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Fit/active women of Reddit, what’s your weekly exercise routine like?

Main Post:

So basically I started exercising and working out about a month and a half ago with the goal of growing my legs and glutes plus cardio but have recently had some knee soreness. My lifestyle before was quite sedentary for years then I started exercising 6 days a week with legs being done everyday either through resistance training or cardio. I had 2 days a week of heavy weight low rep lower body exercises around 60-90 minutes and 4 days cardio + a bit of core but all with inadequate warm ups and stretching (I know I’m dumb).

I think/know I’ve been overdoing it with my lower body and am trying to change up my routine to protect my knees and so I’d love to hear what you all do! How many days a week, how long per session, how many exercises per session, how often going very heavy/til failure etc... Also how often do you stretch? Any advice or suggestions for beginners?

Edit: lots of good answers here! I’m reading everything and trying to answer anything that relates to me but it’s good to get an idea of what to work towards. Thanks everyone :)

Top Comment:

Monday- Legs+ Shoulder Tuesday-Chest + Triceps Wednesday -Back n Biceps Thursday -Cardio+Abs Friday-Legs Saturday -Compound excercises Sunday-Rest

Is it good ?? My goal is toning and fat loss

January 21, 2022 | Forum: r/xxfitness

Strength-Based Women's Workout Plan Guide - At Home (no HIIT) & At Gym

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Hi Everyone,

I've never posted a question on Reddit before so my apologies if I do anything wrong in advance.

I'm currently 26 years old and would like to work on incorporating exercise back into my life and losing around 15-20 lbs to reduce fat while gaining muscle. (Don't care about scale weight as long as I'm losing fat & toning up)

When I was 17-19, I used to follow Lais De Leon's fitness guides for at home and at the gym, and having a structured plan (what body part to work out, which exercises to do, # sets/reps) was wonderful for me as I have ADHD and it made working out much easier for me. I also liked knowing that I was closer to the finish line and had a sense of accomplishment when completing plans/challenges. These were all strength-based and I loved that. I feel like a badass when lifting and feeling like a badass is what motivates me to work out.

I recently retried one of Lais De Leon's challenges through her app but it's expensive & I felt that it was a bit too much and unrealistic for a single gym sesh. It's also been about 4 years since I've consistently worked out so I've realized that I need to start from the basics again.

I've been looking around and lurking on Reddit posts but it's VERY overwhelming with the amount fitness women and people out there and guides. I've checked out a few guides based on posts from here and most are good but not exactly quite what I'm looking for.

The biggest difficulty that I'm running into most is that many are HIIT-based workouts. I do not enjoy HIIT-based workouts whatsoever and I also cannot physically do them since I have a kidney disease and my kidney doc told me to avoid HIIT & Cross Fit type workouts because of the focus on a fast heartbeat and overload of high-intensity. When I attempt HIIT workouts I get light-headed, get close to passing out, and develop hives. Unrealistic to keep attempting this if I plan to stay consistent with working out, therefore am avoiding these types of workouts.

What I'm looking for:

1. A home-based fitness guide for women: I have access to my apartment gym which has dumbbells, resistance bands, and a cable machine. Strength-based workout focused and can include bodyweight. Not HIIT focused or have it as a minimum if it is in there.
2. A gym-based fitness guide for women: When I join a gym again (In August - after I'm done w/ grad school due to cost) I would like to fully get back to lifting. Squats, DLs, bench, hip thrusts, etc. Looking for a guide to tell me which body part to focus on, which exercises, sets/reps. Low-impact cardio is perfectly fine, just no high-intensity cardio or HIIT style.

Overall: SIMPLE layout/plan, tells me exactly what to do & how much, focus on strength building using a combination of weights & bodyweight, beginner-intermediate, don't care about fast gains/results, something 8-12 weeks or longer if possible (longer the better).

Thank you all for your help in advance!

EDIT: For others that may read this post later looking for help/new recs, I've compiled most of the answers in a manner that would've been helpful for me as a lurker :). I'll keep trying to add more as I see them.

Current Recommendations (Dec 2021):

Programs

Apps: SWEAT, Books: The New Rules of Lifting for Women: Lift Like a Man, Look Like a Goddess by Cassandra Forsythe & Lou Schuler

People Mentioned: Sarah Olive Bergeson, Tracy Steen, Emi Wong, Heather Robertson, Sohee Lee, Sydney Cummings, Natacha Oceane, Caroline Girvan, Jeremey Ethier, Casey Johnston, Meg Gallagher, Natalie Freeman

:)

Top Comment:

I love Stronger by the Day by MegSquats for strength. They have an at home program and a few times a year Meg runs a course called Before the Barbell to get you comfortable with using a barbell and doing compound movements. I had my husband following the program last year because he was totally new to lifting and he really liked it.

December 30, 2021 | Forum: r/xxfitness

Do men and women need different workouts? (Resolve an argument.)

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I got a book, Strong Curves: A Woman's Guide to Building a Better Butt and Body by Bret Contreras and Kellie Davis. I showed it to my significant other, who told me, essentially, that it was a shitty book and a marketing ploy for women. He complained that the book has pages and pages of tiny variations of obscure exercises. He said:

you need bench press, squat, deadlift, and pull-ups, and maybe military press. That's all the core exercises you need for men OR women

He's a fit guy. He usually knows what he's talking about. But I think he's wrong this time.

Edit: I showed him this post and caught flack for quoting him improperly. Added deadlifts to the list. My bad.

Top Comment:

He's not entirely wrong but the point he is missing is that men and women often have different goals in the gym.

November 30, 2018 | Forum: r/Fitness

Best pre-workout for women

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I've been into fitness and weight training for over a year now, but haven't found my go-to pre-work out. I started with C4, but didn't like that it affected my sleep and I don't prefer the flavors very much. After that my ex boyfriend got me into just taking beta alanine and citrulline malate together. Now sometimes I take Amino Energy that I get from Costco...which I love the flavor and it doesn't seem to affect my sleep or keep me wired after.

Not sure if I should order Amino Energy again or try something new. I did like taking beta alanine and citrulline malate, but honestly I'm not sure if it's good for my body. I did like the tingles it gave me and duration of my workouts were the best.

Just looking for others opinions.

To add, I'm 27 years old, weigh about 155lbs, and am 5'7"

Top Comment:

If you're looking for less caffeine stick to amino Energy or find something you like and half scoop it. Beta alanine is a general performance booster and citrulline increases cell volume (they're pump boosters) nothing wrong with them.

August 8, 2018 | Forum: r/Fitness

Women's chest workouts.

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I finally got my girlfriend into the gym and surprise, her main focus is butt, abs, legs and cardio, all things that I'm happy to help her with. However , shes also asking for workouts with her chest that will make her breasts bigger/better formed, and I'm completely lost there. I imagine if there are exercises designed around that, they are different from chest exercises that I normally do, but any advice I could get or tips on things I should look into would be greatly appreciated.

Top Comment:

It's the same exercises as you would do for your chest. The boobs aren't technically getting "bigger", but what happens is that she will build up her chest muscle behind her boobs which will help push her boobs out and make them more prominent.

March 29, 2018 | Forum: r/Fitness

What's your upper body routine?

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I know there's a lot of resources around here for examples of upper body routines but I was curious on what you ladies do for upper body, how often do you train & do you split it up or just do all upper body in one go?

I used to split it up, now I just do a full upper body workout. I need some inspiration to change up my routine!

Top Comment:

I do full body with a focus on 3 different days

Monday: power yoga Tuesday: full body / chest, back and shoulders focus + 20 minutes of running Wednesday: hot athletic yoga Thursday: hot power yoga Friday: full body / legs and glutes focus + yin yoga Saturday: rest (worst day IMO) Sunday: full body / arm focus + athletic yoga

When I do legs, especially, I have been working on correcting my stupid imbalance and getting my right side up to my left side's level

May 29, 2017 | Forum: r/xxfitness

Difference in men and women's workout?

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I'm a guy, but I've been following both HASfit and Abby Pollock on YouTube and I've noted that women more successively develop the lower part of the body while men the upper. Are the different results a result of focused effort in specific regions of the body (butt, legs / biceps, pecs) or is it a gendered thing (innate biological differences, bone structure and whatnot)? I ask because I'm returning to fitness after some health issues, though now I don't have a personal trainer and have to figure stuff out for myself, and I don't know what to expect later down the line if I do, for instance, lower body exercise as instructed by women and upper body exercise as instructed by men. I'm new to this sub, so I don't know if penis-havers are even allowed to ask (but sexual dimorphism is a topic that interests me greatly, so I'll stick around nonetheless), so tell me if there's something I need to know.

Top Comment:

Are the different results a result of focused effort in specific regions of the body (butt, legs / biceps, pecs)

Yeah, I think it's mostly this. Most of the mainstream programs I've seen around involve just squats & deadlifts and maybe one or two other things for lower body, and have like 15 high-rep accessory exercises for arms, chest & back. Compare the focus in this popular general workout to the Strong Curves routine many women like (google "strong curves pdf").

(Higher reps usually = greater muscle size)

If you eat enough, you'll grow wherever you put volume. Maybe you'd be interested in a PHUL workout like this https://www.muscleandstrength.com/workouts/phul-workout ?

(well and also men usually have greater natural upper body strength bc of how hormones manifested during puberty.)

August 1, 2016 | Forum: r/xxfitness

(IN NEED OF PPL WORKOUT PLAN exclusively for women for a sexy body overall)

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FYI Age-20 Weight-119lb Height-5 ft 8inches Hey guys, I have been following the PPL program for about 5 months now and I see progress (I look lean, a little muscle). However, this is not my ideal progress rate or body. My body fat percentage is 22.4% and I wanted to follow a "PPL program exclusively for women to build a great body". (Visible abs, bigger butt, perkier boobs, defined shoulders and back, defined quads, hams, calfs, you know). No hurry, I want to get stronger over time. Can you please suggest a proper P-push P-pull L-legs workout plan for me?

Top Comment:

So visible abs is all about diet. You'll have to lose the fat on your stomach covering them. There's no workout plan that can make them appear.

Best thing you can do is eat a little more and change your PPL routine to focus on the body parts you want to grow (quads, glutes, shoulders, etc) then diet down to expose the muscle you've built. Maybe take a look a coolcicada's PPL or the beginner one posted on r/fitness as a starting point. There's no magic workout routine for women that will give you those results without a proper diet.

Also, I don't know if you run PPL 3 days a week or 6 days a week but it works much better run 6 days a week.

December 9, 2015 | Forum: r/xxfitness