Look, I get it.
Weight lifting can be intimidating, especially when you’re just starting out.
What exercises should I do? How many days a week do I need to lift weights? How much time should I be spending in the gym each time I go in?
It’s a lot.
And it’s difficult to know what’s most important when it comes to getting results and making the most out of these workouts.
That’s why I’m writing this article for you.
This guide is going to include five of what I believe are the most important things to know when it comes to lifting weights to improve your body composition (losing fat and building muscle).
Obviously there’s A LOT more to weight lifting than just what I’m going to discuss here, but these five tips will set you off on the right track with learning some of the fundamentals of weight lifting, designing a program that works for you, and how to actually get the most out of these workouts while staying safe.
Let’s jump into it.
Tip #1: More Isn’t Always Better
I’m intentionally putting this as the first tip out of the five, mainly because it’s a concept that can change the game for you in your fitness journey.
When most people think of their workouts, they assume that more is always better.
More workouts, more exercises, more sets, more reps, etc.
And while I appreciate the enthusiasm, the “more is better” mentality ends up backfiring for many people.
There are a few reasons for this.
But here’s the biggest one.
That mentality causes people to have an all or nothing mindset.
They either have to be in the gym six days a week without fail and perfectly dial in their nutrition or else everything is ruined and they’ll never reach their goals.
Sounds ridiculous, doesn’t it?
Look, I’m not going to lie to you.
Achieving your fitness goals is going to require you to be about 80-90% consistent.
But.
Consistency doesn’t mean working out everyday and completely running yourself into the ground.
That’s where “more isn’t always better” comes into play.
Most of the workout programs that I design for my online coaching clients consist of 3-4 days a week of lifting.
For most people, and especially beginners, that’s plenty.
Working Out Three or Four Days Per Week
Here’s exactly how I would structure those workouts.
If you want to lift weights 3x/week, I’d do one leg workout, one upper body workout, and one full body workout.
And, if you can, I’d put at least one rest day in between each workout to maximize recovery.
If you want to lift weights 4x/week, I’d do a legs, upper body, legs, upper body workout split.
That would look something like this.
Monday would be a leg workout, Tuesday would be an upper body workout, Wednesday would be a rest day, Thursday would be your second leg workout, and Friday would be your second upper body session.
Then you would take two more rest days on Saturday and Sunday.
Notice how both of these options give you either three or four rest days each week.
Your body needs to rest just as much as it needs to train, so following a plan that balances the two is crucial.
Tip #2: Follow A Real Program & Progress At The Same Exercises
When I say follow a “real program”, what do I mean?
Well, I’ll put it this way.
Most people make the mistake of doing whatever they feel like doing when they go into the gym.
And while you should be enjoying your workouts, it’s also important to have structure in your workouts to see real results.
So, instead of doing random exercises in random orders whenever you go into the gym, make sure you actually have a plan.
This is important when it comes to seeing progress.
Because, in order to ensure that you’re getting stronger over time, you need to be sticking with the same exercises long enough to measure your strength on them.
This will allow you to achieve what’s called progressive overload.
Simply put, progressive overload is when you either increase the weight on certain exercises and/or do more reps with the same weight.
If you’re constantly changing up your exercises, how will you know if you’re actually getting stronger on them?
And, when it comes to getting stronger, I talk a lot about why it’s important to lift heavy in my article How To Lift Weights To Get Toned.
Make sure to give that article a read!
Tip #3: Rest Longer In Between Your Sets
This is a topic that always seems to be counter intuitive to people.
Mainly because, when most people think of what it takes to have an effective workout, they immediately think of super high intensity, calorie burning, high heart rate workouts.
Now I’m not saying that any of those things are bad or that they won’t happen as a by-product of lifting weights.
You should be bringing enough intensity to your workouts.
You will burn some calories from lifting weights.
And your heart rate might get pretty high while weight training.
But, with that being said, those things shouldn’t be the primary focus of an effective lifting workout.
Like I mentioned in the last section, lifting weights is all about getting stronger (while using good form, which we’ll cover later).
And, in order to get stronger, you need to be resting long enough in between your sets to make the next set that you do more effective.
In a nutshell, taking adequate rest time in between sets allows not only your muscles but your entire central nervous system to properly recover in between sets.
Think Of It Like This
Let’s say you’re doing a leg workout, and your first exercise is dumbbell RDL’s.
And let’s say you’re using 30lb dumbbells for 3 sets of 8-10 reps.
You do the first set, and you’re able to get 10 reps with that weight.
You feel amazing and super proud of yourself.
Now, here are two hypothetical scenarios about how long you rest after that first set.
The first scenario is that you only rest for 30-60 seconds before going into your second set of 8-10 reps.
And, because you didn’t rest that long, you were only able to get 7 reps on that second set.
Here’s the second scenario.
You decided to rest for 2-3 minutes before that second set.
And, because you rested longer, you were able to get 9 reps on that second set.
Which scenario led to a better result?
Obviously the second one where you rested longer.
Just by resting a little bit longer, you were able to get two more reps on that second set.
Now, you might be asking yourself if getting those two additional reps even matters.
For maximizing your results, it really does matter.
Those two additional reps allowed you to create more mechanical tension for your muscle, which directly contributes to getting more toned and defined.
I know what you’re probably thinking right now, “I don’t have the time to be resting for 2-3 minutes in between each set!”.
This brings us right back to the first tip I gave in this article: more isn’t always better.
If you do fewer total exercises and fewer total sets for each muscle group in your workouts, then you’ll have the time to rest longer in between sets to get better results.
As a general rule of thumb, try to rest for 2-3 minutes in between sets on bigger compound movements (e.g. squats, deadlifts, bench press, etc).
And rest for 90 seconds to 2 minutes on smaller isolation exercises (e.g. bicep curls, leg extensions, calf raises, etc).
Tip #4: Prioritize Your Form & Technique
This could’ve easily been tip number one, given how important it is.
At the end of the day, while lifting heavy is incredibly important for making progress, it needs to be built on a foundation of using good form on every exercise.
There are many reasons for this, but the main one is injury prevention.
You need to view lifting weights as learning a new skill.
And like with any new skill you’ll ever learn, you can’t expect to be very good at first.
It takes time to learn the fundamentals.
When it cones to weight training, the fundamentals are taking the time to actually learn the proper way to execute each exercise that you do.
Yes I want you to lift heavy.
Yes I want you to get progressively stronger over time.
But, if you’re just starting out, I’d recommend taking the first couple weeks of a new program to dial in your technique on each movement that you do.
Then, as soon as you feel more comfortable with those exercises, make a conscious effort to lift heavier week over week (remember, as a beginning you can make CRAZY amounts of strength gains in the first year of lifting weights, so take full advantage of that).
The Most Underrated Thing A Beginner Can Do
The single most important tactic that a beginner can implement is taking form videos of certain exercises.
Look, I know it’s not easy.
It can be super intimidating to film yourself right away, especially if you’re working out in a public space.
I know because I’ve been there myself.
With that being said, if you’re able to muster up the courage to do it, it’ll be the best thing you can do for yourself early on.
I can’t stress that enough.
Now I’m not saying that you need to film every single set of every single exercise.
That would be a bit excessive.
What I recommend is filming a set of each of your heavier, compound exercises.
Things like RDL’s, squat variations, bench press variations, shoulder press variations, rows, etc.
These are more complex exercises that have a lot of moving parts, so it’s important to actually see what you look like doing them.
Trust me, you can gather A LOT of information about your form just by taking a quick video of yourself.
Tip #5: Don’t Neglect Cardio
I wanted to include this section because it’s super important to undertstand.
When it comes to losing fat, building muscle, getting more toned and defined, etc.
Weight lifting should be your priority.
There are many reasons for this.
But, when it comes to getting more of that toned look, lifting heavy (relative to your strength) is what’s going to get you that look.
With that being said, no matter your fitness goal, cardio should never be neglected.
There should always be a healthy balance between weight lifting and cardio in your routine.
Whichever one you emphasize is specific to your goals.
However, both should always be done consistently for longevity and having the best quality of life possible.
I find that the pendulum often swings from one side to the other in the fitness industry.
It used to be that cardio was put on a pedestal and weight lifting was considered something only bodybuilders should do.
But I feel like there’s been a shift in recent years.
Now you have people saying that weight lifting is the only thing that’s needed and cardio can be put on the back-burner.
That’s also BS.
Here’s the truth.
Doing both weight training and cardio regularly is way better than only doing one and completely neglecting the other.
So, What Kind Of Cardio Should You Do?
I talked about this in detail in my article Is Cardio Necessary For Weight Loss?
I highly recommend giving that a read to get a more nuanced answer to this question.
But I’ll briefly touch on it again here.
The foundation of your cardio should be low intensity, steady state cardio (LISS).
For most people, this simply means first getting your daily step count up.
So, if you’re currently getting 3,000 steps a day, try to bring that up to 5,000.
And then slowly increase it over time until you’re consistently getting at least 8,000-10,000 steps per day on a regular basis.
Getting your daily activity up through more steps is seriously underrated for improving your heart health.
Having a well-balanced plan that included lifting weights 3-5 days a week plus getting more steps in is truly a great approach for a successful fitness journey!
Wrapping Things Up
There you have it!
My top 5 weight lifting tips for beginners.
I hope you found these tips super helpful and informative.
If you actually implement these tips, I promise you that you’ll start seeing better progress in your workouts!
If you have any questions on anything discussed here, feel free to drop a comment below!
