Female bodybuilding is now extremely popular, as there are currently more women lifting weights and training like bodybuilders than ever before. Contrary to popular belief, lifting weights as a woman will not transform you into an androgynous she-hulk with more muscle mass than a WWE wrestler. Lifting weights will actually help turn you into a lean, toned, curvy and thoroughly beautiful woman. If you’re thinking of stepping on stage and competing, or even if you simply want to get yourself into better shape, here are a few effective female bodybuilding tips you can start following right now.
Push yourself in the gym
At a cellular level, male and female muscles are exactly the same, which means if you are looking to build muscle, you need to constantly challenge yourself and push yourself in the gym. Every single time you train, try to beat your last workout, even if the improvements are only very slight. If one day, you performed 10 reps with a certain weight, try for 11 reps the next day, or aim for 10 reps with a slightly heavier weight. The more muscle you build, the stronger you will become, and the more adaptive to training your body will be. To help you to continue to build muscle and grow, make sure you always push yourself in the gym whilst training.
Clean up your diet
Female bodybuilding places a distinct emphasis on clean eating and diet and nutrition in general, so make sure you clean up your diet. Ideally, you will be looking to drop body fat whilst increasing lean muscle mass, which means ditching processed junk food and getting plenty of quality nutrients instead. Up your protein intakes, get enough healthy fats, eat your vegetables, and watch your carbohydrate intakes. Experts have found that women have been found to burn off marginally higher ratios of fats to carbohydrates than males, which is why carb intakes should be fairly low and should come almost exclusively from complex sources rather than simple sugars.
Find an effective training program
As you’re trying to build muscle, you need to make sure that the training program you’re following will allow you to do just that. There are countless training programs out there to choose from, so do your research and find one that you deem appropriate for your lifestyle and your training preferences. If for example, you can only get to the gym 4 days per week, a 5-day split will obviously be no good for you. Once you have found a program you’re enjoying, however, make sure to switch things up after 6 – 8 weeks or so, to prevent your body from becoming complacent in regards to training.
Create an effective supplement stack
Providing your diet and training is where you need it to be, the next logical step is to create a supplement stack. Supplements will help give you a slight competitive edge and will help make you that little bit better. The supplements you choose to use will depend largely on you, but a typical example could be: whey protein, multivitamin, fish oil, creatine, BCAAs, and casein protein.