The Training Guide Of Tips And Tricks of upper Body workouts for Women in the gym.
The lifting world has a stigma of being exclusive to men only, especially when it comes to upper-body training. If you go to your local gym, you will notice a strong majority of the free weights area is populated by men. But this is changing, and it’s a beautiful sight. There could be a host of different reasons for this, some may be:
· Increase in female coaches.
· Greater presence on social media.
· More light being shone on training from a woman’s perspective and the challenges they face from gym intimidation through to menstruation.
Myth Busters
Now I will be honest, I do not have first-hand experience with all the nuances of the female training experience, but what I can offer here is a means to help you take your training to the next level by debunking myths surrounding women's strength training and offer you exercises to add to your training. One of the major myths that I have heard is that strength training, especially in the upper body, will make you too big/bulky.
I am not sure where this narrative derives from, but I feel a part of it is due to what you see on social media of people with great physiques and impressive displays of strength. The issue with this is that you can only see the current stage of their journey, but most of them have been training consistently for the past 5 years, staying on top of their nutrition, training consistently and with good intensity every week, and progressively overloading. Whereas you may only be starting your journey, or have only been training for a few months.
Another myth that needs to be addressed is the notion that upper body training is exclusive to men and women should mainly focus on lower body exercises. When I programme for online coaching clients and they see there are a few upper body movements in the sessions I tend to get questions about why I have programmed these in when their goal focuses on the lower body.
I understand the confusion however, it should be made clear that training the upper body does not equate to your arms becoming the size of your legs.
Here is one of my old clients who was doing an upper/lower split (A whole session for upper body only as well as lower body only sessions) does she look like a bodybuilder to you?
One thing that is 100% true is that you will find upper body movements harder than men, but again, this does not mean you are unable to do them. A study of 468 men and women showed that women have around 8.46kg +/- 1.8 kg of skeletal muscle whilst men possess around 14.16kg +/- 2.6kg (Janssen et al, 2000) in the upper body.
What does this tell us?
1. Women carry far more muscle mass in their lower body than their upper body
2. The greater the muscle mass area the more force can be produced= more weight can be lifted
3. Physiologically women are at a disadvantage in comparison to men, but you can still train your upper body effectively, although it is harder.
It is not that you are unable to train the upper body, it is just a bit more difficult. Now that you know there is a biological difference in your distribution of muscle, how do you overcome this and still train effectively to help develop your upper body as well as your lower body?
The answer might surprise you, but you need to train the upper body! It may start difficult, but anything we do for the first time is hard. Over time you will learn which lifts work for you and it will also give you a great insight into weak areas of the upper body such as strength imbalances between left and right, which in turn will create more goals for you to achieve.
Now before you go any further, I think it’s best to state here that there is no such thing as exercises for women and men. Exercise is exercise and that’s it! This needs to be made clear before you continue. It is a myth that I am always quick to debunk with all online and in-person clients.
Effective upper body training
When looking to develop strength in the upper body I am a big fan of improving your ability to lift your body weight as well as your ability to lift an external resistance (dumbbell, barbell, kettlebell etc) which is why I always programme 2-3 bodyweight exercises for my online coaching clients. The ability to lift your body weight is a great indicator of strength as it is not an easy task to do for both men and women.
Think about it, if you are 58kg and you can perform 6 full-body push-ups, then you can push 58kg from the floor 6 times! When programming upper body sessions into your training, aim to include a mixture of body weight movements as well as movements against resistance to allow the upper body to face different types of resistance.
Also, body weight training offers a variety to your training from the usual dumbbells, and barbell-based training and are great means to strengthen the wrist, elbows, and forearms.
Weekly Structure
Let's look at how would you go about structuring the upper body into your training
Here are a few examples:
Upper and lower split- This split allows you to fully target all areas of the upper body as well as the lower body and takes away the restrictions of bro splits (specific body parts to specific days). It also fits in well with training and lifestyle. This is a favourite for most of my online coaching clients.
Full body training- This split is great for those who have limited time in the gym and/or limited time to train during the week. This split focuses on training the whole body in one session and you can bias more upper movements into the training session but still have elements of lower body exercises.
Conditioning- Adding in conditioning sessions does not have to mean endless running on a treadmill. This can utilise conditioning styles such as metcon (metabolic conditioning) or EMOM (Every Minute On the Minute) using kettlebells or dumbbells, complexes can be great means to get the heart beating as well as load the upper body.
Classes- The addition of classes are a great way to add variation to your training and put you in a situation where you have to perform upper-body movements. Taking away any excuse to not target the upper body as well as introducing you to new movements. I strongly encourage you to partake in classes if you can as it is a great way to break the ice in the gym and meet new people.
Training Week Example:
M- Lower 1 T- Upper 1 W- Rest T- Lower 2 F- Upper 2
M-Full body 1 T-Rest W- Full body 2 T- Rest F- Lower
M- Strength session T- Conditioner W- Rest T- Strength session F- Conditioner
M- Class T-Class W- Rest T- Strength Session F- Class
Of course, these are just my suggestions, and nothing needs to be set in stone as life will make this weekly structure different for all of us. But what I aim to get across is the rough layout of the week.
Take note of the rest days as these are going to be vital to your progress and strength development.
Hopefully, by now you have a better understanding of upper body training for you and how to overcome the biological disadvantage and train the body effectively to allow you to receive better strength and physique gains.
Exercises to include
Looking to start adding some upper body exercises to your training then give some of these a try! (Exercises are hyperlinked)
Exercise: Incline Push-up // Target Muscle: Triceps, Chest
Exercise: Kneeling Push-up // Target Muscle: Triceps, Chest
Exercise: Eccentric Push-up // Target Muscle: Triceps, Chest
Exercise: Seated Dumbbell Shoulder Press // Target Muscle: Shoulders
Exercise: Flat Dumbbell Bench Press // Target Muscle: Chest
Exercise: Single-Arm Dumbbell Row // Target Muscle: Back
For you
As an online coach, I am always willing to help and give advice as and when needed, if you found this article useful then please feel free to send me an email and we can discuss your programme and how it fits into your lifestyle.
You have nothing to lose and everything to gain so why not?!?
I hope you found this useful
Till next time
Myles
Free Push-up Progression guide
Reference:
Janssen. I, Heymsfield.S, Wamg. Z & Ross. R (2000) Skeletal muscle mass and distribution in 468 men and women aged 18–88 yr, Journal of Applied Physiology 89: 81–88,