How can i explain to my girlfriend in layman’s terms that you cannot ‘tone’ a muscle through weightlifting?
‘Tone’ results from either a) an increase in muscle mass, or b) a decrease in bodyfat. However, if you lose fat, then obviously there must be some manifest muscle to be toned. Is the 6’ 135# guy toned?
Tell her you CAN tone it through weight lifting, but only by lifting heavy weights in the 8-12 range. Use her own terminology to help her.
It all depends on what you consider ‘tone’ to be defined as. We all exhibit some degree of resting muscle tone due to the constant activation of A-alpha motor neurons. So in actuality your girlfriend already has at least some degree of muscle tone. To add, weightlifting can increase the amount of muscle tone by increasing the efficiency of the neuromuscular junction and the respected amount of muscle fibers activated at rest. If you are mistakingly refering to ‘tone’ as the muscle becoming more visibly striking to the eye, then I don’t really understand what you are getting at because weightlifting will still benefit, to at least a minimal degree.
(M)
Sometimes I just let it slide and try to speak in their language instead of lecturing. Later, I’ll explain that “toning” as used by lay people at least, is a combination of fat loss and muscle gain. Of course, then you have to go through the whole “don’t worry, you won’t wake up ‘too big’ one day from weight training.” I wish it were as easy to get “too big” as many newbie women seem to think.