A trainer recommends making this simple tweak to your upper-body workout to make it more effective
Try exercising on your knees to work your muscles harder
Contrary to popular belief, you don't need heavy dumbbells to strengthen your upper body. Light weights are sufficient to challenge smaller muscles, like those around your shoulders.
This upper-body session from Sweat trainer Britany Williams is a great example of a lightweight routine. It's a barre-inspired shoulder workout, designed to improve muscular endurance (your muscles' ability to repeat a particular exercise or movement).
You can do this eight-move circuit standing, but Williams recommends making a simple tweak to your upper-body workouts to make them more effective: do them on your knees.
Responding to a comment on her Instagram post, the trainer explained: "As we get tired and we are standing, it’s easier to push the weights up with our legs a little bit—more reliance on momentum. So I do [the exercises] on my knees to focus on my arms solely, and it’s harder for the core that way too!"
How to do Britany Williams’ shoulder workout
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As this is a barre-inspired routine focused on muscular endurance, Williams says you should use light weights. The trainer is using 5lb dumbbells in her video.
She recommends doing ten repetitions of each exercise with minimal rest. Take one minute of recovery time in between sets and aim for two rounds in total.
Benefits of lightweight dumbbell workouts
Using light weights makes it easier to concentrate on your form, which is important as proper form helps you target the right muscles and reduces the risk of injury. When a weight is easier to lift, you can move comfortably through a greater range of motion too, which can improve flexibility and strength.
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And when this routine starts to feel too easy, you can always increase your load to make it more challenging.
Shop light dumbbells
There's no need to complicate matters, we recommend Amazon Basics neoprene dumbbells—they're always available and affordable.
Maddy Biddulph is a freelance journalist specializing in fitness, health and wellbeing content. With 26 years in consumer media, she has worked as a writer and editor for some of the bestselling newspapers, magazines and websites in the US and UK.
She is also a qualified L3 personal trainer and weight loss advisor, and helps women over 40 navigate menopause by improving their physical and mental strength. At Maddy Biddulph Personal Training, she runs one-to-one and small group training for menopausal women who want to get fit to ease symptoms and feel like themselves again.
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