Avoid These Weight Lifting Mistakes
How to avoid injuries when you start strength training
OK, you already know that strength training in midlife is the most beneficial for your health:
• Strong, resilient bones
• Pain-free, mobile joints
• Move with ease and confidence through everyday life
• Lose fat, improve your body composition, and boost your metabolism
Strength training should build you up…NOT break you down.
The last thing you want is an injury that sidelines you just as you’re gaining momentum.
And yet, injuries from lifting weights are super common—especially for women in midlife.
There are several reasons for this:
Hormonal shifts in midlife make you more prone to inflammation, more vulnerable to poor technique.
And your muscles and tendons need a little longer to recover and grow.
So how do you keep your body safe while reaping all the benefits of strength training?
JUST ONE THING
To avoid unnecessary training injuries there are a couple things you can do:
✔️ Ease into strength training moves with a safe progression (which is exactly what we do inside the Getstrong30 program.)
✔️ And, something that people often underestimate - practice proper technique!
Your JUST ONE THING to Avoid Injury While Strength Training
Use Proper Lifting Technique
If you’re brand new to strength training, I always recommend that start with bodyweight-only moves first—like bodyweight squats, bridges, planks, hinges, etc.
Starting here and progressing onward gives your joints, muscles, and connective tissues time to adapt.
And then once you begin adding weights, technique matters more than the number on the dumbbell.
The way you grip, press, and position your body can be the difference between building strength and ending up with wrist, elbow, or shoulder injuries.
Here are some tips to help you practice proper lifting technique.
How to Prevent Pain When Lifting Weights
- Use different gripping styles throughout your workout so the same muscles don’t get over-fatigued
- Alternate between weighted exercises and bodyweight only exercises
- Avoid “death gripping” the weight—practice holding it as lightly as possible
Extra Tip: Whenever you’re holding weights, you may automatically shrug your shoulders up without realizing it. This shrugging can result in lingering neck tension after your workout. Check yourself right after picking up the weights by taking a deep breath to let your shoulders relax down.
Did You Know...
- Your legs are stronger than your arms, so you’ll always lift heavier with lower body moves. If your grip strength limits you, try a “goblet hold” (demonstrated in the video above) to make holding larger dumbbells easier.
- You do NOT have to lift the same exact weight for every set. For your first set of an exercise, try using the heaviest weight that you feel comfortable lifting, then decrease the weight a bit for the next set, and so. This is called “drop sets”.
- One of the best ways to prevent injuries is giving your body recovery time. Avoid lifting on back-to-back days, since muscles and connective tissues (especially in midlife) need more time to heal. A smart weekly rhythm looks like this: Strength Training → Mobility Work → Walking/Cardio → Repeat
Until next week... Be strong💪
