How do we Tone Muscle??
Everyone wants a little more tone and definition, the question is how do we accomplish this?! By lifting small weights and going for the high repetition burn?? NO. This will do next to NOTHING. The only way to tone muscle is to increase its size and decrease the body fat around it. Women, fear not becoming bulky, you don’t have the testosterone to do so.
Just like us as people, we don’t change unless we’re made uncomfortable and forced to do so. The only way that muscles grow is to take them out of their comfort zone, and do something they find difficult to do. Lifting a LIGHT weight 25 times with little burn is not difficult for muscle. Lifting a challenging weight 10 times and failing on your 11th rep IS challenging. The body will realize that what it currently has is not sufficient, so it will begin the process of building muscle.
When lifting challenging weights for 5 to 15 reps, your muscles actually develop micro-tears in the muscle fibers. Your body’s response is to say “I’m TEARING APART!!” Therefore, the body takes the protein from your diet, and puts it to use to rebuild the muscle fibers thicker and stronger, so they will not tear next time. Lifting challenging weights 3x per week, each time pushing the muscles to their limits, will gradually build the muscle. If your weight lifting is EASY for you, you’re basically accomplishing nothing, it should be a CHALLENGE! Once a weight becomes easy for the prescribed number of reps, you should try to go to a heavier weight. This is called Progressive Overload.
Combine this challenging lifting with a clean, and nutritious food plan and your body fat will begin to decrease as well. This combined with the increased metabolism from increased muscle mass, will have you well on your way to increased definition and tone! It’s POSSIBLE for EVERYONE!
Try our Bodybuilding class at 12:00 on Thursdays if you’re looking for an extra kick and some extra tone! Our women and men have EXCELLENT RESULTS!