Training men and women

Many people imagine that men and women need to train differently. Even in high school sports with qualified coaches, it's been found that,

"Compared with coaches of male athletes, coaches of female athletes were less likely to know the credentials of their strength coaches, and they were less likely to use certified coaches to plan and implement their strength and conditioning programs. [...] Compared with their female counterparts, male athletes were more likely to have required training, participate in strength training year round, and train using more sessions per week."

That is, the coaches didn't really care about the strength of their female athletes, or about the competence of their strength coaches. I don't have statistics as they do, but from what I've seen in gyms, female gym-goers are less likely to be given strength-oriented routines, and when given them, will be pushed and supervised less (form will be allowed to be sloppier, there'll be less encouragement to increase resistance) by the instructors. That is, the greatest barrier female athletes face is the low expectations of their coaches - who are mostly male. 

Men and women's bodies react in the same way to training. If a person around 20 years old gets their heart rate up to around 140 beats per minute for 20 minutes, two or more times a week, they'll get an improvement in their cardiovascular fitness - that is, in four weeks if they go at this speed or resistance/incline their heart rate will be 130 instead of 140. If they can today just do 10 pushups, and now do 3 sets of 5, next session 3 sets of 6, and so on progressing in the same way, well in a month they'll be able to do 20 pushups in a go. If they eat less they'll get smaller, eat more they'll get bigger, and so on. Gender's irrelevant. It's all the same. 

All need to think of movements, not muscles, to do more over time, and so on. Exactly which movements and how much weight and so on depend on the capabilities and goals of the individual. Take two 30 year olds, the woman has done netball for 10 years, the man has done nothing but sit in front of a computer. Neither has done squats before, but the woman will learn them more quickly and perform them more strongly than the man for the first few months at least. But she mightn't expect so. 

The actual differences between men and women come from their different capabilities to begin with. In brief, these are that men have more lean mass than women of the same size, so they start off stronger; but women learn new movements more quickly and better... if they stop saying "I can't" and actually try. 

Body composition - a typical healthy man and a woman of the same weight, the man will be around 15% bodyfat, and the woman 25%. This leads to,

Strength - A man of 60kg might be 50kg lean mass (bone, muscles, internal organs) and 10kg fat mass, the 60kg woman 45kg lean and 15kg fat. Fat doesn't help you lift heavy stuff. So the man begins with 5kg more muscle and bone, 5kg more stuff to help him lift. If neither has trained before, he'll have more strength simply because of sheer muscle and bone size. Of course if he sits on his arse and she trains for a few months, she'll be stronger. I once had a woman client quit because she beat her untrained boyfriend in an arm wrestle and he couldn't handle it; a trained woman is stronger than an untrained man of the same size. 

Bodily awareness - If I say, "bend at the hips, not the lower back, but here at the hips," do you bend at the hips, or the lower back? If I say, "shoulders back," do they go back, or do you hunch up, or just look confused? That's bodily awareness. In general, women have more of this than men. So they learn new movements more quickly. And only once a movement is learned can we add resistance and get the person stronger. This is why when people get interested in strength, men mostly go to powerlifting, and quite a lot of women go to Olympic weightlifting. You can be a physical idiot and eventually squat, bench and deadlift well; but you have to be pretty switched-on to ever snatch and clean & jerk.

Joint mobility - since women's pelvic girdle must be able to open up during birth, they begin with greater joint mobility than men. This makes some movements easier for them, such as deep squatting, front squatting and so on. Many men simply can't get their shoulders forward for a front squat, or back for an overhead squat. Mobility like strength can be improved over time, but it's hard work which most people avoid. 

Psychology - women underestimate their current and potential strength, men overestimate it. A woman will say, "I can't" before even trying something, a man will say, "I'll try." This is why men get more injuries than women, and why women fail to reach their potential in physical training. Women will for example press a 12kg kettlebell overhead for 6 reps, then when you ask them to do it again, say, "I can't."

"But you just did. You've rested, now do it again."

"I can't."

Obviously there are cultural issues here, women being taught that being helpless is attractive, etc. That's a bit above what we're looking at here, though, which is just what happens in the gym. Your body can never get stronger than your mind. It's for this reason Neghar Fonooni and her friends have started Girls Gone Strong. The development of physical strength will at the same time develop mental strength. You're not "tough" until you've been buried under a weight, got up and then tried again. 

The differences in body composition, natural strength, joint mobility and psychology will of course lead to different approaches in training. Men will need more practice at the basic movements to master them, more joint mobility work, meanwhile the mobile woman who's mastered the movement is loading up the plates and getting stronger at it - if she's decided to let herself. 

That said, all these things are individual. A person may have a long training background giving them great bodily awareness, but a bunch of injuries to work around. The women clients I've trained for a year or more, if any other trainer gets them half-squats and curls on a bosu he may get a rude surprise. 

Recently a fellow trainer had to be cautioned for giving overly-complex routines to beginners.

"Just keep it simple, build the movement skills. Barbell lunge and press? Seriously? Can she do a squat? First squat, then a dumbbell squat, then a barbell squat, then a lunge, then maybe lunge and press. One step at a time, start simple, teach the movement skills."

"Especially with girls," he said.

"No, especially with people who lack the movement skills."

"Usually girls."

He's a new trainer, he'll learn in time. Without naming the trainer, I told this story to a woman client who has squatted 60kg for 30 reps.

"That guy sounds like a douche. Makes me mad, that people think like that. Can you point him out to me and I’ll show him how effective a simple move can be. That’s right, I’ll bitch slap him."

This is a woman who I originally found doing crunches on a swiss ball. She's come a long way. Strength and confidence. 

There are differences between men and women. But there are greater differences between individuals. A competent trainer will deal with the individual and their capabilities and goals. I don't care what you have in your pants, you still have to fucking squat, deadlift and press properly.