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Weight Training for Beginners: Keys for Building Strength
Filed under Weight TrainingJun 17Congratulations on making the big decision to make yourself healthy and strengthen your body. But before you go rushing off to the gym to lift the biggest, heaviest, weight you can find, you need to remember a few things. As a beginner, you should take these steps to get yourself ready for the big stuff, and to keep yourself from getting an injury.
You know that lifting weights builds strength but how do you do it?
Lifting weights causes your body to stress. Because the body does not like stress, the body quickly adapts, becoming stronger to accommodate your actions with less stress. To avoid reaching a plateau increase the weight you lift, but do so gradually over a period of time, not through one workout. This is what is known as power loading. Use a systematic approach to increasing weight and resistance.
Eventually, you will reach a point where you can no longer increase the weight and the resistances, so to get through this plateau, go back to a lighter weight for a while, giving your body a break. When you go back to the heavier weight, you will cause your body to adjust again and become stronger, breaking through the plateau. This seems somewhat backwards, but it works.
Another key to building strength is your speed. The faster you become at lifting weights and doing other weight related workouts, then the stronger you become. Speed is another thing you should gain gradually over time. You cannot expect to be Speedy Gonzalez overnight.
Power is another thing to consider. Power refers to the ability to accelerate. In other words, your ability to go from a dead stop to fast. The quicker you can do this, the stronger you will become. Speed and power are related to each other. The faster you can do something, the more power you can put into it. The more power you have, the stronger you will become.
All of these things are very important to consider when you begin weight training. But above all, remember that strength building takes time. You should never push yourself too far, too soon. When you get signals from your body that enough is enough, listen to them. You can always come back and try again later, after your body has rested. You will be sore, but the stronger you become, the less soreness you will experience. Good Luck!