Quote:
Originally Posted by sidonia
Ryan...I'm curious...when you are training a man who comes you to overweight to lose weight and a woman who comes to you for the same, do you start both of them with the same workouts? Or do they differ because of gender? Just a question...  |
Honestly, not really. But let me give you some real examples of things that I have to work around. Because of my current training environment I am not doing any barbell training. If I was I would be doing lots of low rep heavy deads and squats with my clients. I like sldl's for the ladies quite a bit because it seems to hit the spots that I hear them say they are concerned about and I think it's a great overall exercise for someone's health.
But I don't have barbells. So I do a lot of bodyweight work and I've had several women complain about size that they put on doing bodyweight squats. I've never ever had a man complain to me about this. So I do goblet squats using kb's and db's and weighted lunges with them. Not a big deal. What is strange to me is that this happened at all. Now for guys being "big" seems to be slightly different than what a woman perceives. It's this variance in perception, wants and needs that I thought others here might have some perspective or input on.
So if someone were to ask me what's different when training a woman compared to a man I would reply that (in my humble opinion):
1. watch out for very motivated women they are more likely to work themselves into the ground than the guys are.
2. some women may want to take it easier on during her period
3. make sure your guys eat their veggies/fruit and your ladies eat their protein
4. A woman's 5 rep max is closer to her 1rm than a man's is
5. don't do lots of bodyweight squats with a woman that is concerned about the size of her legs
6. guy's love to put too much weight on a bar, convince them what proper progression means
7. Teach your female clients that they are not going to get huge working out with heavy weights.
Can anyone add to this? Can anyone say that any of these are complete bs? Yes, they are broad strokes. But treating each client as an individual and listening to them will tell me when one of the above generalizations don't apply to them.