#115: 7 Must-Haves for a Strength Training Program That Works (Without Wasting Time)

You want to lift weights, build muscle, and feel stronger… but how do you know if the program you’re following is actually helping you get there?

In this episode, I’m giving you a simple 7-point checklist to evaluate any weight training program - whether it’s something you found online or one from your gym.

You’ll learn:

• Why more exercises and longer sessions don’t equal better results
• The ideal number of exercises, sets, and sessions per week
• What to look for (and what to avoid) in free fitness programs

This episode will help you train smarter and make sure you’re following a program that actually supports your goals in midlife.

Resources Mentioned:

• Episode #114: Progressive Overload
• Episode #22: Unilateral weight training
• My membership >> 

Hit play to find out what makes a great weight training program - and how to spot the red flags.

Transcript

#115: 7 Must-Haves for a Strength Training Program That Works (Without Wasting Time)


[00:00:00] Welcome to 40+ Fitness for Women. I'm Lynn Sederlöf-Airisto your host, and I'm a certified menopause fitness coach, and I really am all about helping women stay strong, maintain their muscle, keep their bodies functional. In midlife and beyond, and so today, this is really a weight training focused session because I know that a lot of you are getting programs online that are free.
You think, I don't wanna invest in a program. And so I wanna give you kind of a checklist on how to evaluate whether that program that you are following is a good one or whether you should look for a different one. Okay. And by the way, I do feel pretty strongly that it is worth investing in getting a good program if you have a personal trainer at your gym. A lot of gyms, they offer you a free session with a personal trainer or some [00:01:00] kind of basic program. Then get that because they have probably thought through these things. But you can also evaluate that programming that you've gotten using these criteria. So I have seven criteria,
and my basic assumption here is that you are a busy woman who does not want to spend her life in the gym. You would be listening probably to somebody else if you were really like into bodybuilding and you wanted to get every little part to its absolute maximum. I'm talking to women who. Want to get in there, do something that's effective and efficient and is going to get them to their goals, which is to be stronger, more toned, keep their body functional for the decades ahead, and then they wanna get out because they have a lot of other stuff to do.
Okay, so let's start there. So I'm not talking to my 17-year-old son [00:02:00] who goes and hangs out for two hours in the weight room with his friends. Like every single day they have time to spare. They don't care if it's efficient, they don't care.
They just are having fun hanging out there. And that's the thing that they do with their lives. Right. So you and I, I think we're different. We wanna get in there and do our thing and get out, so with that in mind, there are certain key principles that you need to keep in mind when we do programming.
One is that during the session you are getting more and more tired as the session wears on. So in the beginning, you are going to have a lot of energy and those sets are going to be, that are more stimulating because you are not tired yet, your body's not tired yet, and as your session wears on, your body's gonna be more tired and it's gonna be less stimulating.
Okay. So you're kind of [00:03:00] going downhill as far as how effective what you're doing is. And that's why it doesn't really make sense to have training sessions that are over an hour, right? If you can have something that's 45 minutes to an hour, that's pretty ideal. And, and that doesn't matter like how long you've been weight training, because if you're doing this effectively, if you're really challenging, your muscles going close to failure, progressively overloading, your body's gonna be cooked at that point.
And this also works kind of on a smaller, uh, scale in that for each muscle that you work, be it your biceps or your thighs, your hamstrings, whatever, they also, the first set that you train them is going to be the one where they can really. Perform, and then every subsequent set is going to be a little bit less and a little bit less, and a little bit less, so it doesn't make sense to just keep [00:04:00] doing a million sets because there's just diminishing returns.
All right? So when you take into account those facts that sets up a little bit of like a ticking, time clock for your sessions, uh, that you can't just make them endlessly long and you can't just put endless amounts of exercises in there and you can't just do endless amounts of sets.
So let's look at this. The first thing you want to be aware of is, is your programming hitting all your muscles when you take into account that there is not gonna be unlimited time to do stuff, it needs to be effective, so you don't need. Redundant exercises that are working the same muscles the same way.
The less redundancy you can have, the better. Okay. So that's gonna be number one. And I have seen [00:05:00] very reputable, recommended all over the place free fitness programming where, you know, when I go look at it. 'cause sometimes I get to ask my opinion, I, I'm like.
Okay. Yeah. They're doing good exercises, but then there's a huge amount of redundancy in what they're doing. And I, and the, the reason that that's happening is that when you are an online fitness influencer and you are doing these free workouts, you have to come up with something novel like.
Every day, right, or a few times a week at, at the very least. And if it needs to be different, so often you really are going to have a heck of a time coming up with a really good program where you're not being redundant. Okay. It may not matter if that person's just doing that training session [00:06:00] once, that, Hey, this was actually just, you know, a hamstring session.
Or it may just be way too much for somebody. Like for my one client who did one of these sessions, it turned out it had three hamstring exercises. You know, you do six exercises and three of them are focused on your hamstrings, and then you do that all out. You're, you know, she ended up tearing her hamstring.
So anyway, not to say that they're all bad out there, but this, this can happen and it does happen. If you have to be putting something out all the time, then you are not gonna spend all the time like, oh, is this perfect? Have I hit every muscle group and have I not overloaded anything? And on and all that.
Okay, so number one was you wanna make sure that you're hitting all your muscles and ideally twice a week for every muscle group.
All right. Now the second thing is how [00:07:00] many exercises does it have per session? So like said there is, you know, diminish diminishing returns or diminishing capability to actually. Push your body as your session goes on. And if you think about it, you have one set and then you rest between sets. So just by virtue of a set, taking about a minute and the rest being two to three minutes, and then maybe you walk from one machine to the other, maybe you have to wait in line for somebody you know there.
There's just. You're, you're just not gonna be able to get in that many exercises in that hour. So I think the sweet spot is somewhere between three and seven exercises per session. I program six almost all the time with three of them being kind of the primary, the big exercises. And after you've done those big ones.
[00:08:00] Once you're in the membership, so when you're a beginner, it's a little bit different, but like once you've been weight training for a little bit, when you've done three big exercises and you've done your three sets, you are feeling like you've done something and you're, you're like, you're, you're physically fairly tired.
So, so then after that you might have some accessory exercises or some machines and, and smaller muscles that don't require quite as much like, ooh, out of your body. So they should be a lot of compound exercises in the beginning so that you are hitting major muscle groups, but you do need some of the isolation exercises.
For example. Calves are something that I always keep in my programming because they don't really get worked otherwise, and they are important for your. Knee health. And when your calves get weak, then it starts to show upward up the leg. [00:09:00] So when you're doing calf raises and things, you're strengthening your ankles, your feet, your calves, and you're supporting your knees.
So that's important. Even though calf raises are kind of like, oh my God, really? I gotta do those. And then the other one is like quad extensions, seated leg extensions. Because the rec fem muscle isn't really hit in other quad work so that, you know, you get well-rounded. It's good to have that as well. And then there are other things like women want to have, you know, their biceps and their triceps worked a little bit more so that they don't have, what do they call it in the uk?
Bingo wings under their arms. So, you know, there, there are these kinds of things that come in there. But you don't wanna have a million exercises. If you look at a program and there's like 12 exercises, first of all, that's just mentally exhausting to think that, oh my God, I have to do all of these. You look at six, [00:10:00] it feels a lot more doable and, and if you think about it like, okay, I have.
Three that really matter. Then, then it's even more kind of emotionally, mentally, uh, more doable and that's how I try to program that way.
The third thing you wanna look at is how many sets of each exercise. I can't believe it when I see like four to six sets of the same exact exercise because of what I talked about in the very, very beginning, which is that each set you are able to recruit less of your type two muscle fibers and you get diminishing returns as far as stimulating muscle growth and strength.
So. One set? Yes. Do one set? Absolutely. Two sets. Great. Three sets good. Four is kind of like Mm. Okay. Mm-hmm. And usually if somebody needs to save time on doing their weight training, I recommend that instead of [00:11:00] skipping an exercise, you just do fewer sets of those exercises. So maybe you do all six exercises, but you do two sets of each.
I was working with one client who was recovering from a long illness and really trying to build up her strength, and doing three sets of each exercise was just too much for her. And even just doing the one set of each exercise, she was able to start getting stronger. So that is better than nothing.
For sure. For sure, for sure. But if you see a program where it's five sets, six sets, I mean really guys, no.
And here, here I have to, I have to comment on men because you know they are very much like Arnold Schwartzenegger, my boyfriend's. Definitely one of them. There's the bro split mentality where you do a certain body part each time you [00:12:00] train and you go five days a week.
So you've got chest day, back day, arm day, leg day. All your legs get done in one day, your whole lower body, but everything else, it gets like so much more time. But anyway, and. You know, they go in there and they're like chest day. So they do some chest presses for the upper chest, some for the middle chest, some for the lower chest,
and of course they will tell you this is the way to do it and they believe that's the way to do it and they've been doing it. But I mean, come on, five days a week. That they're training in there. I don't have that kind of time. And really when they're doing the upper chest, actually it's not like the middle and the lower chest are just like, oh, well, we'll just take a nap here.
No, they get worked too. I don't wanna say that they're wrong to do it that way, but they are doing something different and, and yeah, I have to say that I've had discussions with [00:13:00] my boyfriend about, like, about this.
I of course cannot talk about it. Like, Hey, I've noticed in your programming, I have to say it more like, wow, since I have all these women who just have, you know, three days a week, one hour to train, I have to think about this redundancy thing and, and how can I really minimize? And actually when they do, you know, chest, they're hitting their whole chest and they don't need to do three different bicep variants in one session.
And he's actually. He won't admit this, but he is actually changing his training up where he is doing less redundancy. And, uh, this guy who's been training for 30 years in the gym, he is making more progress. Of course, this is just one example, but anyway,
 The fourth thing is how often do the exercises change? Now, I hope you listened to last week's episode. It was on progressive overload, and [00:14:00] that should have rung some bells in your head that the only way you're going to be able to apply progressive overload is if your program stays the same for a while.
And in fact, I have noticed. That Okay. For a long time I was doing, you know, the same, I had upper body day and a lower body day and I trained four days a week. So I'm like upper, lower break, upper lower. I. And my upper body days were exactly identical and my lower body days were exactly identical. And now I've started playing with this where I have two little bit different upper body days and two, a little bit different lower body days.
And I'll tell you what has happened. It has been that my progress has kind of stalled because even though I am. In principle training the same muscle, uh, with two different exercises [00:15:00] on the two different days. So for example, I do R DLS on one of my lower body days, and then I do hyper extensions on the other day.
Both of them are hip hinge, glute hamstring exercises, one training more in a lengthened position. The other more in a shortened position, but I wouldn't put them both in the same. Workout because they're essentially the same exercise. I mean, there are differences, but, but they're redundant enough that I wouldn't put them in the same, uh, session.
It means that I'm doing RDLs only once a week, and I'm doing hyper extensions only once a week. And so progress has really stalled. You know, I did a lot better when I had. Hyper extensions two days a week when I did, like, I'll do a month of hyper extensions or two months of just hyper extensions, and then two months of RDLs.
So it does make a difference when you swap out the exercises, and I know [00:16:00] that there's. There's a desire for some variety and, and I get that, and that's why I do things like in my programming, that it's not just the exact same thing always, um, but. Too much of that is a bad thing because you, you don't get to do the progressive overload.
You're not doing the same exercises over and over again. And also you don't get the learning of how to do those exercises correctly. So if you think about, powerlifters, the ones who are, doing bench press, back squat. And deadlift. They do three exercises.
They do those three exercises every week of their life, right? And they still are improving on them. Of course, they do some accessory stuff to help with their strength on those exercises. But the thing is that you can still improve your [00:17:00] technique over. Years, decades, you know, doing the same exercise.
So the swapping up is not necessary. And the problem with a lot of programs is, and especially if you do some of these online programs, is they're doing different exercises every single time. So how are you gonna do the progressive overload? It becomes exercise rather than training, which brings you to the result.
Number five is, are you getting enough recovery before working that muscle group again? So you want at least the 48 hours of recovery. And I think a lot of women, I. Perimenopause menopause. Need a little bit more than that. I like to take two days off before training the same muscle group again. I just notice it.
I, I just haven't quite recovered. But of course, I am somebody who pushes myself quite close to failure, so that does mean that I need a little bit more [00:18:00] recovery. So you need to figure out what works for you. If you're, if you're able to stay two or three reps from failure, then you'll probably recover a little bit faster than I do.
I like to really feel it, at the end. But when you are going to group fitness classes,  I mean, if you went to body pump class, every day, which I've seen some women do, like you're working the exact same muscles day after day. Or if you go to a booty class and you go to a body pump class, both of them have trained your glutes or you go into an upper body class and a body pump class. Both of them have trained your arms. So you are not getting those recovery days. And you need those recovery days 'cause that's when the magic happens. That's when your muscles build. And if you're doing online programs, make sure that you are taking the breaks for your muscles.
Alright. Of course you do end up with situations where. When you're doing a lower body day, let's say you're [00:19:00] doing RDLs, your upper body's gonna do something right, because you're holding that bar, you're holding the dumbbells when you're doing the RDLs. And so you've got this static hold. Yes, your upper back.
As you get heavier, it is going to need to work. Your grip strength is being challenged, all these things, but it's not the same as when you've gotta do, actual eccentric contractions. So. You don't need to worry about that. You can definitely, like it is an upper body rest day when you're doing lower body, so that's not a problem.
And then the last two things that I wanna bring up are just things to keep in mind. So number six and number seven. Number six is unilateral and bilateral training. So. I did a podcast episode like way long time ago, I'll link it in the show notes. And it is important to ensure that you are not becoming uneven on your two sides.
 I have struggled [00:20:00] with this personally in that when I was doing body pump all the time. I turned out was using my right leg and I wasn't using my left leg as far as the hamstring went. And I started to have really kind of debilitating hip pain. I couldn't sit for long periods of time and long periods of time was like half an hour and um, and it was just sore all the time.
And then when I finally. Yeah, finally went to physical therapist. He was like, oh, it's because you're not using your left hamstring at all. And so then I started on the long, long road to strengthen my left hamstring by doing. Unilateral hamstring curls. And oh my God, my left side was weak. That was a very important lesson that you need to mix in some unilateral work in your programming.
And [00:21:00] so when I do my programming for my, for my members. I do mix it in there. So everybody who enters my membership, they actually, they start at block one or two, depending on whether they've been in the learn to lift or whether they're somebody with, weight training, experience. And so they come straight into the membership and then they proceed, you know, to block three, to block four, to block five, to block six.
Everybody takes the same road. And that road develops them over time and it takes into account things like hitting the muscles a little bit differently, doing unilateral versus, bilateral work, all these things. So I'm taking that into account and you should as well, so that you don't end up in trouble.
You know where one arm is stronger than the other one leg, or you get very unevenly [00:22:00] strong.
And then the last one is, again, more nuance, but there are different ways to train your muscles as far as them being trained in a lengthened position or in a shortened position. And that has to do with when you are, contracting the muscle.
So moving it through the exercise. What point in that contraction the muscle has to work the hardest? Is it way in the beginning when the muscle is as long as it's gonna be? Or is it towards the top when the muscle is in its shortest configuration? And it's good to mix those up as well, at least over time in your programming. 
So I hope that this episode has a little bit opened your eyes to the fact that there's a lot of thought that goes into doing this programming and [00:23:00] even with these things that I mentioned, these seven things. there's a lot of flexibility as far as what exercises, what equipment, home or gym and, and whatever.
You know, you can, you can hit all these seven things in many, many different ways. So I don't wanna say like, oh my God, if your program isn't exactly looking like this, it's wrong. There are a lot of ways to achieve these seven things, by exercise selection and so forth. So, but there is a lot that goes on and if this all seems like, oh my God, I mean I have to get to know my biology and what exercises, use what muscles and so forth and think about how do I change it and evolve it over time and that's just too much for you.
Then I have my membership and I am happy to have you come join me. And you can see what [00:24:00] it's like. So it will allow you to do progressive overload. I program in eight week blocks and every eight weeks, some of the exercises get swapped out and some get kept. And that makes sure that you have time to progressively overload some of the exercises, yet you get some variety from the new ones that get swapped in. So, that is my way of helping you stay on your journey and get some experience with new exercises.
All right, and with that, I leave you till next time and remember to listen to the last week's progressive overload episode if you haven't, because that is another super important aspect to getting results out of your weight training. It's not just the program and the exercises. You've got to do the training.
The right way so that you are challenging your muscles as you go. So have a [00:25:00] wonderful rest of the week. Until next time, happy training.