I was reading a magazine article for some reason, called It’s Harder For Women To Lose Weight. I’m not a woman so I’m going to look into this from a man’s point of view. I guess I could be wrong but here goes. I think it’s generally harder for women to lose weight. I’m speaking in general terms, and I realise that there will be exceptions to every rule, but that’s what I think anyway.

Why would I think this? Well they’ve got a couple reasons in that article I read: Women have to do about 20% more exercise to get the same benefits. While exercise alone might be enough for men to lose weight, women also have to look carefully at their carbohydrate intake to get the same results. Experts say body composition such as muscle mass, and hormones are to blame for women not being able to lose weight.

The story goes on to says that research at the University of Missouri by Prof Jill Kanaley put 75 obese men and women, all with type 2 diabetes on the same fitness program, and found men always did better as far as weight loss went. What they are saying is that exercise alone might be good enough for a man, but unfortunately it’s not good enough for a woman who must also worry about her diet to lose weight.
It’s a pretty interesting article. It goes back to basics suggesting that because the male body is more utilitarian then the female body it responds better to exercise and diet. One main reason for this is body composition – men have a higher proportion of of muscle of women – and muscle has a higher metabolic rate than fat. This means men can burn more calories then women even when at rest. There was one part where the researcher said a man working 65 per cent effort would require a woman to work at 85 per cent to have the equivalent output or results. I haven’t done any research and am not sure that I want to believe that, to be honest. The article then goes onto say that men naturally have this advantage because they have larger hearts and lungs along with a higher proportion of hemoglobin. (Haemoglobin is the part of the blood that carries oxygen around the body which is very useful when exercising).

So what is going to be the best way for women to achieve weight loss?

I think the best way is to lift weights, do cardio and eat properly. Lifting weights temporarily raises the level of testosterone and growth hormones which in turn, burn more fat. Hormones are a big part of your metabolism. Women naturally have slower metabolisms because they tend to store fat instead of burning it, due to lower testosterone levels. Women should be doing what’s known as compound weight training, that is, using muscles such as the glutes and quads. The bigger muscle groups you use, the more calories you will burn. Lifting weights is not going to make you big and bulky. But that’s another post for another day!