 45 we start to lose muscle mass which means it becomes harder to do stuff we used to take for granted.  When our muscles start shrinking, our bodies sag and our posture droops.  This doesn’t just affect how a body looks, but how it functions.

But weight training is the antidote as it will slow down this process by boosting muscle power and strength.  This is particularly important for women who don’t tend to have as much muscle mass to start with.

Furthermore, weight/strength training also helps prevent diabetes because muscles soak up blood sugar to use as fuel.  The more muscle you have, the more blood sugar they take up and the lower the risk of high blood sugar levels that lead to diabetes.

Plus, stronger muscles give you more energy and that’s gotta be a good thing, right?