Welcome to Episode 57 of the Movement Logic podcast. In this episode, Laurel and Sarah discuss the fact that lifting heavy is not automatically a strength sport and that more people would feel invited to lift heavy if the media didn’t fixate so much on barbells as equipment for large, young, competitive male lifters and instead represented people that look more like everyone else and shared goals beyond competitive ones.

You will learn:

• The difference between powerlifting, Olympic weightlifting, body-building, and lifting heavy weights.
• Why large, young men are over-represented in the media’s depiction of lifting heavy weights, and how this has been a deterrent to other groups of people (especially older women) who potentially have more to gain from lifting heavy weights than large, young men do.
• How competitive athletes often have to take their training to extreme levels, but how everyone else who wants to see enormous benefits to their health can train with a far more moderate approach.
• Sarah and Laurel’s first impression of lifting heavy weights growing up.
• How being an elite athlete can often mean sacrificing non-insignificant aspects of health.
• How when women start lifting weights they also start saying no to toxic bullshit in their lives.
• Risk of injury is often higher amongst more experienced/elite lifters.
• How women’s fear of getting “bulky” is understandable given that in our patriarchal society, women are often rewarded for a small and thin appearance.
• Ironically lifting heavy, despite what conventional wisdom might have us believe, is not typically the best way to bulk up.
• Everyone assumes that old age means getting frail, gaining weight, and becoming less capable, but it absolutely does not need to.
• Standing up out of a chair becomes a non-issue if older people are regularly squatting heavy.

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