5 Strength Training Exercises For Fat Loss

Strength training exercises are a must if you want to lose weight. While cardio is a great way to cut fat, resistance training is something you must concentrate on, and, of course, diet is key.

Strength training exercises help with improving metabolism, burning calories, improving mobility and flexibility, and improving cardiovascular health and muscle endurance.

Strength Training Exercises to Include in your Routine

Here are five strength training exercises that can help improve strength and aid in weight loss.

1) Deadlift

Deadlifts are equivalent to royalty in fitness. This exercise has variations, such as conventional deadlift, sumo deadlift, and others.

Usually, conventional deadlifts are more difficult than sumo deadlifts, but every deadlift works on your lower back and lower body.

However, deadlifts need to be done in proper form. When you’re starting out, you should use light weights or just a barbell. Once your form is right, you can move to heavier weights.

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2) Squat

Squat is another great strength training exercise. It’s known as the king of lower body exercises, as it works on your quads, lower back, hamstrings, calves and glutes. Additionally, it helps with improving balance and stability, as the entire barbell rests on your shoulders.

Squats work on several large muscle groups, which helps with muscle endurance and weight loss. As you move to heavier weights, you can add a weightlifting belt to your routine to help keep your back straight.

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3) Bench Press

The pectorals are a primary muscle group in your upper body. You shouldn’t ignore primary muscle groups when it comes to strength training and aiding weight loss.

Additionally, bench press not only focuses on your chest but your triceps and shoulders as well. In fact, it’s always better to have compound movements in your workout routine along with isolation movements, as compound movements focus on more than one muscle group.

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4) Bent-over Barbell Row

Another muscle group that comprises a key part of your upper body are tye lats and back muscles.

The bent-over barbell row is a great compound movement that targets the back muscles, along with working on the biceps and rear delts. You can do the exercise with dumbbells as well, and do them unilaterally.

Every time you focus on unilateral movements, you enable your body to address any muscle or strength imbalance.

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5) Clean and Press

Clean and Press is a strength training exercise that works on your entire body. Ideally, you should do deadlifts, upright rows and barbell overhead press before this exercise.

Clean and press uses all three motions and can be done with barbells, dumbbells, or kettlebells.

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Strength training exercises work on almost your entire body. They're great compound movements and are top picks among CrossFit exercises.

However, clean and jerk shouldn’t be done with heavy weights from the start. Ideally, you should begin this exercise using just the barbell to understand the foundation and build a strong muscle-mind connection before moving to heavier weights.