Body Shaping With Free Weights: Easy Routines for Your Home Workout

Offers weight training techniques, health-related exercises, and diet tips to enhance the workout

When the fitness movement began to crank up in the late 1960s and early 1970s, it was all about running, and it was also predominantly a guy thing. Aerobics classes in the early '80s gave women an appealing way to get in on the movement. But it wasn't until the '90s, really, that fitness enthusiasts began to see weight training as the best method for changing body composition instead of just something for muscleheads to do to impress each other. Body Shaping with Free Weights draws the distinction between lifting for maximum bulk, as bodybuilders do, and training to create a more shapely appearance. It gives detailed descriptions and photo illustrations of the best exercises for toning muscles, and it issues cautions for each movement, helping people with specific physical problems (bad knees, especially) to avoid the exercises that will aggravate those conditions.