More Common Gym Myths

Gyms are wonderful places to breed confidence, improve your strength, and get healthy. Unfortunately, they also are places where myths and falsities run rampant. Here are some common myths that I want to explain and debunk for you. (For more myths check our archives for previous posts for other subjects!)

“Spot Training”

Sadly this is a myth! A common thing we trainers hear is a client wanting to train away the fat at their thighs or their core or their dreaded “muffin tops”. Unfortunately that is not how it works because fat and muscle are different things. Some people genetically carry their fat in certain areas which means that’s where your excess weight goes. For example, you can do abs all day long to get your abdominal muscles big and strong but when it comes down to losing the mass on your stomach, it ultimately is your diet and calories you burn and overall activity levels that help to decrease the fat on your body.

• Lifting weights make you “big and bulky”

Lifting weights do allow your muscles to grow but how they grow depends on the type of training you’re doing.

• There is endurance training consisting of high reps (>15) where you are looking to increase your muscles’ ability to go for a while before feeling fatigued.
• Hypertrophy training is for those looking for size increase and endurance with reps of 10 – 15.
• Strength training is done with reps of 4 – 10 where you’ll see your overall strength increase and size increase.
• Lastly, power training with reps 1 – 4 working on your strength, power, and explosiveness.

They all affect your muscles in different specific ways and how you train or get trained should depend on what your goal is.

• Weight loss results

Everybody is different. Some people want to get big, some want to be able to run for a long time, others want to lose weight. Your diet, exercise habits, and training should depend on what your current goal is. Understanding how to achieve your goal however depends on the individual. For example, many determinants to weight loss are things you cannot help such as; genetics, gender, age, and how your body moves. No two people will lose weight the same way so try not to compare yourself to someone else if it looks like their results are coming faster.

Hopefully this shines some light on any myths you may have heard in or about the gym!