There are a few tips you should keep in mind when looking at different weight training programs for women.The first thing you should consider is the impact level. You will want to choose a program that is at the right level for you. If you are a beginner, you do not want to end up in an advanced class where you will risk pulling a muscle or have something even worse happen to you. On the flip side, you do not want to choose a program that is too easy for you as this will not give you any real muscle building benefit. It is a good idea to find a training program that is adaptive or will fit around you and your particular strength level.

If you decide to go to a gym or choose a personal trainer, choose one that you know you can trust. It is important to make sure that they are trained and certified. This is the only way to know that they will know the proper techniques and poses to use. Do not just trust yourself to someone who has just gone to the gym for years and looks buff. One wrong move or stance can seriously hurt your body.

Another way to go is to design your own program and workout at home at your own pace. This option is not however for the uninitiated. If you have no experience working with weights, it may be better to start off with someone who does initially. For those of you who would like to design your own program there are two programs I would recommend. The first is Tony Horton’s 10 MINUTE TRAINER 5 Workouts SET – Includes Resistance Band and Other Extras from Beach Body. The workouts are quick and manageable and the resistance bands get you used to working your muscles. The other program  is P90X Extreme Home Fitness with Tony Horton also from Beach Body. This is a more advanced program but you can use the 13 DVDs to design your own program. I own and use both these programs and recommend them highly.

Another thing to think about with weight training programs for women is to keep it interesting in order to keep committed. One way you can do this is to get a few of your friends to go with you. You may even try to have some friendly competition between yourselves on seeing who can lose the most weight. It is always a good idea to set goals for yourself and remember to reward yourself for meeting those goals. Maybe there is a dress you fell in love with. Set a goal of losing two dress sizes and buy the dress in that size when you reach your goal.

Weight training programs are important for women, especially as you age. The older you get, the quicker your body will lose muscle. That is why it is important to keep working on trying to build muscle. This does not mean that you have to bulk up and have huge muscles. Even if you just work on toning your muscles, you are still promoting new muscle growth. This will not only help with keeping your weight at an optimal level, but can keep your blood pressure under control and can even help with fighting the symptoms of menopause and osteoporosis.

Please never forget to always talk to your doctor before beginning any exercise program.

Well-defined shoulders enhance the look of your entire body.  Shoulders that have been properly exercised help to make your waist appear smaller and can make hips seem to disappear.  The military press is the most well-known and effective shoulder exercise.  Using a bar or dumbbells, you lift your arms straight above your head.  Don’t be concerned about building bulky or broad shoulders; unless you use a lot of weight and have a lot of testosterone, that won’t happen.  Do multiple reps with a small amount of weight for the best results.

Another excellent exercise is the lateral side raise.  Holding dumbbells in each of your hands start with your hands at your side.  Remember to use good posture.  Raise your arms straight up until your arms are perpendicular to your body, then slowly release and lower your arms.  You can also do a modified lateral raise with dumbbells while sitting on a chair or bench.  This works your deltoid muscle that runs from your shoulder up to your neck. For this exercise you don’t need a lot of weights. I’d recommend depending on your level of fitness, you start with 2 1/2 to 5 lbs. weights.

Pushups will also help define your shoulders even as they work your pectorals, so pushups are an excellent exercise that belongs in every fitness regimen.  Be warned, shoulder injuries are very difficult to heal from, so it is important that you move slowly. Start out with very light weights until you become accustomed to the  motion.  also make sure you stretch your shoulder muscles and warm them up before you work out.

Some good stretching and muscle warming exercises include shrugging your shoulders (lift your shoulders up toward your ears and bring them back down). Make big and small circles with your arms, and reaching up and out with your arms to stretch the shoulder muscles.  If you do get an injury or experience pain while exercising, stop immediately.  Most muscle aches can be soothed with alternating ice and heat packs.  Consult with your physician about taking ibuprofen if the pain is severe.

Well-defined shoulders not only make you look healthier, but give you the freedom to wear sexy, off the shoulder blouses and strapless dresses.  When you feel sexy and attractive, you are motivated to continue making healthy and positive changes to your physique.  Working on building more beautiful shoulders is one giant step toward a mentally and physically healthier you.

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The first place to start in attaining muscle definition is by assessing and addressing your emotional, mental, and physical health.  Making changes to the way you eat, the way you handle stress – even your level of physical fitness are all extremely important areas you must address.  Increasing the amount of protein, particularly protein from fish that are rich in Omega-3 fatty acids, will make attaining muscle definition that much easier.

Once you’ve developed your goals for both your physical and mental health start exercising regularly.  Improve your endurance.  Build an exercise regimen that includes aerobic exercise, weight training, and yoga and/or Pilates. Focus first on your core muscles – your abdominal wall.

Working with weights and weight lifting doesn’t mean building body-builder muscles.  By using just a little weight and a lot of repetition, you will build definition in the muscle you have without making your muscles big or manly looking.  As you begin to see the changes in your body from your better diet and your increased activity, you’ll see where you want muscle definition.  For some women over 40, having well-defined arms instead of sagging triceps allow you to still wear sleeveless dresses and blouses.  For others, firm, well-defined calves and thighs make wearing dresses and shorter skirts more alluring.  Still others want shoulders, neck, and even facial muscles to have better definition.

There are exercises for every muscle group; sticking your tongue out repetitively helps tighten your neck and prevent the appearance of a double chin.  Lifting weights or soup cans can tighten your arm muscles and keep them looking toned in summer.  The biggest advantage to focusing on achieving muscle definition, however, is the added health benefit of increased metabolism.  When you build and define muscle, you are also improving your calorie burning ability, increasing your bone density, and improving the health of your joints and ligaments.

As with any exercise, consult with your physician before you begin to lift weights.  Make sure that you have no hidden health conditions that would cause complications.  Focus on the muscle groups that make you happy – don’t try to compare yourself to anyone else or try to live up to some media-enhanced expectation in a magazine.  Just be the best YOU that you can be.

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By age 40, most women have entered or are about to enter a state of perimenopause  (a pre menopausal state in which ovaries’ production of hormones becomes irregular).  During perimenopause,  women’s health issues like osteoporosis, certain cancers, including breast and colon cancer, and heart disease become more prevalent.

One of the best preventative measures women over 40 can take to combat health issues is develop a fitness regimen that includes weight training, flexibility, and aerobic exercise. Not only will this keep your heart healthy but it also improves joint strength and flexibility as well as improving bone density.  Maintaining a healthy weight is directly linked to lower cancer risks as well.

If you smoke, quitting now can improve your life and cut your risk of cancer significantly.  Women who smoke have double the risk of dying from cancer and heart disease; women who smoke and take hormone replacement therapy or birth control pills also increase their chances of serious illness from a stroke or blood clot.

At age 40, all women should begin having regular, annual mammograms.  Most women don’t, out of fear. My own experience was that while it was uncomfortable, let’s face it someone is trying to turn your breasts into pancakes, it really was not painful.  I understand from friends with larger breasts that it’s actually more than just uncomfortable for them.  So let’s get that out of the way and move on, a mammogram may hurt, but breast cancer is one of the most serious  health issue facing women today, and early detection can make the difference between surviving and not.  By age 50, all women should have a colonoscopy.  Colon cancer, like breast cancer, can be highly treatable if caught early.

No matter what health issues concern you, whether your eyesight is failing or you have high cholesterol, eating a healthy diet and incorporating fitness into your lifestyle will make a difference.  Cardiovascular disease is the number one killer of women over 40.  It is critical that women in this age group get up, get moving, and work out regularly to prevent health concerns from becoming an overshadowing component of  your life.  Exercise and nutrition are the keys to keeping your 40+ body and mind as young as possible.

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For women over 40, flexibility is an increasingly important part of fitness.  It is also more difficult to attain, especially as hormones begin to fluctuate during perimenopause (the period of time before menopause when your ovaries start producing less estrogen).  However, building muscle will not only help you burn calories faster (resting muscle tissue burns three times as many calories at fat tissue) but will also help you maintain bone density and your joint flexibility.  In addition, building muscle and doing exercises to increase flexibility has been proven to help alleviate some of the symptoms and challenges that occur with menopause, like reducing stress and reducing the risks of osteoporosis.

The best course of action to improve your muscle elegance and flexibility is to combine regular aerobic exercise with weight training, yoga, or Pilates.  Think about where your body is now and where you would like it to be; you may have just a few extra pounds to manage or you may be considerably overweight.  Regardless of your starting point, every bit of muscle you tone and build will increase your ability to burn calories effectively.

Muscle elegance is about more than just building muscles;  it’s about building a fluid, supple body that responds the way you want it to respond.  It’s the beauty in the curve, in the definition of muscle you will see in your body.  It’s the feeling of renewed energy and strength.  Building muscle and increasing flexibility really can make a woman in her 40s feel younger and more vibrant.

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Improving your nutrition can have a significant impact on everything from your level of energy to your mood.  For women over 40, nutrition can be a key component in continuing to be young and active and vibrantly alive.  The key to good nutrition is balance.  The nutrients we need include energy nutrients, like carbohydrates, proteins, and fats and vitality nutrients, which include water, vitamins, and minerals.  It is through eating a balanced diet that we give our bodies the balance of nutrients we need to be at our optimum health.

Having good nutrition begins with being willing to pay attention to what you are eating.  It often means eating more meals you prepare at home and less at restaurants or fast food diners.  Good nutrition is probably the most important aspect of good health for women over 40 and probably the area we focus on the least.  Eating well takes time – something we never seem to have enough of.

To help you start better nutrition habits, I’ve developed both a meal plan and some healthy cooking tips that will make it easier for you to incorporate good eating habits into your daily routine.  I know you can’t manufacture extra time, but you can spend ten minutes the night before packing a healthy lunch of carrots, a turkey sandwich, and hummus instead of finding yourself at the vending machine grabbing a candy bar the next day.

You can prepare meals in advance and have them waiting to be microwaved for the night’s dinner.  You can carry a water bottle instead of drinking soda or coffee all day.  When you add up the amount of money spent in restaurants and on fast food, you will see that you have a budget for buying prepared healthy foods instead (already-prepared chicken breast, bagged vegetables, etc.).

As we age, our metabolic rate slows.  We gain weight more easily and have a more difficult time losing or even maintaining a healthy weight.  More weight tends to gravitate to the belly area, increasing risks of diabetes.  We are more likely to suffer from chronic ailments and are more susceptible to stress.  Eating a well-balanced diet and focusing on good nutrition will help improve your energy, your mood, and your outlook.

If you’re over 40, struggle with your weight, or have other image struggles, you probably spend a great deal of time being frustrated with your inability to meet the media-driven expectation of perfection.

I’m here to tell you, “STOP!!!” Forgive me for shouting, but this is non negotiable. If you are lucky enough to make it to a ripe old age, I guarantee,  the one thing you will regret, is the time you spent obsessing about your weight, and the unhappiness you caused yourself as a result.

The first thing that has to change is your willingness to buy in to the ridiculous expectation that you have to be;

a) perfect

b) just like “them”

in order to be happy with you.  To be happy with you, you need to love yourself – just the way you are.

Being overweight doesn’t make you some kind of social pariah.  Being overweight is something you should address, but not because of wanting to look like a supermodel, but because you care about your health and well-being.  Losing weight should be something you do for you – because you want to have more energy, be more active, and live a healthier life.

To determine whether or not you are overweight used to be as simple as measuring whether or not you could “pinch an inch” of flab on your abdomen.  Now it’s a matter of measuring your Body Mass Index and doing a bunch of math. The reality is, you know whether or not you need to lose weight.  For some, it may be a matter of a few pounds.  For others, it may be a life-and-death struggle to survive and rise above obesity.

Whatever your weight loss need is, the first step is to make a blueprint of the steps you need to take to make changes.  Now, here it is, the “weight loss tip” drum roll please,  all you really need to do to lose weight is to burn more calories than you consume.  By now you are saying to yourself “that’s it, I know that”, well sure you do, but do you really understand what that means.  It means that regardless of what the latest fads are, if you focus on changing your nutrition and eating a balanced diet and you incorporate some weight training and aerobic activity  into your daily routine, you will lose weight.

The changes that you make can be large or small, your fitness plan can be elaborate or elagantly simple.There are no rules you have to follow, you decide what’s best for you. My advise to you however, is make a plan and follow it. You know what they say “if you fail to plan, then plan to fail.”

The most important thing to realize is that no matter what the specified weight is for your height, you need to work on achieving “your” ideal weight – a weight where you are comfortable with your body and feel like you have the energy and fitness to do the things you want to do with your life. This means you need to focus on healthy weight loss, you’re not trying to be that girl in the magazine who’s had 20 pounds airbrushed off of her; you’re just trying to be your very best YOU.

For women over 40, the benefits of weight training are even more significant.  As we age, women naturally lose muscle mass at a much faster rate.  Weight training can counteract that decrease by preventing loss of muscle mass and allowing you to actually increase the amount of muscle on your body.  There are many studies that show that weight training in women over 40 can also improve other medical complications like diabetes, arthritis, and even depression.

From a mental health standpoint, weight training and the effect it has on metabolic rate will give you more energy and release feel-good endorphins that help you create positive energy and well-being.  If you combine aerobic exercise and weight training, you can have an enormous impact on your overall health – physical and mental.

Worried you might end up looking like a female Arnold Schwarzenegger?  It’s really not something you have to worry about.  In order to build those big, bulky muscles, you need very heavy weights and a lot of testosterone.  The weight training you will be doing consists of a lot of repetition using a small amount of weights.  What will happen over time is beautiful definition.

Do you have flabby arms?  Did you inherit your grandma’s swinging triceps flab? Try arm exercises to tighten the flab and give you beautifully shaped arms.  Trust me; you’ll be dying for summer and an excuse to wear sleeveless blouses.

One of the best reasons for women over 40 to consider weight training is because of the benefit it has for your bones.  Bone density begins to decrease as women age;   weight training will increase bone density and help prevent osteoporosis as well as keep your tendons and ligaments flexible and your joints strong.

As your body grows stronger and leaner, things like picking up your children or grandchildren will become easier – and so will things like going dancing, hiking in the mountains, and climbing stairs.  Adding weight training to your fitness program is a sure first step in becoming the new and improved you.

The two most important elements of your workout clothes are your shoes and your sport bra.  Without these two items, none of the rest of the workout clothes really matter.  Shoes should be specially designed for the type of activity you plan to do.  You may need more than one pair of shoes if you do multiple exercises, or at least a really good pair of cross trainers.  You should try the shoes on before you buy them, wearing the socks you plan to wear when you work out.  Blow the budget on shoes – if you don’t have a good foundation, you’ll be more likely to be injured and not get anywhere with your fitness.

Your sport bra should also fit well, not too tight, not too loose.  It should be make of a moisture-wicking material that keeps you dry.  You should try on the bra and move around a lot – move your arms, bend over, jump up and down.  Make sure the bra holds you comfortably with very little bounce and that it doesn’t rub or chafe the skin under your arms or around your midsection.

Once you have the foundation of your workout clothes, the rest of the ensemble is up to personal preference.  There are pants, capris, and shorts all made of moisture wicking material; there are tanks, shirts, and sweatshirts as well.  It’s important when exercising to dress in layers so that you can peel off a layer if you get to warm.  Make sure you have workout clothes for all seasons.  As with your sport bra, try the workout clothes on and make sure everything fits well, moves with you, doesn’t bind you or limit your movement, and doesn’t chafe you anywhere.

If you exercise outdoors, you should consider workout clothes in bright colors or with reflective material for safety purposes.  If you are out jogging early in the morning before the sun is up, it’s important that your workout clothes allow you to be seen by early-morning traffic.

Finally, pay attention to the care instructions for your workout clothes.  There is no sense in investing money in workout clothes and then ruining them the first time you wash them or dry them incorrectly.

You should always shop for a new athletic shoe before you will actually begin using the shoe; this way, you’ll have time to wear them around and make sure they are “broken in” before hitting the pavement and going for a jog or spending an hour in them at the gym.

When choosing shoes, depending on your activities, you may decide to buy specialized shoes for your activities (running shoes, walking shoes, aerobic shoes) or you may decide to sacrifice some specificity in order to save money and buy a nice pair of cross-trainers. Cross-trainers are designed to provide adequate support for a number of different fitness activities but will not provide the same support, say, for running, that an actual running shoe would provide.

To make sure the shoes will fit correctly, you should always shop for shoes late in the day.  Typically, feet swell slightly throughout the day, and this will make sure the shoes you buy are not too tight.  Try the shoes on with whatever athletic sock you wear to exercise.  Choose a sock that is comfortably cushioned and made of a moisture-wicking material.

Walk around, jump up and down, and mimic exercise activities in the shoes you are trying on.  Make sure they don’t rub or pinch your feet.  Your toes should have room to wiggle and your heel and the back of your foot should sit firmly in the shoe.  Lace the shoes snuggly; walk around with the shoes on for a while before making a decision.

Your feet are sometimes a most ignored part of your body, but if you get blisters or injure a foot, it will certainly derail your fitness plan.  Shoes may seem like an expensive investment – and you don’t have to get pulled into brand-name marketing ploys – but in the long run, buying a decent pair of athletic shoes is a wise investment.