Men and women have different workout needs and desires. While many men desire to bulk up, that is not always the case for women. Some women simply desire to burn fat, increase their heart rate and tone muscle. This means finding the right exercises that are going to achieve these goals. Additionally, women tend to have certain problem areas they would like to focus on. Think about what your personal goals are as you search for kettlebell workouts for women.
If you are looking to tone up but not build too much muscle your best bet is to go with lower weight kettlebells. This enables you to do more repetitions of each exercise without inducing muscle growth. In general, it is ideal to keep the weight below 20 pounds to get this type of results and do 3 sets of 20 repetitions of each exercise, focusing on your target areas.
If you do desire to build significant muscle mass you will want to work towards increasing the amount of weight that you can effectively manage. You will want to pick a weight that you can just barely do 7 to 10 repetitions with before it becomes too much. It is important to keep in mind that you are at a higher risk of injury when attempting to bulk up in this fashion so be sure that you have the proper pose and do not exceed a safe weight for your ability.
Workouts that target specific areas are ideal for women, as they tend to have fat deposits that center around the thighs, buttocks and stomach. A very basic and effective workout that targets all of those areas are squats. When you add the kettlebell to the exercise you are increasing the effectiveness of each one that you do by adding weight resistance. Some people prefer to hold the kettlebell out in front of them, which can help to increase core strength, but the choice is really yours
Of course, you can also use these to build your arm muscles. Just about any exercise that you might do with a dumbbell can be done with a kettlebell. The key is to focus on each individual muscle group so that you can get the best possible toning results. When doing these exercises it is important to remember to only use the amount of weight that you can naturally handle to ensure that you do not accidentally injure yourself in the process.
If you are looking to focus on toning your abs you can use kettlebells for this as well. Anything that you would do to work out your stomach muscles can benefit from adding this resistance. For example, if you are doing crunches you can simply hold it out in front of you as you use your muscles to lift yourself up. This will greatly maximize the effects that you get from each crunch that you do.
Kettlebells can even be used to get in a good cardio workout. No matter what particular exercise that you are doing you can simply add a low weight to increase your resistance. The key is to use fast motions so that you get the heart rate going. For a good cardio workout, you will want your heart rate in the 80 to 85 percent range. For most people, this should be around 160 to 165 beats per minute. There are a number of devices that you can wear that can track this for you if you are not inclined to check your heart rate yourself. However, you can simply count the beats for 10 seconds and multiply that by 6 to determine if you are on target.
There really are countless kettlebell workouts for women that can easily be found online. The key is to first determine what your ultimate goals are. Different approaches will definitely yield varying results. If you want to tone your muscles and burn fat you will want to use low weight with more repetitions, but if you are looking to build muscle you will need to use higher amounts of weight in each set. From there it is easy to set out a workout regimen that is right for your personal goals.
