Why “Lift Heavy” Isn’t Just a Trend—And How to Make It Work for You as a Midlife Runner

If you’ve ever tried lifting heavy and thought, this just doesn’t feel right for my body, you’re not alone—and there’s a good reason why. The “lift heavy” mantra, especially popular among midlife women navigating perimenopause or menopause, is grounded in real science: it helps combat muscle loss, supports bone density, and boosts running performance. But what’s often missing from the conversation is how to get there—because effective, sustainable strength training isn’t just about picking up heavier weights. It’s about building the right foundation first, one that aligns with female anatomy and the unique demands of running. In this article, we’ll explore why lifting heavy has become so popular, why it might not have worked for you yet, and how to make it feel powerful, safe, and truly effective for your body.

Lifting Heavy: The Reason Behind the Hype

The hype around lifting heavy for women in midlife is rooted in real physiological changes. As women enter midlife, hormonal shifts increase susceptibility to muscle loss, also known as sarcopenia.

Strength training—specifically training that stimulates muscle growth—is a critical tool to counteract this. Growing or even just maintaining muscle during this phase of life supports:

• Bone health
• Metabolic health
• Glucose regulation & insulin sensitivity
• Cognitive function

These are key considerations as we navigate aging, especially for runners (just running is not enough). It’s never too early or too late to start! If you are already in menopause, start now! If you aren’t even close to perimenopause yet, start now too!

But Here’s the Truth: It’s Not Just About Lifting Heavy

What truly promotes muscle growth is training to failure, which maximizes muscle fiber recruitment. That might look like:

• Lifting a heavy weight for 5 reps, where that last rep is close to all you can manage
• Or using a lighter weight for 20 reps, where that 20th rep brings you to the same point of muscular fatigue

Both strategies can be effective, so why does the heavy lifting message dominate?

Reason 1: It’s a Trend—And One That Empowers

Yes, part of the reason is trendiness. But it’s a positive trend, and one that I fully support—as long as women are given the tools to do it successfully (more on this below).

This message encourages women to stop chasing “small” and start chasing strong. It encourages us to take up space in the weight room and own our strength.

Just the other day, I walked into the gym and noticed something truly awesome: for the first time ever, the weight room had more women than men. That’s powerful. That’s progress.

Reason 2: It’s About Volume Management for Runners

Here’s where this message really aligns with what runners need: managing training volume.

As runners, we already log a lot of volume on the road—measured in miles, minutes, or hours. In strength training, volume is the total number of reps and sets. When combining the two, we need to be strategic with our volume to remain in that sweet spot of training, pushing your edge just enough to make progress while avoiding overtraining.

That’s where lifting heavy comes in: by using heavier loads, we can stimulate muscle growth with fewer reps, just 5–8 reps to failure with heavier weight, instead of 15–20 reps with lighter weight.

This saves time and energy, letting us keep our strength gains without overwhelming our training schedule. Less total volume, but the same (or even better) results. That’s a win.

Reason 3: Building Force Production and Resilience

Heavy lifting isn’t just about growing muscle—it’s about improving force production. The more force we can produce and coordinate through our body, the better we can handle the impact and demands of running.

Think about midstance in your running stride: it’s the moment where you apply the most force into the ground—and the ground applies it back to you. If your body is trained to produce and manage that force efficiently, you're more resilient, more efficient, and better protected against injury.

That’s why heavy lifting is a valuable tool for runners. But—and this is key—it’s not where everyone should start. In the Women’s Running Academy we start with “challenging but safe” loads, you get to choose what that means for you. Then we build a solid foundation first, in a way that will help “lifting heavy” actually feel good in your body.

Why It Might Not Feel Good at First

If you’ve tried “lifting heavy” and it just didn’t feel good (the most common thing I hear is that “it hurts my low back”) you’re not alone. Many women experience this. It’s not because lifting heavy is wrong for you. It’s likely because you need to build the right foundation first.

That doesn’t mean you should give up. It just means you need to back up and build a solid base before working your way toward heavier loads.

For many women this means first recognizing that effective heavy lifting requires internal rotation, a strong core with bottom-up pressure management, and the ability to generate force into the ground—skills and patterns that can be more difficult for women to access due to differences in anatomy.

Let’s get nerdy for a minute, shall we…

The Role of Female Anatomy in Strength and Force Production

Most women have a narrower infrasternal angle (the angle below the ribcage) and a narrower infrapubic angle (the angle below the pelvis), which means our pelvic structure tends to be wider at the top and narrower at the bottom.

This configuration at the pelvis makes internal rotation more difficult and places the pelvic floor in a more descended state by default. It makes it harder to lengthen the posterior pelvic floor and glutes, which are essential for effective internal rotation and force production—both critical in running and heavy lifting.

With the narrow ribcage, we are more likely to direct pressure down into the pelvic floor or outward through the lower abdomen—the kind of pressure that can lead to pelvic floor dysfunction.

Understanding Your Core Strategy: Bottom-Up vs. Top-Down

An important piece of this puzzle is how you engage your core. Many women with a narrow infrasternal angle rely heavily on their rectus abdominis (the 6 pack muscles) and external obliques—a top-down strategy that drives pressure downward.

Instead, what we want is a bottom-up strategy, where we teach the body to activate the internal obliques and transverse abdominis, helping access better deep core engagement, support the pelvic floor and contributing to that crucial internal rotation. This shift doesn't just improve strength training outcomes—it changes how force moves through your entire body, including during your running stride. 

The Skill of Internal Rotation

Internal rotation involves lengthening through the glutes, creating a natural lift of the pelvic floor, and the capacity to generate (and receive) force effectively. Internal rotation is necessary for accessing a solid mid stance in your stride (where you put the most force into the ground) AND lifting heavy weight off the ground.

That’s why the cornerstones of programming in the Women’s Running Academy involves developing these specific skills:

• Internal rotation through the hips and pelvis
• Glute and pelvic floor length for effective force transfer
• Bottom-up pressure management via internal obliques and transverse abdominis
  

Smarter Training for Women Runners

With these foundations, your body becomes more capable—not only of lifting heavy weights safely and effectively, but of creating and receiving force during mid-stance in running. That means you become more efficient, more injury-resistant, and better supported in everything from metabolic health to bone density and muscle mass as you age.

And yes, some women naturally have a wider infrasternal and infrapubic angle. Some men present with narrow angles. These anatomical concepts are not about strict categorization, but about offering a framework to better understand what you might need. It gives us a starting point to build the programming from.

Then within the Women’s Running Academy you will learn to understand YOUR own bodies needs and specifically how to support YOUR unique body along the way.

What This Looks Like in the Women's Running Academy

Inside the Women’s Running Academy monthly membership, we do all of this gradually. It’s designed to be your one-stop shop for smart training—pairing running progressions with intentional strength work based on female biomechanics, physiology, and social context. It’s not just about sets and reps—it’s about teaching your body how to move, lift, and run in ways that feel good.

Enrollment opens first for priority access to the waitlist on May 21st (tomorrow), then to the general public from May 26th through May 30th.

Click here to learn more and join the waitlist if you haven’t yet.

If you are already on the waitlist, look out for the official “doors are open” email tomorrow morning at 10am!

PS. If lifting doesn’t feel good purely because it makes you feel too sore and gets in the way of your running here’s what to do:

First, stick with it. Anytime you introduce a new stimulus to the system like that you're going to be a bit sore, but it should dissipate as your body gets used to it. Consistency wins here just like it does with running.

Second, mind your volume. More reps (where you start to feel the burn) typically will make you feel more sore than fewer reps. In a head to head comparison, high reps to failure will likely lead to more soreness than low reps to failure.

The Women’s Running Academy can help you create that consistency with a plan to follow and in a way that doesn’t interfere with your running (in a way that actually supports it)!

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