Ugh, I wish someone told me these things, too, CassieLynnLift.
in my early 20s, fresh out of Army Basic Training and desperate to get stronger after realizing just how weak I was compared to my male counterparts. Trying to walk 12 miles with a 35-pound rucksack while wearing a suffocating weighted vest and carrying my rifle was more difficult than I had imagined.
I knew I had to do something to improve my physical fitness before my first deployment to Iraq and doubling down on cardio was not the answer. Everyone has their own reason for stepping outside their comfort zone and picking up a barbell for the first time. There’s always fear and awkwardness for a beginner. I personally had no ideaand I was convinced that I knew it all after reading a few “How to Lift Weights” articles online. Since transitioning careers from soldier to personal trainer, it’s easy for me to look back and identify the things I was doing wrong back then and, in hindsight, what I wish I had known before I started. I also realize now that I probably should have invested in working with a personal trainer to build a strong foundation and a better plan. To help you avoid some of the mistakes I made, here are the top things I wish I knew about lifting weights when I first started.A two-hour weightlifting session six days per week may feel like a proper dedicated routine, but it's just too much for most people. I used to log endless hours at the gym, thinking the sweat dripping from my body and mental exhaustion was an indication of my hard work. But tracking progress by time spent lifting rather than increases in the weights I used for each lift limited my progress. That’s because lifting too often for too long can actually be counterproductive to building muscle and strength. The fact that you’re able to lift for so long probably means you’re not lifting heavy enough to challenge your muscles and efficiently build strength. To use resistance training effectively, you need to put a decent amount of stress on your muscles, causing fatigue and ultimately muscle growth. If you don’t challenge your muscles with enough weight, you won’t stimulate this process. Using too-light weight may allow you to train for a longer time, but isSo, how can you tell how heavy is heavy enough? A good guideline is to lift heavy enough that the last 2-3 reps on each set feel challenging to complete but not so hard that you can’t do them with proper form. After the last rep, you should feel close to maxed out with enough energy left to do however many sets you have left. If you’re lifting heavy enough, you probably don’t need to lift for more than an hour. I’d suggest planning to do five to seven exercises, 2-4 sets of 6-12 reps of each. Once you feel your performance declining, you will know it's time to wrap up your workout for the day. Don’t ignore that feeling!
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