The 3 pillars of fitness are the factors that will account for 95% of your fitness success/failures.  They are:

  1. Weight Lifting
  2. Diet
  3. Cardio

All three of these pillars play a crucial role in your overall fitness.

“But Mike, If you were held at gunpoint and forced to choose which pillar is the most important, which would you choose?” 

First I would need to know your fitness goal.  Assuming you took my advice and made your goal to MAXIMIZE YOUR QUALITY OF LIFE through fitness, I would choose weight lifting.

So today I want to talk about the benefits of weight lifting and what happens if you skip this part of the trio.

 

Why should you lift weights?

Lose Fat

The “old school” way of thinking when it comes to losing fat is do cardio, then have a second helping of cardio, and finally some big fat cardio for dessert.  Yes there is some fat burning benefits received from doing cardio, but weight lifting is actually the best long term solution to fat loss.

“But Mike, How is that possible !?!?!?”  

Here’s the deal.  You gotta feed muscle.  So the more muscle you have the more calories you burn 24 hours a day 365 days per year.  And let’s be real, you’re not gonna consistently do enough cardio daily for the rest of your life to keep up with the fat burning capabilities of having extra muscle to feed.

Gain Strength

I know your thinking “DUH” but I think this benefit is horribly underrated when it comes to maximizing your quality of life.  Most people don’t realize how important their strength is for everyday tasks.  Things like carrying your kids, grandkids, groceries, climbing stairs, moving furniture, sex, etc.  When these daily activities are a struggle it definitely impedes on your quality of life.

A lot of people think things like “I don’t need to be stronger”.  If you don’t feel like you need to be stronger I can respect that. (I think it’s a bad decision, but I’ll respect it.)

The problem is by not choosing to get stronger you’re choosing to get weaker.  As we get older our bodies get weaker unless we do something about it.  Weight lifting is that something.

Injury Prevention

Nothing puts the smack down on your quality of life like an injury.  One of the unsung benefits of weight lifting is injury prevention.

Weight lifting will improve your bone density.  As we age our bone density gets worse.  That’s why you often hear stories of the elderly breaking a hip.  Weight lifting = fewer broken bones.

Weight lifting also strengthens connective tissue.  Ligaments and tendons are also stronger in people that weight train regularly.  Weight lifting = fewer sprains and strains

 

For tips on how to implement a weight lifting program check out my previous blog posts:

  • Hey bro, I’m only gonna work on chest and biceps and look dead sexy on the beach
  • How heavy do I need to go in the weight room?
  • What’s better for me: Free Weights or Machine Weights

 

“I hate lifting weights.  I won’t do it.  But I wanna be fit.  Is that possible?”

It depends on your definition of fit.  Here’s a variety of “definitions” for being fit that you may be able to accomplish without weight training.

 

Low Bodyweight. – If this is how you judge “being fit” you can absolutely accomplish this goal without weight lifting.  With proper diet and plenty of cardio anyone can lower their bodyweight.

Endurance Athletes – If your goal is to run a marathon or some other type of endurance challenge, you can accomplish these without lifting weights.  I would argue that lifting weights will improve your speed and lower your chances of getting injured, but you could do it.

Looking better – If you’re like most people, you start working out in hopes of looking better.  Most people will improve their appearance when they add cardio and proper diet to their lifestyle.  But your best case scenario is to get skinnyfat.  You can get skinny without lifting weights, but the sexy curves can only come from proper muscular development. (weight training)

 

My primary goal for today is to convince you to include weight training in your workout routine.  But if I failed to convince you to lift weights, there are still some fitness benefits available to you.  So don’t totally give up on fitness.