Nottingham Trent University (NTU) Senior Lecturer in Performance, Dr Athalie Redwood-Brown, shares her professional analysis with The Conversation about how weightlifting can be beneficial before and after the menopause.
Improving overall health and wellbeing
"Many women begin experiencing symptoms of the menopause around age 50. As hormones begin to fluctuate and change, women might start experiencing a range of symptoms, such as hot flushes, joint pain, low mood and vaginal dryness. The menopause can also be accompanied by a range of physical changes too – including loss of muscle mass, loss of bone density and a slowed metabolism," shares Athalie.
"Fortunately, regular exercise – specifically weightlifting – can help mitigate these changes somewhat and improve overall health and wellbeing. Here are just some of the ways weightlifting can be beneficial to women going through the menopause."
Athalie highlights these benefits as:
- increasing bone density
- maintaining muscle mass
- boosting metabolism
- improving mood
Maintaining good physical and mental health
Athalie explains: "Weightlifting can have many benefits – and doing it consistently may help you maintain good physical and mental health not only before and after the menopause, but as you get older too. Just be sure to consult your healthcare provider before starting any new exercise programme, especially if you have pre-existing health conditions or concerns."
A career in high performance sport
Athalie is Module Leader for Observational Analysis for Sport, MRes Performance Analysis, and IPAS Advanced Topics in Performance Analysis. Athalie leads on Professional Fitness and Health Qualifications. Athalie works part-time at Nottingham Trent University and part-time in the football industry.
Prior to joining NTU in 2009, she was a Senior Lecturer in Sports Science and Coaching at Oxford Brookes University having started her academic career as a Lecturer in Sport and Exercise Psychology at Reading University.
Her career in high performance sport sparked my interested in elite sports performance and led to a Doctoral degree at Nottingham Trent University in collaboration with the Premier League exploring the impact of significant events on the performance of professional soccer players.
After many years in elite sport, her research interests moved to exercise and health, namely the use of exercise as a means of treatment for those with chronic disease. This research spans across multiple exercise specialisms and enables her to investigate the relationship between exercise and quality of life for those with barriers to exercise due to long term health conditions. She is particularly interested in exercise as a form of treatment for those effective by cancer.
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