You *must* drink 2 litres of water a day
We all know this one, right? Surely it’s better to have too much than too little..?
Seriously, unless you’re training for the Olympics in 30 degree heat, just drink when you’re thirsty. It never hurts to have your water bottle handy when you intend to get a sweat up, but “drink to thirst” is the most up-to-date medical advice, and the mantra of coaches and trainers who know what they’re talking about.
Safety note: dehydration IS a very serious thing – look out for headaches, irritiability, feeling dizzy, etc. It’s unlikely to happen after half an hour of doing some weights though.
(health note: drinking lots of fluid can help some people for issues other than dehydration – one of my clients chugs the water because she has very fussy skin, and this works for her…. J )
If you work out on an empty stomach you’ll burn more fat
I’ve lost count of the number of clients I’ve had who’ve gone a strange shade of green halfway through a session and been unable to finish because they believe this. Let me tell you about glycogen storage in the liver – no come back….! Suffice it to say, you need to fuel your workout, and you do that by having readily available fuel in your body. This ensures that your metabolism can work at its optimum – an efficient metabolism will carry on burning calories long AFTER you’ve finished working out!
Women who do weights get really bulky
You have to work VERY hard to bulk up as a woman. We generally don’t have enough testosterone, for a start! What weight training WILL do for a woman is make strong and firm muscle (leading to a toned look), which in turn will help keep our bones strong, support our posture and enable us to keep fitness thoughout our lives – yay!
Weight training turns fat to muscle
This is physically impossible! What actually DOES happen is that proper weight training burns loads of calories and you lose fat. Hey presto! You can now see your beautifully toned muscles 🙂
Sit-ups will give you a six pack
Sit-ups are probably one of the LEAST effective core exercises! All you’ll get by doing hundreds of these is a sore lower back… Our “core” muscles are made up of sheets and layers of muscles that are tethered on different axes, and move in different directions, and go all the way around our trunk.
To get nicely defined muscles (and a 6 pack if you want one!), it’s important to do combinations of planks, balances, twists, crunches, and all manner of exciting alternatives (!) to make sure we’re getting a proper core workout.
So, there we have it, 5 myths I encouner all the time – if you want any more info, let me know and I can point you in the direction of scientific papers, etc., better still, contact me – I LOVE to chat about this stuff! 🙂
