Fitness Programs Offer Toning, Not Bulking

It is the most common question women ask, exercise experts say, when they embark on a fitness program: Won’t all this exercise make my thighs bulky and ugly? Here are answers from two experts.

Dr. Jean Rosenbaum, director of the American Fitness Assn., Durango, Colo .

“The only exercise that causes bulking up of the thighs is resistance training, like lifting stacks on a weight machine.

“Any other kind of exercise that strengthens or increases endurance won’t make your thighs bulky.

“To tone up without bulking up, do aerobic dance, ride an exercise bike or walk the treadmill.”

Patricia Brill, exercise researcher, Institute for Aerobics Research, Dallas

“With exercise, women will increase lean muscle mass and decrease fat and most likely thighs will slim down.

“Strength training will tone up muscles and you will get more definition, but women don’t have enough testosterone to bulk up unless they do just strength training without any aerobic or endurance training. Then you would have to do a lot of strength training. To look like some of those (male) body builders you would have to spend six or eight hours a day in the gym (weight training).”