A young female weightlifter once asked me whether she should be training differently from the guys at her gym. Women make up almost half of our weightlifting community, yet nearly all of the resources that are available are written for the default, male, weightlifter. This forces most women to rely on training plans that simply aren’t designed for their physiology.

I asked one of the best female weightlifters in the world, multi-time World Champion Nadezhda (Nadia) Evstyukhina, about topics she thinks women in weightlifting (and their coaches) should know of in order to get the most out of their training.

Together, Nadia and I set out to cover each of the following 3 topics in detail:

How to design training plans for women The differences in technique between men and women How sex affects men vs women before training or a competition

Today’s post will be about the first topic, how to design training plans for women .

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The entire body must be strong for weightlifting. The maximum amount of weight that a lifter can snatch or clean and jerk is limited not by their most powerful muscle groups, but by their weakest. If their legs are strong enough to pull 100kg, but their upper body isn’t strong enough to support 100kgs overhead, the lifter won’t complete the lift.

Women typically have a harder time developing speed in their lower bodies and muscle mass in their upper bodies than men. The following points should be considered when designing training plans for female weightlifters:

To address lower-body speed

Jumping exercises, such as box jumps, are a great exercise for developing lower-body speed and explosiveness. Female weightlifters should use jumping exercises more frequently than men of the same level. And while men typically perform jumping exercises towards the end of training, female weightlifters should consider doing them during their warm up.

Upper-body muscle mass



Building upper-body muscle mass is harder for women than for men. Also, women are typically more flexible, which increases the likelihood of injury when working with heavy weights during certain exercises. It’s advised that during the Base Phase , women should perform full-body exercises that require a lot of upper-body strength with less weight (as a percent of max) but for more reps. This increases hypertrophy, strengthens joints, and reduces the risk of injury.

It is also advised that women perform several General Physical Preparation exercises per training session that specifically target the upper-body muscles used in weightlifting. These include the trapezius and tricep muscles, and the muscles of the shoulder joint, lumbar, and thoracic spine.

Nadia recommends the following GPP exercises to be frequently performed:



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Below is a training plan designed for two lifters of the same level. The program on the left is written for a 77kg male lifter, Adult Level-1 rank. The program on the right is written for a 58kg female lifter, also Adult Level-1 rank.