When girls pump iron: Demystifying the myths and realities

Hellen Mzigwa a Gym instructor during her fitness session at Bornfit Gym and Spa, Nairobi on August 17, 2023. PHOTO | WILFRED NYANGARESI | NMG

If you were to visit the free weights area at most gyms in Kenya, how many women do you think you would bump into pumping iron?

On leg days, where exercises such as squats, deadlifts, and lunges, are done, you may find about 90 percent of the gym goers will be women seeking to tone the lower body. But the rest of the days, the weights area is full of men.

Hellen Mzigwa a Gym instructor during her fitness session at Bornfit Gym and Spa, Nairobi on August 17, 2023. PHOTO | WILFRED NYANGARESI | NMG

So, why are many women avoiding strength training exercises yet they shape the body faster, enhance your quality of life and improve your ability to do everyday activities?

It could be because some women still believe that if they lift weights, they will look like professional bodybuilders Andrea Shaw and Andrulla Blanchette. Wrong.

Hellen Mzigwa is among a small number of women who prefer weight lifting as part of their fitness regime.

At 11am, we found her at Bornfit Gym and Spa on Nairobi’s Koinange Road. The leg extension machines next to a large mirror wall thunder with the weight plates smouldering each other.

Hellen releases a blue headband and with the right finger, strikes the sweat off her cranium. It is her leg day.

The 39-year-old then reaches to her quads with both hands and rubs gently in an attempt to soothe them. Her breathing is heavy.

“One more set to go, the tension on the muscles is gut-wrenching my ‘G’, I tell you my quads are on fire,” she manages to sigh.

For the last five years, Hellen has been pumping iron. This has been her routine every four days a week and even then, her physique does not come anywhere near those of Blanchette and Shaw.

She is not shredded like the two women but has a well-toned physique.

Hellen Mzigwa a Gym instructor during her fitness session at Bornfit Gym and Spa, Nairobi on August 17, 2023. PHOTO | WILFRED NYANGARESI | NMG

“I don’t know who told women that lifting weights will get make them as muscular as men. As a fitness trainer, I get that a lot from female clients and over the years I find myself repeating myself, no amount of weight-lifting will get a woman looking like a man. Those women who have been lifting weights and have achieved a man-like physique are definitely on something stronger than the estrogen hormone which dictates our physique,” she says.

The science

Citing science, Hellen explains that the levels of the hormone testosterone are around 10 times lower in women than in men.

And because testosterone is an anabolic hormone (that stimulates muscle growth) making men considerably more muscular, masculine and stronger than women, a female weight training would be physiologically unable to achieve anywhere near the levels of muscularity reached by their male counterparts.

“Women, therefore, need to understand that the worst they can achieve (with lifting weights) is reaping all of the benefits of muscular strength training without becoming muscular, not unless they ingest some substance like steroids,” she says.

Hellen Mzigwa a Gym instructor during her fitness session at Bornfit Gym and Spa, Nairobi on August 17, 2023. PHOTO | WILFRED NYANGARESI | NMG

The to-die-for curves

Of these benefits, Hellen says, sexiness tops her list. She mentions the word ‘sexy’ six times in this eight-minute conversation about how weights perfectly shape a woman’s body.

“Tell me which woman wouldn’t want to look sexy. Do you know of any? Well then, if you are a woman and you want to look sexy, have all those curves that are to die for, then be consistent with lifting weights, eat clean then call me to say thank you. This is a long-term investment for aesthetics and general wellness, that’s far much better than those shortcuts of surgeries ” she says.

Beyond sexiness, science has proved that strength training in both males and females increases the stability of connective tissues, particularly those of the ligaments and tendons.

These connective tissues provide the body’s joints with increased stability and strength reducing the risks of one picking injuries from their daily to-day activities.

Minding the age

Weight lifting also increases the deposit of calcium into the skeleton and ultimately increases the density of the loaded bones which then reduces the risk of the brittle and porous bone conditions known as osteoporosis, especially as women get older.

Hellen Mzigwa a Gym instructor during her fitness session at Bornfit Gym and Spa, Nairobi on August 17, 2023. PHOTO | WILFRED NYANGARESI | NMG

But there is also the issue of age.

Hellen maintains that women especially at the age of 30 and above should focus on strength training more than any other form of fitness activity.

“Once you get to 30, there is the rapid loss of skeletal muscle tissues. This results in a significant decrease in the size of the muscle fibres which then corresponds with a decline in muscular strength and because women have lower levels of absolute muscular strength than men, this situation manifests much earlier in life for us women. Do you see why women need to pay attention to strength training? I would love to maintain my sexy physique for as long as I can,” she says.

But if as a woman your obsession is on attaining general well-being rather than achieving and maintaining those head-turner curves, you will still achieve your goal.

“Of course having a sexy physique is the reward of your efforts but there is more to strength training. A woman’s metabolic rate will increase leading to an increase in lean body weight, reduction of body fat, which is a nightmare to most women, improved posture, better functionality and flexibility, and of course, boost one’s self-confidence,” the fitness trainer says.

Hellen Mzigwa a Gym instructor during her fitness session at Bornfit Gym and Spa, Nairobi on August 17, 2023. PHOTO | WILFRED NYANGARESI | NMG

The defeatist mentality

As easy as it sounds, Hellen notes that most women never get to achieve all these because of their quick-fix mentality.

“Women often feel pressured to watch that number on the weighing scale drop and may engage in disordered eating patterns and fad diets to make it happen. That’s our major undoing, we want quick results, and we don’t want to give ourselves time. Rome was never built in a day,” she says.

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