6 Power-Building Exercises for Women

Power-building exercises should be a major part of your fitness regimen. It helps grow muscles by stretching and tearing (and subsequent repair) of muscle tissue. Thus, it makes you gain strength. As muscle is heavier than fat, it needs more energy per unit area. Therefore, your metabolism is increased even during rest, and the body’s ratio of lean mass to total mass is improved. So, your body will hold on to more muscle.

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Effective Power-Building Exercises for Women

Although you know that there are so many benefits to strength training, you may not know where to begin or what exercises you should be doing. Here is a list of 6 power-building exercises for women that allow you to move enough weight to transform your body.

1. Barbell Clean and Press

The barbell clean press engages all of your major muscle groups—upper, lower and core—and improves balance, coordination, and flexibility.

How to do it:

• When you are ready to lift the barbell, stand with your feet shoulder-width apart and hold it with an overhand grip.
• Dip your knees, drive through your heels, and push your hips forward to lift the bar to your chest.
• Keep your core tight as you perform this movement.
• Once you've lifted the bar off the floor, drive your elbows up underneath it until they touch the bar above you.
• From here, press the bar overhead until arms are fully locked out.

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2. Zercher Squat

The front-loaded squat is a power-building exercise that will ensure you're event-ready, as they strengthen your upper back and core.

Here's how you do it:

• Make sure to keep your feet about shoulder-width apart and pointed out slightly, as if you are standing at attention.
• Hold the barbell in front of you with arms straight, resting it on top of your collarbone in a front rack position.
• Bend your knees until they are parallel to the floor.
• Pause for a moment, then drive back up to the starting position.
• Perform Zercher squats in much the same way, holding the bar at rest in the crux of your elbows instead.

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3. Kettlebell Swing

The kettlebell swing is an exercise that will help you develop power in a safe and effective way. The movement requires you to generate force while maintaining stability, so it can be an excellent addition to a routine focused on developing strength and explosiveness.

To do this exercise:

• Stand with your feet shoulder-width apart, holding a kettlebell in front of you with both hands.
• While holding the kettlebell with both hands, hike it up between your legs and pop it up over your head.
• Reverse the motion to drive the bell back to the starting position while keeping your grip on it.
• Squeezing your glutes and keeping your shoulder blades pinned back and down, let it float up until it’s level with your chest.
• Maintaining your grip on the bell, let it start to fall back down, then use the momentum to repeat the “hike” phase.

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4. Wall Balls

Wall balls are an awesome power-building exerciser because of their explosive nature. They are effective in working the entire body. It's a great exercise for increasing explosiveness.

Here's how you do it:

• Stand with your back to a wall and place a medicine ball in front of your chest and hold it with both hands, keeping your arms straight.
• Pull your shoulders back, engage your abs, and push your butt and hips back as if you were sitting in a chair.
• Push up into a standing position while simultaneously throwing the ball toward the wall.
• Catch the ball in front of your chest, lower down into a squat position, and repeat.

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5. Heavy Sledge Push

This power-building exercise enhances your conditioning while building explosive strength that will be useful in certain Strongman events, such as keg loads and medleys.

Here's how you do it:

• To do the sled push, load a sled with weight plates and stand behind it with a pole in each hand.
• Push the sled forward as fast as you can, powering through your entire leg with each step.
• To do the sled drag, grab the rope or straps attached to the sled and keep your weight back.
• Pull on the straps to move backward quickly.

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6. Deadlifts

Deadlifts are power-building exercises. Six to eight reps of deadlifts a day will develop propulsive force in the glutes and hip extensors, which will help you increase your pace.

To perform a deadlift:

• Set two dumbbells or a kettlebell on the floor in front of you.
• Stand with your feet on either side of the weight and hinge at the hips, maintaining a flat back and slight bend in your knees, and grab the weight.
• Keeping your core engaged, drive your feet into the floor and squeeze your glutes to stand back up.
• Lower the weight to the floor by reversing the motion used to lift it.

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Takeaway

By adding power-building exercises to endurance or cardio workouts, you get all of the strength training benefits and then some more. Not only will you see a boost in your running speed but also an increase in agility and fluidity of your routine movements.