As you may have already inferred from other parts of this blog, seeing women get strong is kind of a big deal for me. Sometimes, I get to have a hand in that. Ace detective that you are, you may have also already figured out that I’m going to tell you about one of these women. Let’s get to it.

Like a lot of people, “T” got into running with losing weight as being one of her goals. However, she kind of jumped the gun on that one. I’m a big advocate of getting in to shape first and then running (a discussion for a whole other article). T learned this lesson when she started to accumulate injuries, but didn’t drop weight as she had hoped. T was gracious enough to let me take the reins, so I got her onto a strength-intensive program (not forever, but to set a base for physical performance). We’ve recently finished the first major stage in this program. How’s she doing? T is going to tell you herself.

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Three months ago when Geoff suggested I try a powerlifting-based approach to strength training, I thought it would be something interesting to try . . . simply to see how my body developed. I was worried about ending up looking like a muscle bound man and – as a woman who would not exactly be described as “willowy” – I absolutely didn’t want this to happen. My reservations were supported by conversations I had with other women and I was even told by a fitness professional that I should be careful or I’d “build my abs out” (whatever that meant) if I didn’t lift properly. In spite of this I made the decision to try this novel approach thinking that it would simply make me stronger in the gym. Now I’m starting to understand how this type of lifting translates to my other activities, namely running and dancing.

Last week, I squatted 190lbs with Geoff [note: Tara has also performed 5 x 213 lbs. on a trap bar deadlift and several other great demonstrations of upper-body strength]. I was thrilled with this accomplishment but, it wasn’t until a few days later (at a pole dancing class), that I was able to see how these changes were adding up. I was immediately able to hold my body weight up and perform a lot of the strength moves with greater ease than ever. Previously it would take me many classes before I could build up the strength and technique to accomplish a given move. This was immediate. The instructor and other ladies of the class noticed and commented on my athleticism. It made me feel amazing to see how far I’d come from being a cardio-focused woman over the last few years to being a strong woman today.

At this point, I’m training for my second half marathon and I already feel a lot better physically than I did during the training for my first race last year. So far I have also been injury-free which wasn’t the case before.

My outlook on strength training especially for women is to not be afraid of building enormous muscles and losing your femininity. Muscles are sexy, strength is sexy and you will be in awe of how much better you perform in life.

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I’ve been doing a fair bit of bragging about T; not just because of how quickly she’s gotten strong since beginning a focused program, but because of how it’s helped with her other goals, including remaining injury-free for this running season. She has, for the record, continued to lose weight and (in my ever-so-biased opinion) look better and better.

I also know that getting stronger has changed T’s perspective. She recently told me about a conversation with another woman who was debating whether or not a 20 lb. weight would be too heavy to deadlift. It means a lot to get advice from someone they know can (semi-)comfortably lift over 10 times that amount. It gives me hope that, as time goes by, we’ll see fewer and fewer tiny, pink dumbbells outside of a rehab setting.

Geoff