Is there a difference when training a female client?
I've never trained a female client before, and i was wondering what to do if I had to do anything different from training a male.
For males I typically prescribe 3~4 exercises per body part, 2~3 sets. Same for females?
Thanks everyone.
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08-14-2010, 12:40 PM #1
Female training any different from males?
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08-14-2010, 12:51 PM #2
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08-14-2010, 01:37 PM #3
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08-14-2010, 03:58 PM #4
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Only difference is they seem to worry more about "getting big and muscley".
And if you are going to take measurements or use bodyfat calipers... use discretion and common sense.
Oh yeah... And one other tip... No matter what, if they are a lonely house wife who flirts through the whole session... DO NOT TOUCH!
But to be serious, unless the woman is currently pregnant, treat her just like a male client.~Coach Rick Sterling Tarleton
USA Weightlifting, USA Track&Field
CrossFit L-1, ISSA CFT, Pilates
www.CoachRickSterling.com
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08-14-2010, 04:51 PM #5
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Nobody's going to like me for this, but here it is.
If you have to ask how to train a woman, then you should not be training anyone at all.
It's not like women are a special needs category like MS sufferers or below-knee amputees or something. This is not obscure stuff, it should have been covered by your qualifications and practical placement, combined with common sense.
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08-14-2010, 05:20 PM #6
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08-14-2010, 05:24 PM #7
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08-14-2010, 07:37 PM #8
I will push the envelope here a bit. You should train women harder than men. Why? Because women are hardcore. They bleed for five days every month and they don't die.
Seriously, like what the others said. Train them no different than men.This above all..
To thine ownself be true..
And it must follow, as the night the day..
Thou can'st not then be false to any man..
-----------------------------------------------
Bros, my Weightlifters and Powerlifters are my credentials.
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08-14-2010, 07:38 PM #9
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[QUOTE=pumplikecuming;533467363 They generally tend to recuperate between sets faster than males, maybe since they have slightly higher amounts of 2a/1 fibers I would assume. [/QUOTE]
Do you have a source on this?~Coach Rick Sterling Tarleton
USA Weightlifting, USA Track&Field
CrossFit L-1, ISSA CFT, Pilates
www.CoachRickSterling.com
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08-14-2010, 07:46 PM #10
Women do seem to respond better to volume than men. Once again, i can't get the source because it's in one of my damn text books and it's hard to find a reference in those damn things.
I wouldn't push the volume a lot at the start though. Let them go through the neuromuscular facilitation stage and learn the basics. Also, if there is one thing I find with 90% of women, it's that they don't push themselves hard enough. They think weight lifting will make them look big, they feel that the weight lifting part should be a aerobic activity or they just don't understand that the "burn" isn't something that you stop the second you feel, or all of the above.Last edited by Kraken; 08-14-2010 at 07:51 PM.
One party system; Most Republicans are Democrats, but no Democrats are Republicans.
Hayek and Mises were right; they're all socialists.
"To Call something fair or unfair is a subjective value judgment and not liable to any verification" Ludwig Von Mises
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08-14-2010, 08:14 PM #11
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i think your psychology might need to be a little different, but the physiological side is much the same (taking in to account that every person is different, of course). Women are still human beings...
by psychology i mean for example a male client you might be able to get excited about the idea of working towards a goal of being able to pump out 20 push ups, because he might see that as a good achievement, a sign of improved strength and endurance etc. But perhaps a woman might be thinking "i don't really care about being able to do 20 push ups, i just want to lose some damn weight!".
So you might want to say something along the lines of "ok, imagine a woman in your age group who could just pump out 20 push ups on demand and then jump back up again ready for the next exercise. What do you think she might look like? Probably she'd be pretty lean and toned and not carrying much extra weight, right?"
Just something I've had in mind for a couple of my clients... trying to get in the habit of wording things more applicable to THEIR goals. I suspect most guys would like to be able to do 20 push ups just for the sake of being able to do 20 push ups but for different individuals you have to approach things in slightly different ways to best motivate them.
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08-14-2010, 11:31 PM #12
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08-15-2010, 10:15 AM #13
Like others have mentioned, the physical approach to training men and women is about the same (depending on unique goals of course). The Psychological approach has been, in my experience, very different between the sexes. Your male clients will relate to you differently than your female clients because you are male- but I think as long as you adopt kind of a "chameleon" approach where your personality genuinely adapts to each person, there will be no problems.
You should also consider the relationships you have with men and women in your life already. You may be more sensitive to your sister or girl friends, than you would be with your brother or guy friends. There isn't alway that stereotype because some women can be very aggressive/masculine, and some men can be very sensitive/feminine so you have to allow yourself to open up and learn to read each person well. Ask questions and really listen to what your clients are saying regardless of gender, this will help you grow as a trainer.NASM CPT, NFPT Master Trainer, Psychology Major
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08-15-2010, 10:45 AM #14
Agreed. I have met many magazine models (smaller scale, but modeled bathing suits etc) and the best looking ones admitted to doing squats and deadlifts etc. Size is also indicated through diet, so one would not need to eat a ton of food, they could control size with diet too, not JUST weight lifting.
One party system; Most Republicans are Democrats, but no Democrats are Republicans.
Hayek and Mises were right; they're all socialists.
"To Call something fair or unfair is a subjective value judgment and not liable to any verification" Ludwig Von Mises
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08-15-2010, 10:47 AM #15
I don't believe there has ever been a clear cut study done on it, but people have been going by what works best. I read an elite fts article, and I think Jim Wendler wrote something on it as well. But here is a link to one of the elite fts writers
http://jasonferruggia.blogspot.com/2...r-females.html
And just by common sense, I can infer that women don't have as much 2b fibers (but I have seen some bulky women that have big quads/glutes/hams), and what we do know about 2a and 1 fibers is that they have higher amounts of hemoglobin so they can contract longer, and recover faster so that they can be used asap.
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08-15-2010, 11:33 AM #16
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Sorry, but that article has nothing to do with real science... If you read it carefully, the writer basically states that women are weaker so they do less weight than their male counterparts... then because of that they can go on to do much more sets. Not because they have more or less of a muscle fiber type.
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Quoted from the article
• Females can tolerate a slightly higher training volume- Because they are usually weaker and have less overall muscle mass than males; females recover more easily and quickly and for this reason can tolerate a greater number of sets in their training.
....
• Females require less rest between sets than males- This is very similar to the rule about training volume. Because they are weaker, less muscular and recover faster, females don’t need to rest as long between sets. While most males will need at least 3-5 minutes between a brutally heavy ten-rep set of squats before they will be able to repeat the effort, most females can do so in just a minute or two; sometimes even less. If they are extremely weak, they may actually be able to repeat the effort in as little as 30 seconds.
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According to this article, women are weak compared to males and tend to do less weight... therefore they can do more sets and less recovery time. If you read the entire article, he basically compares men who lift big and have plenty of muscle to smaller, weaker females...
Ummm, pretty sure if I wasn't pushing myself to my limits (85%max) for my sets, then I would be able to crank out several more sets with less recovery time.~Coach Rick Sterling Tarleton
USA Weightlifting, USA Track&Field
CrossFit L-1, ISSA CFT, Pilates
www.CoachRickSterling.com
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08-15-2010, 04:54 PM #17
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It's likely the article authour is comparing novice women with experienced men lifters. Novices to weight training, assuming they don't have very poor cardiovascular fitness, need less recovery time between sets - simply because they're not currently using all their muscle fibres to lift. During the neuromuscular adaptation phase of novice lifting, rest times can be shorter.
The article reminds me of what Mike Boyle said, that the greatest obstacle before women athletes is the low expectations of their male coaches.
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08-17-2010, 07:21 PM #18
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08-17-2010, 09:36 PM #19
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08-19-2010, 03:36 PM #20
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Obviously above all else the specific goals of the person will detail the majority of your training program. In my history/opinion I usually incorporate alot more compound movements with women. I don't mean heavy deadlifting or bench pressing, but something along the lines of Squat & Press, Lunge and Lateral, Bench Pushing, and Pushup Rows for examples.
I feel that women often are not as coordinated or as neurologically capable as the average man because they do not compete or participate in sports as often or as long as men. Obviously this is not true all the time, and not every woman is in a position to perform these movements properly but it serves as a basis.
Getting them to fire efficiently on a central nervous system basis will go along way towards their ability to perform physical tasks in the future.
This approach also allows you to burn more calories per workout by involving more muscle groups per movement. So if the goal is weightloss this is more effective than performing isolation movents, especially considering it will take far fewer calories for a woman to do a dip than for a man to perform one."Losing weight and losing only fat are not the same thing.
Therein lies the difference.
I can chop my arm off and lose 30 pounds but it doesnt make it a good idea."
Dave P
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08-22-2010, 12:24 PM #21
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I'm going to throw my opinion out there. I train males and females the same. Of course, the weight used is a bit lighter for women. I mostly do bodybuilding training. Great results in muscle growth, tone and body fat loss are achieved. Seems as though women like to think that all they need is an hour of cardio a day with maybe 15 minutes of resistance training. They don't get the tone, firm body they desire and wonder why. Notice the great shape a male has when he does intense resistance training with little or no cardio? So, get those females off the cardio wagon, and kick their butt in the weight room. I'm not saying cardio is off limits, but it can be done 2 to 3 times a week for 20-30 minutes on days you don't do resistance training.
just my opinion...CaryD
Strength, power, endurance. SPEfitness
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08-22-2010, 12:41 PM #22
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08-22-2010, 04:16 PM #23
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08-22-2010, 06:58 PM #24
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I think what you're clumsily trying to describe is what we usually call "bodily awareness." Some people can squeeze their glutes or brace their abs when you tell them to, some can't.
I have not found this to vary by gender. Rather, it varies by background. People with a varied sporting or physical training background will have good bodily awareness, those without it won't. Many women come to PTs after years of aerobics, they have better bodily awareness than a person - man or woman - who's been sitting at a desk all that time.
All that changes, though, is how long it takes them to perform certain exercises with good form. Someone with good bodily awareness will get it in the first session, someone with poor bodily awareness might take a dozen sessions. But all of them get it in the end, provided the trainer/coach is competent and a good communicator.
There are certainly differences between the genders. But the difference between individuals are much, much greater. Let's not forget the first part of our job title - we deal with the person. Treat clients as individuals, not as men or women or fat or thin or strong or weak or healthy or disabled or whatever.
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08-23-2010, 12:25 AM #25
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training women is a lot different.
they say they wanna be pushed, and dont wanna be pushed.
you have to make sure they arent hurting.
they like to talk a lot during training.
they are afraid of getting bigger/ bulkier = afraid of real results
so much other bull****--
but theyre still cool to train.
you train them with the same exercises.
and try to explain to them that doing 2hrs of cardio everyday is not actually effective
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08-23-2010, 12:39 AM #26
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one difference i just thought of;
with a male client you often have to tell them "use a lighter weight" when they have a bit of ego and want to use heavier weights than they can handle and make a mess of the form.
women on the other hand seem to always think you're putting too much weight on, but i give them an attitude like "I'm not going to go easy on you just because you're a girl, that would be sexist! Now give me 10 reps!" and usually they smash them out. I really enjoy training all my girl clients, they're champs.
so yeah, it's opposites. Guys you'll be telling "that's too heavy", girls you're telling them "that's not heavy enough for you". I'm generalising pretty enormously but it does happen that way in my experience.
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08-23-2010, 05:18 AM #27
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08-23-2010, 12:39 PM #28
You're being overly-generous.
Women suck at strength in comparison to how well THEY (that is, women) perform on cardio.
Women do not outperform MEN on cardio, lol.
The role reversal is about psychology, it doesn't extend to performance.
Here's a statistic for you:
Women's aerobic capacity is significantly lower, meaning they cannot carry as much as far as fast as men, and they are more susceptible to fatigue. In terms of physical capability, the upper five percent of women are at the level of the male median. The average 20-to-30 year-old woman has the same aerobic capacity as a 50 year-old man.
The average female Army recruit is 4.8 inches shorter, 31.7 pounds lighter, has 37.4 fewer pounds of muscle, and 5.7 more pounds of fat than the average male recruit. She has only 55 percent of the upper-body strength and 72 percent of the lower-body strength... An Army study of 124 men and 186 women done in 1988 found that women are more than twice as likely to suffer leg injuries and nearly five times as likely to suffer fractures as men.
It's nice of you to say that men suck at cardio while women suck at weights, but the reality is, women just suck all-around. They are simply more willing to do cardio than weights because it's easier.
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08-23-2010, 12:43 PM #29
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08-23-2010, 05:50 PM #30
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it's to save arguments. if you don't add a little disclaimer every time you say something like that some bugger will come in and call you out on it and kills my buzz. welcome to the internet
ps - Kyle is right about the cardio thing. Last night I put my girls through a circuit, worked them really hard. At the end I was like "good job, girls!" but what I was really thinking was "i did this circuit on the weekend and was breathing much harder than this!"
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