🙋♂️🤷♀️ It is often said that women can’t gain muscle mass as easily as men.
🤔 But is this actually true?
1️⃣ - 2️⃣ In this post we breakdown two studies. The first looks at the long term effects of resistance training in men and women. Although starting at lower overall muscle mass, women gained as much, if not more, muscle mass on a relative basis as men.
🩸The second study examines short term responses to an acute bout of resistance training in men and women. Although men had a robust increase in serum testosterone, changes in muscle protein synthesis in the hours after resistance training, again, did not differ between men and women.
💡 Take home.
1. No, the overall data is pretty clear, women do not seem to be ‘hard gainers’ when compared to men.
2. Throw your ‘testosterone boosters’ out of the window. An increase in serum testosterone within physiological ranges does not correlate with muscle mass gains.
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Read the full papers here:
Roth et al. J of Am Geriatr Soc, PMID: 11890579
West et al. J Appl Physiol, PMID: 22383503
Viecelli and Ewald, Frontiers, 2022
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