In my experience, most women who start strength training make excellent progress, attain their exercise objectives, and maintain their muscular fitness through regular workouts. However, not all are satisfied with a better body composition and higher functional capacity. Some women want to achieve their best physical appearance and highest level of strength fitness.

High-Intensity Strength Training
Over the past few years, many women who enjoyed the benefits of our standard strength training program elected to participate in our high-intensity workouts. Our 6-week high-intensity strength training program involves 30 minutes of nearly continuous strength exercise, working all of the major muscle groups to fatigue. Each of the two weekly workouts is performed under the expert direction of a personal trainer who ensures safe and productive exercise sessions.

So how does such hard training affect the women's physical appearance? As you can see from the photo of our most recent high intensity trainers (and their coach), these women in their 20s, 30s and 40s look lean, strong, and extremely fit. While they are certainly muscular, they are by no means big or bulky. What's more, they feel great and function like teenage athletes.

Although these women were already well-conditioned when they started high-intensity strength training, they definitely enhanced their physical appearance over the 12 exercise sessions. On average, they added 3.3 pounds of muscle and lost 2.7 pounds of fat, for a 6-pound improvement in body composition.

Conclusions and Recommendations
Strength training is a safe and effective exercise for women. It does not produce bulky bodies, but it does develop strong and shapely muscles that are fit and functional. Both standard and high-intensity strength training programs are time efficient, requiring only two half-hour exercise sessions a week for excellent results. Over the past five years, Shape Magazine has regularly featured our women's strength training programs (basic and advanced), and the response has been excellent.

Regardless of age or present level of fitness, I encourage every woman to begin a strength training program for life. The South Shore area offers a variety of fine fitness facilities with highly qualified strength instructors and personal trainers. Many offer women's strength training classes and some fitness centers are exclusively for women. So there is no excuse not to start strength training in 1999. In addition to looking, feeling and functioning better, research indicates that regular strength exercise may also reduce your risk of osteoporosis, diabetes, heart disease, low back pain, certain types of cancer and depression.

Wayne L. Westcott, Ph.D., is fitness research director at the South Shore YMCA, and author of several books on fitness, including Building Strength and Stamina, and Strength Training Past 50.