If you are a teenage girl, lifting weights may be the last thing on your to-do list. Yet resistance training is one way girls can manage their weight, improve posture and build strong bones. Including weight training as a part of your active lifestyle is easier, more fun and less time consuming than you may think.
Girls and Exercise
Girls tend to cut back on physical activity during puberty, according to Alison E. Field, associate professor of pediatrics at Harvard Medical School. There are many reasons you may be reluctant to exercise. Not wanting to get sweaty, not wanting to mess up your hair and makeup, feeling awkward or self-conscious or not having the right clothes for exercise are all reasons girls avoid physical activity. A three-year study of 2,000 teenage girls headed by Sue Kimm, M.D., revealed that more than half of the girls were sedentary, never engaging in exercise. The primary reasons the girls gave were lack of time and fatigue, even though sedentary girls had as much free time and got as much sleep as physically active girls.
Exercise Recommendations
Exercise does not have to be time consuming to be effective. The American College of Sports Medicine recommends 30 minutes of moderate physical activity daily, noting it can be broken down into shorter segments throughout the day. Activities like walking, cycling, dancing or swimming all satisfy the 30 minute daily recommendation. The ACSM also recommends weight training on two nonconsecutive days per week. Perform one set of eight to 12 repetitions of an exercise for each muscle group. Use weights that you feel are moderately challenging.
Weight Training Benefits
Weight training has many benefits that make it the ideal exercise for teen girls. Toned muscles make your clothes fit better, and lean muscle revs up your metabolism, giving you energy and helping to control your weight. Working out with a friend or two gives you a wholesome and productive way to socialize that does not involve eating or negative lifestyle behaviors. Harvard's Dr. Field notes that the exercise and eating habits you form as a teenager may be with you for the rest of your life, setting you up for a fit and healthy future.
Overtraining and Female Athlete Triad
Under normal circumstances, weight training builds strong bones that will decrease your risk of osteoporosis later in life. But young female athletes with a drive to succeed sometimes take training and restricted eating to extremes, setting themselves up for a syndrome known as female athlete triad. The triad begins with excessive exercise and too few calories to meet energy demands. This leads to extremely low body fat, which causes estrogen levels to drop and monthly periods to cease, a condition known as amenorrhea. Because estrogen influences bone mineral density, once estrogen levels drop, the bones become thin and fragile, a condition known as osteoporosis that puts girls at risk for fractures and related sports injuries.
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