Lifting weights twice a week can help women
prevent "middle-aged spread" and keep their
hearts healthy, a new study shows.
"On average, women in the
middle years of their lives gain one to two pounds a year,
and most of this is assumed to be fat," study author
Kathryn H. Schmitz, an assistant professor at the University
of Pennsylvania's Center for Clinical Epidemiology and
Biostatistics, said in a prepared statement.
"This study shows that strength training can prevent
increases in body fat percentage and attenuate increases
in the fat depot most closely associated with heart disease.
While an annual weight gain of one to two pounds doesn't
sound like much, over 10 to 20 years the gain is significant,"
Schmitz said.
The study included 164 overweight and obese women, aged
24 to 44, divided into two groups. One group took part
in a 16-week program of supervised strength training classes,
which were followed up with booster sessions four times
a year for two years.
The other group of women received a brochure that recommended
they get 30 minutes to an hour of exercise most days of
the week.
Both groups were told not to change their diets in ways
that might lead to weight changes during the study.
By the end of two years, the women in the weight-training
group showed an average 3.7 percent decrease in body fat,
while the women in the brochure group showed no change
in body fat. The study also found that weight training
reduced intra-abdominal fat, which is associated with
heart disease and metabolic disturbances.
The findings were presented Friday at the
American Heart Association's annual conference
on Cardiovascular Disease Epidemiology and Prevention,
in Phoenix.
Schmitz said that weight training is a fairly time-efficient
way to prevent these small annual increases in weight
that may increase the risk of heart disease and diabetes.
