In any sport there is always a risk of getting injured, however there
are several things you can do to reduce the likelihood of an injury:
1: Always warm up properly before training any strength sport.
Dynamic stretches are a good way to warm up your muscles before lifting.
Powerlifting: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r0WUFHKuguY
Weightlifting https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XF5LLh7kmfk
2: Stretching and Rolling.
3: Be careful of over-training, or training too hard!
While it is tempting to lift heavy all the time, making sure our muscles are getting the recovery time they need is vital to preventing injuries. A good way to make sure you’re
not over-training is by following a program - take a look here for our recommendations.
4) Finally, sleep and nutrition are key in both improving your lifting and avoiding injuries!
As with any exercise, the more lifting you do, the more food and sleep your body needs. There is plenty of information around this online, or you can have a chat with our resident expert, Alex Jackson.
Find more info on preventing injury here
In any sport there is always a risk of getting injured, however there
are several things you can do to reduce the likelihood of an injury:
1: Always warm up properly before training any strength sport.
Dynamic stretches are a good way to warm up your muscles before lifting.
Powerlifting: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r0WUFHKuguY
Weightlifting https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XF5LLh7kmfk
2: Stretching and Rolling.
3: Be careful of over-training, or training too hard!
While it is tempting to lift heavy all the time, making sure our muscles are getting the recovery time they need is vital to preventing injuries. A good way to make sure you’re
not over-training is by following a program - take a look here for our recommendations.
4) Finally, sleep and nutrition are key in both improving your lifting and avoiding injuries!
As with any exercise, the more lifting you do, the more food and sleep your body needs. There is plenty of information around this online, or you can have a chat with our resident expert, Alex Jackson.
Find more info on preventing injury here
women in barbell
At Warwick Barbell we have a likeminded group of female lifters who form their own tight knit community as well as being firmly integrated within the club.
We aim to remove the stigma surrounding women lifting weights by providing an inclusive and welcoming environment within the club where every single member is supported. Lifting weights not only has a tonne of physical and mental benefits but is also loads of fun and we believe this is something as many people as possible, regardless of their gender, should have the opportunity to experience.
Barbell is a club for anyone who has an interest in lifting weights. This means that the club contains people with a broad range of lifting experience from complete beginners to members who compete on a regular basis. Whatever your lifting ability and experience, you are part of the barbell family and encouraged by the whole club in achieving your goals. Last year, for example, many members decided to test their maxes on their lifts during our November interval meet and it was an amazing atmosphere with lots of cheering and support from members.
Alongside all the usual events we also run regular female only training sessions and socials such as coffee mornings and meals out. These help to cultivate the fantastic female community that we have and are a great way to meet other girls who lift!
Hello, I’m Cara and I’m acting as Women’s and Inclusivity Officer this year, and I am a 2nd Year Integrated Natural Sciences student! I have only taken on powerlifting and weightlifting at university, with my last sport being athletics (specifically heptathlon) but the gap between was filled with me learning random exercises at the gym. As you can see I don’t do well just doing one discipline based on my athletics event which is why I obviously had to do two strength sports.
I joined barbell as after going to the gym for two years I wanted to try a sport again, and thought that my gym training would transfer well over into powerlifting and weightlifting. Although I found it initially quite intimidating as the sports tend to be male dominated, there is a strong female community within the club which I found very welcoming, and the men were less scary than expected.
I have made some of my strongest friendships in the women in barbell, through training and socials, with the women’s socials specifically helping as there were less people meaning I found it easier to yap. Women’s socials organised will range from bottomless brunch to charity shop crawls!
I have competed a few times within powerlifting, and hope to try competing in weightlifting this year! I hope that more women and non-binary people also compete this year, as I think it’s super helpful for giving yourself a goal to motivate yourself in training more. Although competition can be terrifying barbell’s supportive community makes it a lot less scary and more fun like it should be.
Other than the women’s side I have found barbell to be the most welcoming sports society for my very neurodivergent self. I find barbell to have felt the most judgement free zone out of the few sports clubs and societies I tried, and somewhere I feel more comfortable unmasking. I hope to continue to make barbell a place that feels comfortable for other people as well, regardless of disability or background, through some more accessible, quieter socials, and hopefully some collabs with disability societies!
Regardless of you being completely new to the gym or already absolutely cracked, Barbell is a community for all that are interested in strength sports. Most of our exec are women and non-binary this year (yippee) and if you wish to reach out to any of them for further details on training, socials, or even just general gym advice you are most welcome (my insta is @caragrace_x_x)!