Pave The Way

Posted on by

Mondays are dedicated to female topics. 

I’ve spent so much time trying to help guys get their the women in their lives training that I’ve neglected the gals who actually DO train. You lovely ladies actually carry the torch — the one that sets fire to bullshit conventional cardio bunny stereotypes.

 

This girl expects to be sore from stretching.

In this video, Nick Offerman of Ron Swanson fame reads tweets by young female celebrities. Ashley Tisdale — who I honestly have never heard of before — said, “Cardio then yoga? I am gonna be sore!” This is a god damn joke. Aside from the fact that it’s one of those pointless-ass status updates that reflect the epitome of narcissism in American youth, the girl expects to be sore from repetitive movement on an elliptical, stretching, and posing. FUCKING POSING.

Ladies. This is what we’re up against.

Wait, this isn’t supposed to be about the enemy. Let’s try and ignore her internal rotation and thoracic flexion. Let’s try and ignore her complete lack of muscle mass. Let’s try and ignore the fact that if she were to be caught in a stiff breeze, she would fall apart.

No, this is about you ladies — you lifting, training ladies — carrying that torch, lighter fluid, and trebuchet to burn down the preconceived notion that being a useless human being WILL NOT STAND. I salute you, woman of barbell lifting.

Tell us about yourself. How did you get into lifting and serious training? Why do you like it? What do you hope to get out of it? There is no wrong answer, I’m just curious as to what was the catalyst for setting yourself apart from the waif or fat girl modern society expected you to be.

Continue to pave the way for serious female trainees by setting a good example. If possible, help your friends — male and female — try it out. Find your niche, whether it’s just getting stronger, powerlifting, Olympic weightlifting, or strongman, and stick with it. Train hard and have fun.

96 thoughts on “Pave The Way”

  1. Got my mommy under the barbell. I had her bench, squat, and row. She has some mobility issues that we’ll be addressing so that she can squat to proper depth, but I’m excited. Gonna have her on a basic Lp lifting twice a week

  2. That so called “cardio bunny” used to be me! (head down in embarrassment). I now lift more than half the dudes in my school gym and damn proud of it. I have been lifting consistently for 2 years, have competed in 9 figure competitions (2 National level shows) and have my eyes set on a Pro Card. The females that tell me I am ‘too big’ for a girl or my arms are too beefy can kick rocks because I am strong, muscular and love the challenge of lifting heavy ass weight. Oh, and still wear a size 27 jean!

  4. I started lifting in my early 20s, because I was all of 90 lbs soaking wet and wanted to put on weight in a healthy way. I found Stumptuous and that got me started. I keep doing it because being strong beats the shit out of being weak.

  5. Well, it was quite the convoluted journey.. from team sports as a kid, to Scottish Highland dancing, to kickboxing, to triathlons, to endurance mountain biking, to CrossFit *gasp*, which finally lead me to my happy place: the barbell. Strict strength training for competitive Olympic weightlifting for over a year and a half (with a little powerlifting thrown in) and I now consider myself an ‘athlete’ for the first time in my life. Long-term goals in the sport have been put on the back burner largely due to my education (yay dental school!) but I will continue to train when time allows, as my sanity depends on it. Doing my best to convince the other ladies to join me :)

  7. I’d always had some cardio and situps type routine growing up but my ex finally got me into lifting after years of me saying no no no. I started with lunges,then moved on to squats.

    I got serious with training after finding a website that had a section for female lifting loggers. After reading and starting a log I picked up tips, saw videos of the fellow chick lifters, interacting finally with other women who liked to do what I did. I’d only seen female listing in powerlifitng usa and never met a fellow female lifter before so this was way exciting. I’ve always lifted or done any form of exercise as a kind of therapy and release of anxiety and innner turmoil. Now I could get a bit better at it from others helping me out and rooting me on so to speak.

    Did two raw pl meets and a strong man meet a few years ago and now I just do what I like. The last six months have been focusing on front squats, deadlifts, and pull ups mainly–upper body is still something I loathe. I hope to get out of lifting what I’ve already experienced–confidence,de-stressing,and the ever lasting quest to better yourself. Everyone is impressed with a female who lifts…its kinda a put down to our gender and a compliment at the same time.I will take the compliment part of it :)

  8. I started dabbling in weights when I was 12 years old…I remember I had this *cough* step-aerobics video (it was the early 90s obviously) which featured a JACKED instructor with defined delts, huge defined quads…and I wanted to be exactly like her! When I was 18 I got more serious and experimented with different training “splits”. Things have evolved over the years (I just turned 31). I would say the main reason I started lifting was to be THAT girl who could lift as much or more than the guys. I also was realistic about MY body type – no way was I going to look like my 5’10” 120lb sisters. I worked with MY strengths.Weight training changes the composition and shape of your body like nothing else can. Over the years I’ve gotten A LOT of negative comments from family…my dad’s latest “who the f*&k is going to date a woman that has bigger arms than a guy?! you need to stop lifting weights”. The constant battle is between what I like to look like and what it seems the majority of people find attractive. So, I’ll HEAR the guys say they love chicks that lift, hell, they’ll even “salute” us. BUT then I see the girls those guys actually date/bang/marry and they look like that ashley waif girl. It seems in my experience that A LOT of men (NOT ALL) think it’s “cool” and “awesome” that women lift in the gym, but outside of the gym us lifting girls become the “buddy” and the waifs get the guy. Just a GENERAL observation in my 14 years as a barbell girl (but for the record, I personally do get laid).

    • I agree with ya on this one! Most guys want a girl that can lift and are willing to get sweaty (in the gym) but when it comes to nailing one down, its the skinny cardio bunny that wins in the end. And to all those people that think a muscular chic is too much like a dude, I still have curves and a pretty face to match :) Keep doin what you are doing girl

      • In the last year, since getting srs about trainIng, I have noticed myself looking at waifs and asking does she even lift? Yes, skinny hipsters will be intimidated by strong women, while the rest of us gon be ‘mirin those delts (and by delts, I mean dat squat ass).

          • My wife gets it the worst from her sister. She’s started lifting heavy recently, and her sister’s first remarks were, “wow, you look too strong.”

            What? Is that even a thing? My wife and I were both like, DYEL?

            She and her fiance are about 250lb…combined…

    • I do have to agree with you there as most guys are intimidated by strong women. But we’re not all like that. My previous two girlfriends lifted heavy, ate (mostly) clean, and we trained together a lot. Believed in the basics and loved a bit of weightlifting and strongman. So we pushed of each other and helped motivate quite a bit. So there are guys out there who do admire and love strong women! heh, it just means i’ve got to keep getting stronger :)

    • Nailed it! TOO muscular. i hear that about female athletes a lot. makes me ill. “girls shouldn’t have abs”. “Looks like a dude.” Obviously, as you get more serious in training you surround yourself with more men ( and women ) who do not follow that thinking, but even in these circles its too frequently a conversation about how much a man can lift and what the aesthetic value of a woman’s work is. lame. My father disapproves of my muscularity too; Old school ain’t always better. Rock on anyway missmichelle!

      • I also get a lot of flak from co-workers about my muscles and I know I am not BIG … YET! grin. I get comments like “Does your husband even know you are a woman?” And yeah, they are cracking jokes and being “funny”(we are a super sarcastic bunch and I do love my co-workers cuz they take it as well as they dish it out) but I know there is an underlying seriousness behind it.

        However, I am SO INCREDIBLY HAPPY with muscles cuz I’ve never had them before… so every crack they make like that gives me a smug, smug smile on the inside. No one else in the office is as fit as me….

        • OH, and my husband digs it, I get nothing but support and appreciation from him so there are fellas out there! It got him working harder….because I am so far still kicking his butt in workouts. grin.

          • I know you said you don’t mind because your co-workers can dish it as well as take it but if my girlfriend told me one of her co-workers (especially male) had something like “does your husband/boyfriend” even know you’re a woman?” to her, I’d be furious.

            Next time one of them says that just say “yes, and so does yours”.

    • i concur with your general observation. i’ve tried pointing it out to my male friends who do this, but they play the “i can’t help that i’m attracted to ridiculously thin women” card. uh huh. culture, society, mass media, none of that affects you at all – you just can’t help who you’re physically attracted to! /sarcasm

  9. I grew up a very active kid. I was ivolved in dance, gymnastics, cheerleading, basketball, and track & field. I cheered in college and after that I did the typical thing that a lot of girls do – aerobics classes, “running” on the elliptical for 45 minutes, and yoga. In 2008 I was introduced to CrossFit and thanks to CF I have a whole new outlook on what I now consider healthy and fit.

    I am 35 years old, weigh137 lbs, eat at ton of bacon and eggs, and just recently high bar back squatted 265 lbs. (My goal is 300lbs+.) I also just got my first two bar muscle ups’s on Saturday. I know there are women much stronger and more fit than me, and they are who motivate me to do what I do daily.

    My favorite saying is from Rip – “Strong people are harder to kill than weak people, and more useful in general.” I believe we are not meant to be fragile beings and nothing frustrates me more than society trying to tell females that frail and fragile is what is healthy and fit.

    http://www.ashleythompsondenton.tumblr.com

    • my goal is to back squat as much as you when i grow up!!

      no seriously, that’s an awesome PR and one you worked hard for!! your commitment to your training is an inspiration to me every day in the gym, not to mention your awesome coaching (when i was a fledgling crossfitter/bootcamper). you’re doing way more than your part to get ladies into lifting heavy things, partly through great coaching and partly through just doing your own thing and being a BAMF. thank you :)

  10. I decided to start lifting after working MMA take downs with a girl 40+ lbs heavier than me and bruising my tailbone. Realized I was probably getting too old for MMA, but that I wanted to stay in as good of shape or better than I was so I started lifting.

    That was a year ago. I’ve now been a part of three “mini” powerlifting meets at my gym and one sanctioned one earlier this month. I’m immensely stronger than I was a year ago, all while changing my body composition – for the better! – and staying essentially the same weight.

    I’ve been out of the gym for a few weeks now for reasons, and I can’t wait to get back in and get ready for the next meet! Trophies are addictive!

  11. dude this is a really cool post. looking forward to reading all these stories.

    also, fuck you. some of us can’t MOB enough and still look like thoracic flexing gordon fucks.

  12. Hey
    It’s LeeAnn Harper here!

    This is a sweet post.. one very much needed!

    I walked into what is now my gym about 4 years ago @ the age of 16 and wanted to know how to get into good shape. The owner/trainer told me that I needed to lift some heavy ASS weights and stop taking advice from fat people .. HA!

    I have now been training at my gym for now 4 years. I have competed in olympic lifting comps and bodybuilding and now the JR Canadian Body Building Champion for this year 2012! My power to weight ratio is pretty awesome and I LOVE lifting heavy! it’s just part of me now.

    My weight training coach is Darren Clarke the owner of my gym CrossFit Langley and my dieting/posing coach for body building is Dawn Alison (body builder) who was the wife of Power lifting legend Doug Young! .. pretty sweet.

    I will continue competing in both weight lifting comps and body building shows in years to come.

    That’s my story ..

    Happy lifting :D

    -LeeAnn
    http://www.leeannharper.com
    http://www.crossfitlangley.com

  13. About May of last year (2011) I went to Gold’s gym and the man at the front desk swiped my card and said, “Woah! You haven’t been in here in over a month, you need to get serious!” Not significant maybe but for me its was THE catalyst. Like the Behind the Music drugged out rocker’s moment, “and then I woke up in an alley, broke and covered in my piss”. I had been living off the good genes and remnants of a decade-past athletic high school career. I was bored out of my mind with the treadmill routine & I had lost my passion about fitness.

    My coworker had mentioned crossfit and how much she’d loved it. So I googled my nearest gym and went in for a free Saturday session. And never stopped going. Initially I was big into running & 20 minute+ Metcons, and I did well enough in them, but then I started doing more strength training. In training for the Open & Regionals I found that I was pretty good and really enjoyed weightlifting. Since then I have more or less been on a string of Strength cycles and have loved it.

    To clarify, I never ever, EVER was interested in the female waif aesthetic goals. I loved to run really fast and climb shit and be outdoors. So I never truly converted from lady to beast, I just found something that really worked for my extremely competitive nature, ‘beefy’ legs & desire to NOT barf after the event.

    I love how it feels to pick up heavy things. Seriously. Its really empowering (yeah, feminist tone there) to be able to jerk something heavier than you overhead. Its very satisfying when you nail the 2nd pull, when you PR, when you get your heartrate up and sweat like a pig in under an hour. Sure my hands could snag sweaters and my shins are kinda ugly. But overall the physical and mental change has been incredible. Short term, I have numbers I want to hit (on the barbell, not the scale), and future competitions I’d like to do, but longterm I just want to win at life I guess.

    • It is so sad that it’s totally Not Okay if a girl wants to run and climb and get dirty outside.

      My mom describes lifting the same way: empowering. She went to school well before Title IX and never played sports as a girl, so she never got to feel what it was like to challenge yourself physically until she started lifting in her late 60s.

      • Hell, I was in high school 99-02 and there wasn’t a women’s polevault at state level. Someone said it was too dangerous? Never knew if it was true, but despite my desire to get into it, I had to trade it for long jump. Yay for sand in the shorts.

  14. I got wise after my local crossfit gym started to introduce a daily heavy lift prior to the randomly created WODs. This was smart of them. But smarter yet, was when I wised up and listened to the sharp guys at the gym who told me not to be afraid of heavy weights, and to crush that good old myth of how weight makes women bulky…
    This was six months ago. And though I have been injured for half of this time (not from training), the physical results felt from lifting heavy are greater than any other kind of “weight training” I thought I was doing throughout my 20 years of active training as a cardio bunny.
    I love that crossfit led me to powerlifting. It’s fun, challenging and effective – and being strong is totally badass!!

  15. After I had my kids, I went through years of globo gym classes and some personal training without getting down to a goal weight. Getting to my BMI could NOT be that hard – but it was! I investigated, cowered and joined a Crossfit gym about 4 years ago. I fell in love with the Olympic lifts and dedicated myself to them after CF induced shoulder injuries (stupid kip). I’ve done a PL training session one summer with Ms. Ellee Carlson of Chicago 70s big fame and it was fun! Since then I’ve not looked back. I do the occasional sprints and secretly wish I could run a 5 min mile.

    Love that there are men who appreciate solid women over skinny and are informed enough to tell the difference.

  16. Until I was 26 I was a 95 lb vegan/yogi/runner. After the birth of my second child my health divebombed and I started eating meat and researching nutrition. A friend invited me to a crossfit gym. I loved it, xfitted for 8-9 months and then decided to get serious about getting stronger. I’m still not very strong, but I think I’m finally learning to eat, I have weighed 135-140 for the last year and only plan to focus on strength and have fun.

  17. Short answer: Eowyn.

    Long answer:

    I was issued the Amazon body type as a girl, which earned me endless teasing. A male teacher encouraged me to make something positive out of that, by playing basketball. For the first time, being tall and strong was cool, not something to be embarrassed of. Still got plenty of teasing for being a tomboy and liking archery, swordfighting, drawing, and reading books like the Lord of the Rings, but I stopped caring. I played basketball for nine years, threw the shot and discus, became a fencer (sabre, of course). I got voted ‘Strongest Girl’ my senior year of high school, to much derision. My uncles, father, and grandfather all encouraged me to keep at it and do what I liked, and to stop caring about what other people thought.

    After college, I was diagnosed with a chronic disease that requires lifelong medication; the meds brought my metabolism to a speed resembling a pregnant yak roaming the tundra. I gained 150 pounds in two years. All of a sudden, I cared intensely about what other people thought of the way I looked. I dieted using the standard low-fat, low-calorie diet my doctor recommended, and religiously did long, slow cardio, all to try to keep my weight down. I was so frustrated and tired of working my ass off without working my ass off. I was tired of being told I must be secretly eating crap, or not really working out. Society totally expected me to just accept being the fat girl, and to act like one. A few years ago, a new medication came on the market for my disease that was weight-neutral, so I switched to that in about three nanoseconds. Dropped some weight, but still wasn’t seeing much progress. I fought to get referred to an endocrinologist, who actually took me seriously — and put me on a very low-carb Paleo diet, and started treating the underlying hormonal imbalances I’d developed. I also started working with a trainer who suggested I start lifting heavy weights and do Crossfit workouts for my conditioning.

    I hadn’t lifted weights since the days of throwing the shot in high school; I didn’t like being told to never add weight to the bar because I was a girl. But last year, once I got back under the bar and taught how to do more than bicep curls, bench presses, and tricep kickbacks, I fell in love with it. I like lifting because it clears my head and forces me to be in the moment; and because it makes me focus on what my body can do, rather than what it looks like. It’s not just that lifting has changed the way my body looks — although it certainly has. No — I like lifting because it brings me back to when I was a girl: confident and strong. Like Eowyn.

      • Yeah, I’m a lifelong Tolkien geek. When my ex-husband and I split up, the one possession we argued over was the Tolkien book collection.

        Thanks for the support; I still have a ways to go before I’m completely back to where I should be. ‘Bro-sis’— I like that. :)

    • I love stories like this one. “Focus on what your body can do rather than what it looks like.” I am passing that on to my daughter as she sets off on her athletic journey.

      • You know, it was the encouragement and support from the adults in my life that gave me permission to pursue being myself. Looking back, my uncles, father, and grandfathers all did one really crucial thing: they took me seriously and showed me how to do the things I was interested in. The women were encouraging, mostly, but they had no idea how to shoot a bow or make a fire. If you can both show your daughter how to do the things she digs, as well as get her to focus on what she’s capable of? She’ll be unstoppable.

    • this is *exactly* why i love lifting, too. it’s one of the few times i don’t have a million thoughts racing through my head. like meditation, but way less boring.

  18. Sadly, I wasn’t introduced to proper lifting until my late 20s. I never considered competing in Olympic weightlifting until Justin told me to stop being a chicken give it a go (thanks dude!). It wasn’t until after I signed up for a meet that I saw real improvement. You train much more seriously when you have D-day approaching.

    Also, I have to do the “no lifting will not make you bulky” speech at least once a week to newbies in our gym and most of the time their eyes glaze over and I can see them pining for a treadmill. Luckily, we have a community of women of all body types in the gym who are all righteously strong, smoking hot, and not bulky who “sell” it for us. The newbs are so busy chasing their weights they don’t think about the risk of getting bulky anymore. And then in a month or two in they notice they have fantastic glutes and they’re hooked. So if you build it, they will come.

  19. I am a 38 year old mom of two young boys. When I was in my teens and 20s I ran cross country and played tennis and biked for fun. I never exercised to change my body nor did I ever have weight to lose. I also did quite a bit of aerobics and step aerobics and eliptical bs. Joined gyms and never went because it was all so boring. Fast forward to my 2nd pregnacy when my husband found CrossFit and went on and on (and on) about it. When my second son was nearly a year old and my body wasn’t where I wanted it to be and I was tired all the time I decided to try whatever my husband was doing that he loved so much and was making him stronger and very energetic. A new box was opening close to our house so I went in fully committed and really loved all of it. I hadn’t ever even touched a barbell before. CrossFit total days were my absolute favorite. I loved being able to do pull-ups. When my first son started school and I had several hours to kill in town, I decided to spend the time at my husband’s box with one of his coaches to help clean up my form because I kept tweaking my back with anything overhead and wanted to be stronger so I could do WODs prescribed without killing myself. The coach cleaned up my form right away and asked if I might be interested in the olympic lifts. I hadn’t ever done any of them (the mere idea of snatching even an empty bar terrified me) but thought HELL, WHY NOT? It took me about 1.5 months to ditch CrossFit, and here I am a bit over a year later about to attend the American Masters Weightlifting Championships in just two weeks with a handfull of sanctioned meets under my belt. I’m hooked & feel super lucky to have a great coach who got me to try it out. I love spreading the word and look forward to bringing more women to the barbell and the prospect of coaching in the future.
    I don’t lift to set myself apart as I never have given a shit about that and still don’t and think that would be a really terrible reason to get into it. I do what feeds my soul. Being strong and fast is where it’s at for me.

  20. What’s up homies. Here’s my story- I started lifting in college after I realized my team sports days were over when I almost vomited during 1 day of college hockey because I was out of shape. I went through years of doing a stupid split with close to 0 real programming. I did enjoy trying to consistently add weight onto my major lifts. I started to plateau since I a) had no real program and b) my mechanics sucked. YouTube is a terrible place to learn how to deadlift from. I decided it was time for me to get my shit right and compete in something but I didn’t want to do 15 reps of isolation exercises and can’t diet to save my fucking life. So long story short I started powerlifting over the summer. I have my second meet coming up in a few weeks (IPL Worlds…. Yikes). I love it and I want to be an S&C coach at some point. I get super frustrated because I feel weak as shit but I’m working on it. After years of doing a shitty split I finally have some sweet lats from pull ups and deads and rows! I love powerlifting and I’m pumped I finally found something that works for me. Now I just need to get swole a shit and kill some records!! Working on it haha. Also I love this site! And I love how my thighs look like sausages in my singlet.

  21. Hey Justin,

    this kind of post is useful to me, but when I used the tag ‘females’, I couldnt find that ‘getting girls to train’ series.

    plz consider consolidating these great posts and putting them somewhere more prominent. :D

    • I agree with this. I like the new format but I think it might not be as helpful to new viewers of the site in general. I remember when I first started reading 70sBig it was easy to see a bunch of articles that made me want to dive in and read the rest. Now, the page doesn’t really hint at everything that is offered here.

  22. I am a 35 y.o. married mother of two (10 & 7). I have a BA in English (read: not athletic in any way) and I have been training for 3 months with my husband, who has been lifting for years. I resisted lifting for years due to my size & fear of “bulking up” and being even bigger. In an effort to have a common activity as a couple AND become healthier, I decided to give lifting a shot.
    I LOVE IT!
    I like feeling strong. I like squatting such a high weight I scare the 90’s small men working on their mirror muscles at our gym. I love that my husband likes a strong woman and tells m daily. 3 months ago I went from bar on all lifts to this week doing 225x5x3 squat, 235x5x3 dead, 105x5x3 press and 115x5x3 BP! All that plus a 30# weight loss leaves me completely devoted to lifting.

  23. I am a 42 yo female.

    Started with trainer couple years ago to get stronger and become a better runner and to be overall more healthy.

    Always before intimated by weights and carried a stigma in my head that only ‘those’ types used them.

    I LOVE WORKING WITH WEIGHTS. So much bang for your buck (time) and progress is quick, obvious, and rewarding.

    I will pick lifting any day over running now.

  24. My parents tried to get me into team sports as a teen but I don’t tend to play well with others so that never worked out. About a year and a half ago I joined a Crossfit affiliate and a few months later was introduced to the Olympic lifts. Lucky for me the affiliate owner was passionate about Olympic Weightlifting and wrote a separate program for a handful of us interested in learning more and eventually competing in the sport. I went to watch the NC State Competition last August and decided from that point on that I couldn’t leave this sport. Something I always wanted but never had was strength and I saw how strong these men and women were and signed up with USAW the next day. I’ve only competed twice and I am at best a novice in this beautiful world but it has changed my life forever. I look better, feel better, lift better, and encourage the people I now train at that same Crossfit gym how to lift heavy and crush weights. I have a female friend who has lifts that qualify her for Nationals and a male friend who is not far off. My goal this year is to get to the National level and I will lift weights every day until I get there.

  25. This may be silly… I’ve always thought STRONG women look so awesome. I loved how Linda Hamilton looked in Terminator3 or whichever one it was… and I liked Demi Moore in the military movie that I can’t think of it’s name… that physique always appealed to me and I didn’t see it really until those movies.

    I didn’t know how to obtain it tho’. I worked out with a body builder type trainer at a Golds Gym in my 20s but wasn’t serious and didn’t have any good nutrition to back up what I was doing. I changed jobs, moved away from the gym and stopped going.

    I got married, became complacent, gained a bunch of weight… tried all the conventional ways to lose it… weight watchers, putting myself on the treadmill for forever, trying to eat low-fat and whole grain… none of it worked and I figured this is just what middle age was…pudgy.

    Then I discovered how to eat… real foods… no more processed stuff and no more processed sugars…. and I dropped weight. Went from a size 16 and pushing a size 18 to a size 8. And never felt deprived or hungry – ate tons of protiens, veggies. Once I got my diet (not diet as in short term but diet as in how I eat all the time) dialed in, I began working out. I worked out on my own cuz I could barely do one modified pushup…

    I read Dan John and he was HUGELY inspriational to me. HUGE. I began doing some of the things he recommended… I got muscles… and I love them! I want MORE of them!

    I am 4 mos in to Crossfit which I know is not really 70s Big but I wanted to learn Oly lifts and didn’t think I could on my own without hurting myself… so I’m learning Oly lifts. I’m not sure I’ll ever be as ripped as Linda Hamilton in T3 (? or was it 2?) because I am learning what it would take to be THAT low body fat…however, I sure am enjoying increasing weights on my bar and being strong-ER and improving and being healthier. I’ve never felt so great in all my life and I know I have so much further to go! I’m having a ton of fun…

    Who knows where it will take me… but I sure am enjoying the ride so far! GO STRONG WOMEN!!!!! LIFT ‘DEM WEIGHTS!!!!

  27. like so many other ladies, my path to lifting heavy things was crossfit. i didn’t set out to find something i loved as much as i love the barbell, but i’m so grateful i did. i don’t think of lifting weights as being revolutionary, mainly b/c i’m surrounded by strong ladies at my crossfit box (where i still lift) all the damn time. i think when i started i was a bit worried about getting “big” (until i actually researched it and then realized it was a stupid concern), but now i’m actually kind of excited when i put on a few pounds b/c it means i can squat more. lifting heavy things has been instrumental in helping me to address a lot of the body image issues that i’ve acquired over the past 31 years. now i think about what my body can do versus what it looks like. i still fight the body image demons, but it’s a lot easier now that i’m stronger.

  30. Pingback: Happy halloween! | CrossFit Danville

  31. QUESTION ABOUT TRAINING FEMALES:

    Dear Justin,

    My girlfriend is highly interested in growing muscle, powerlifting and losing fat. This is fantastic.

    I moved her from a typical diet to a paleo diet. Currently, she is used to sprinting 2-3 times a week.

    I wrote down the following training routine for her:

    Workout A:

    Squat
    Press
    Chins (5 x 2, one leg on a bench behind her, cannot perform multiple reps unassisted yet)

    Conditioning: 10 minutes Jump Rope

    Workout B:

    Squat
    Bench Press
    Deadlift

    Conditioning: 10 minutes Jump Rope

    These are alternated for three weight training days a week.

    I suggested she limits the sprinting to twice a week and performs a calmer jog or walk on the third day (since she trains dogs and does her training with them). These are performed on the days in between weight training.

    The questions:

    1) Is the chin-up progression all right for her the progress to doing singles or doubles on chinups? Once I know that she can perform at least two chinups, I’ll move her up to doing 10 sets of singles, etc. Is this a good idea?

    2) Is the sprinting/weight training too much? Having them both on one day would allow for more recovery, but that is unfortunately not possible.

    3) Based on your article on females and higher reps, I wondered how I should best program her sets and reps. Better to have her perform 3 sets of 10 or 3 x 5? Or would you advise alternating? She wants to gain muscle and firm up, first and foremost.

    Thanks for any advice.

  33. Pingback: Q&A – 49 | 70's Big

  34. I got into strength training 3 years ago as I had to change my gym routine, running days a week did my knees no good… so i signed up for personal training and fast forward to now, I have achieved 231lbs deadlift, 154lbs squat but injuries have set me back… I am like a geriatric now ( feel like it even though in my 40s)… my trainer is xxxxxxx from xxxxxxxxxxx Australia..
    I look at these women who go to the gym and engage in the ‘feel the burn’ and just shake my head in dismay that these women waste their money thinking they are training but really only flapping their gums then go next door to talk about their hard work and sip lattes… my upper body has changed heaps and I feel stronger than 3 years ago… I feel the need to train more and more but setbacks with certain health issues/injuries disillusion me… so what do I do…

  35. Pingback: Derby City CrossFit | Louisville | Workout of the Day – Thursday 11/8/12

  36. Pingback: Inspired Fit Strong – 63 неща, които си заслужава да прочетете

  37. Pingback: Inspired Fit Strong – 63 Things Worth Reading

  38. Pingback: Paving My Own (Unique) Way « Nicole D. Beckerman

  39. Pingback: Wednesday 10.16.13 « Crossfit South Bend blog

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.