Working out with weights may offer you a variety of health benefits, including stronger and bigger muscles, increased metabolism and cardiovascular efficiency, enhanced endurance and stamina, and weight loss and maintenance. However, if you're just starting out with weights, following a few simple tips and guidelines will help prevent injury and ensure that your workout is effective and beneficial. Learning the basics of a beginner weight-lifting workout will lead you well on your way to health and fitness.
Step 1
Determine a weight-lifting workout schedule that starts off slowly. You don't want to lift weights every day, as you need to allow your muscles to rest in between workouts, suggests Ray Burton, personal trainer and coach of the Canadian website, Building Bodies. Lifting weights three days a week is considered adequate for beginners.
Step 2
Warm up and cool down for about 10 minutes before and after a weight-lifting workout. This allows your joints and muscles to infuse with blood and oxygen, become lubricated and ready to work, and helps relax and stretch muscles following the workout. Perform basic stretches, lunges, squats and twisting or bending exercises like toe touches or windmills.
Step 3
Understand the difference between sets and reps. The number of times you lift a weight is called a repetition. Sets define how many times a certain group of exercises needs to be done. For example, you may be asked to perform three sets of biceps curls, which means you need to do 12 biceps curls, which is one set, then rest a minute or two or do another type of exercise, then repeat another 12 biceps curls, then rest, then perform one last cluster of biceps curls, which completes your third set.
Step 4
Perform a biceps curl. Start with the heaviest weight you can handle and still maintain good form. For example, you can start your bicep curls with a 15-lb. weight. Lift the weight 12 times. Next, pick up a 15-lb. weight and perform 10 reps or lifts. Then, pick up a 12-lb. weight and perform 12 lifts or reps. You can increase poundage when the weights you're using don't provide a challenge.
A basic beginner workout may suggest something like this, according to Men's Fitness: dumbbell curl---3 --- 8-12, 60 sec. This means perform 3 sets of dumbbell curls, using poundage between 8 and 12-lbs., with a minute of rest between sets.
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