Last week, I called back a person who had expressed interest joining Power Plant Gym. She didn’t know much about us, and when I said we were strength focused, she immediately said, “Oh no, I’m not looking for strength training, I’m trying to lose weight, so I need cardio.” It’s a common misconception that strength training isn’t useful for weight loss. I hear it all the time. Let’s clear up some of the biggest myths.
Is weight loss the real goal?
First and foremost, if your primary goal is to improve your health, focusing on weight may not be the most important factor. Weight and health are two separate things, and hyperfocusing on weight can lead to behaviors that are harmful to your health. It’s more helpful to focus on health promoting behaviors that actually make you feel good. You’ll avoid the trap of diet culture and build habits that last. Consider putting weight loss on the back burner and just focusing on the things that will help you to feel your best:
- Getting good movement in
- Commonsense nutrition
- Adequate sleep
- Socializing
- Stress management.
These are the big rocks that will help you feel your best.
Strength Training Supports Healthy Weight
If you’ve read all that, and still think, “Cool, cool, but I really just gotta lose some weight,” that’s okay! Strength training can help you get there! Strength training helps you build more muscle. Muscle is metabolically active tissue, so it requires energy (calories) to sustain it. That means that your body with more muscle will burn more calories than your body with less muscle. Furthermore, resistance training can help reduce the loss of lean body mass (muscle) when you’re losing weight. The word “toning“ hurts my soul, but people often use this word to describe a person who has lower body fat and enough muscle to be a bit visible. Strength training will help you build up the muscle!
Lift in Conjunction with Moderate Intensity Cardio
Whether you’re looking to improve your health, or to achieve weight loss, resistance training in combination with moderate intensity cardio can help you get there! There are so many ways to do low intensity cardio, and the most important factor is that you ENJOY it! If you love dancing, dance! Dance by yourself, dance in a class, dance with a partner. If you hate dance, but love to hike, get out and walk in the woods. The important thing is that you get your heart rate up, get a little out of breath, and move your body.
A Note about GLP1s
We’ve been starting to see folks on GLP1s coming and training with us.GLP1s are a class of medications that are being used to assist weight loss and includes medications like Ozempic, Wegovy, Zepbound just to name a few. We can’t recommend for or against use of GLP1s, but if you’re taking one, strength training will help prevent you from losing muscle mass when you’re on it. The rapid weight loss from GLP1s can also disrupt metabolism and lead to other undesired body changes that strength training can help prevent.
There’s a ton of fitness myths out there, and we’re doing our best to fight the spread of fitness misinformation. Unfortunately the old saying seems true; a lie spreads around the world while the truth is still putting its sneakers on. If you need some support cutting through the nonsense, send us a DM. We’d love to hear from you!
