Being a fitness beginner—especially as a woman—can sure get exhausting. Every week, there seems to be a new workout hack or tip on social media. Maybe it’s a 28-day Wall Pilates challenge (our take on that, here) or a fitness influencer telling you walking doesn’t count as exercise (um, it definitely does). With unrealistic beauty standards as rampant as ever, women are often bombarded with misleading fitness advice and exercise myths.
It doesn’t help that our mothers (or the celebs we look up to) have also often passed down less-than-stellar workout advice. A great example? The once pervasive belief that any kind of strenuous exercise—including running—can damage your reproductive health. Point blank, knowing what to do to work on your fitness can feel overwhelming.
At obé, we believe being able to confidently discern what’s fact and fiction is the best place to start. Realistic expectations, realistic goals, and a realistic fitness plan are the best ingredients for sticking to your workouts—and getting results. So let’s call a spade a space and debunk the four big exercise myths that women are still constantly exposed to today.
We tapped women’s health and fitness expert Melody D. for all the intel.
1) Women’s Exercise Myths: Strength training makes you bulky
Ah, the biggest myth of them all—the idea that lifting any weights heavier than the 3-pound dumbbells we rock in Sculpt or Barre will make us look bulky. Sigh. According to a recent study, only 1 in 5 women regularly strength train, and we think this myth is to blame.
The truth? This misconception ties back to faulty medical advice from the 20th century. Back then, doctors perpetuated the idea that women were physically limited, that building muscle was unladylike, and that exerting oneself too much could cause your uterus to fall out (true story).
But women are fully capable of lifting weight—and a lot of it. Most women avoid strength training because they were never properly educated about the numerous science-backed benefits, nor introduced to it in a welcoming environment. In reality, our own biology hinders our biggest fear from ever materializing: because of our unique hormonal profile, women simply don’t build lean muscle mass at the same rate as men!
Fact: Lifting weights is one of the best things women can do to boost metabolism, increase longevity, support hormone health, and slow aging.
Ladies, if you’re not lifting at least medium-sized weights once a week, you’re setting yourself back! Women reach peak muscle mass in their mid-30s. From there, we begin losing 3-8% of it per decade until age 60—then, even more rapidly. Without a healthy muscle mass, you’re more likely to develop all sorts of health and metabolic conditions, like sarcopenia. The earlier you start strength training, the more you slow this decline.
Rest assured, you’d also have to try really hard to bulk up. Really. To put it in perspective: even if you regularly lift 30-pound weights 3 times a week, you’d have to commit to a serious caloric-surplus diet, a strict training regimen, and work with a coach to have a foundation to bulk.
Did we mention that women who strength train 2-3 days a week (think: Strength or Power classes on obé) are more likely to live longer than women who don’t lift at all? Or that it’s the best workout modality for regulating hormones (especially for pre-menopause and beyond)?
Or that committing to a strength regimen is your best tool for regulating weight, improving body composition, and seeing definition in your body?
Not to mention, strength training reduces women’s risk of osteoporosis by increasing bone density, strengthens the heart, reduces the likelihood of developing chronic health conditions, builds mental resilience, and so much more. You have a lot to gain without ever looking bulky—promise.
2) Women’s Exercise Myths: Cardio is the best way to lose weight
When most women think of weight loss, cardio is the first thing that comes to mind. Treadmills, ellipticals, and stationary bikes… these are the pieces of equipment we default to when we want to lose a few pounds.
Spoiler alert: this is a huge misconception. But before we unpack why, it’s important to understand how this exercise myth has become so standardized in our understanding of fitness.
First, we have traditional gender norms, which instill the notion that women should be slim, not “muscular,” reinforcing the idea that cardio is the most appropriate mode of exercise. This is magnified by the media, which often perpetuates the idea that cardio drives weight loss (open up any women’s health magazine for evidence).
On top of that, the fitness industry often markets cardio-based workout programs and cardio equipment more heavily toward women. We often hear that cardio burns more calories than any other type of exercise, which must mean it will help us lose the most weight (wrong!). At the same time, few women are educated about the numerous benefits of strength training (particularly for weight loss and body composition change)—and voila, a prolific myth is born.
Fact: Cardio alone isn’t enough to change your body composition—you’ll hit a plateau! Research says strength training is best.
Women need to unlearn that a) cardio leads to weight loss and b) that MORE cardio leads to MORE weight loss. While cardio workouts can result in more immediate physical feedback—think: lots of sweating and an elevated heart rate—this doesn’t mean you’re burning more calories or “burning fat.”
Yes, cardio does burn calories, and you may see a little weight loss in the beginning if you’re starting to work out for the first time. But it does not necessarily lead to long-term weight loss or muscle retention—a must to have a healthy metabolism.
“Cardio won’t help you drastically lose weight or change your body composition,” explains Melody. “It’s most useful for keeping your heart muscles strong and training your cardiovascular system.”
Research shows that when it comes to long-term weight management and body composition change, strength training offers more advantages. Why? Lifting weights helps you lose fat and build muscle, protecting you from rebound weight gain. “The more muscle you have, the more energy they need,” explains Melody. “To maintain or build muscle, you’ll expend more calories—even at rest after your workout—becoming more metabolically active and healthy.”
For the best results, it’s important to combine both cardio and strength training, which together will burn calories, build muscle, boost your metabolism, and reduce fat mass.
3) Women’s Exercise Myths: You can tone your muscles
If you’ve fallen for this one, we don’t blame you. Ads promising “toned” arms, legs, or abs are everywhere in the fitness industry, especially in fitness boutiques and classes geared toward women. Looking “toned” is an aspiration for many women looking to work out—but the word itself is a marketing term, rather than anything rooted in physiology.
Allow us to explain. To capitalize on the emerging trend of women exercising for the first time (hi, jogging and aerobics), marketers in the 1980s invented the concept of “toning” to preserve the ideal of the feminine figure. Throughout the majority of the 20th century, exercise and sport were generally reserved for males—leaving women at high risk of being called “manly” for wanting to move their own bodies. (The full history on that, here.)
Remember the bulking exercise myths from above? Toning is the “anti-bulking” antidote, something to get women into gyms and studios.
Fact: That’s another marketing trick aimed at women. You can build or lose muscle, but you can’t make it “firmer.”
Here’s the funny part—muscle tone is a real thing, but it refers to your muscle’s ability to create tension and force at rest. AKA, it has a structural function (maintaining your posture), not an aesthetic one. Someone can have low or high muscle tone, but it has nothing to do with how they look physically.
“When someone says they want to tone their muscles, they mean they want to see their muscles,” explains Melody. “But that has everything to do with your body composition—the overall proportion of muscle, bone, and fat in your body—and almost nothing to do with your actual muscle.”
Most women turn to classes like Sculpt, Yoga Sculpt, Barre, or Pilates to “tone” their muscles. “But since these modalities work your slow-twitch, endurance-based muscle fibers, they may not lead to muscle development and the physical changes you’re looking for,” explains Melody. “If you want to build up muscle to see more definition in your body, you have to lift weights or do Strength classes that work your fast-twitch muscle fibers.”
Even better, go for an obé training program, which incorporates the principle of hypertrophy and progressive overload to help you get stronger and look stronger, too.
4) Women’s Exercise Myths: Your weight tells you how healthy you are
Ugh, the scale. There’s always that elusive, “magic” number in our heads—if we just get to it, maybe then we’ll feel confident, happy, and healthy. For many women, weight becomes an internal barometer of both our health and our beauty, a number that tells us how in shape we are.
The problem is that looking exclusively at weight (or even BMI, aka body mass index) to gauge internal health isn’t exactly accurate. The number on the scale is just one data point, which doesn’t distinguish between fat and muscle and can fluctuate for all kinds of reasons.
Imagine two people who are the same height and weight, but person A has more body fat than muscle mass. They’ll be susceptible to different health issues (and likely more of them) than person B, even though they weigh the same. You may also be working out more, seeing new definition in your body, and feeling better than ever, all without your weight changing. That’s because you may be building muscle while losing fat, ultimately supporting your metabolism and healthspan!
Finally, drinking more water, eating more fiber, exercise-induced inflammation (totally normal), different medications, and even digestion can all cause temporary fluctuations in weight. None of these things mean you’re unhealthy!
Fact: Your body composition (aka the ratio of fat, bone, and muscle) is a far stronger indicator of your overall health.
If you feel like tracking something (and you don’t have to!), body composition is where it’s at. Research indicates that the two metrics that gauge it—lean body mass and body fat percentage—are more accurate and reliable for assessing your health. Plus, most health and fitness experts agree that a healthy body composition (meaning you have more muscle mass than fat) is way more important than losing weight.
The first metric, lean body mass measures your total body weight minus body fat, accounting for the weight of bones, organs, muscles, etc—70-90% is generally a healthy range. The second, body fat percentage, looks at how much weight comes from fat. It’s highly individualized, but 21-32% is a healthy general range for women.
Unlike weight or BMI, both these metrics have a strong correlation to how fit or physically active you are and more accurately reflect both your metabolic health and potential health risks.
But the most important factor? Body composition can measure whether you’re healthy for your own unique body type. It’s already personalized to you! (Curious how to start measuring it—and how to track it on obé? Read this!)
obé puts women first–period
Wherever you are in your journey, know that obé is here to empower you with all the facts, and none of the exercise myths. We put women and their unique needs first, tailoring our fitness platform to you and how your bodies work. You’ll never hear us say words like “tone” in class, and we always focus on how working out will make you feel vs. how it makes you look.
The result? A safe space where you can fall in love with movement, instead of feeling like it’s a chore or punishment! We got you, girl.
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