How you exercise can play a big role in your thyroid health. If you want to learn more about why this is, I have an entire blog post dedicated to the topic, here.

The best thing we can do for our thyroid when it comes to exercising is to not put our bodies into a super long state of high stress, which is what happens on a long run or tough spin class.

Instead, one of the best types of exercise you can do is weight training! As a certified physical trainer and someone with hypothyroidism, weight training is something I love to do myself, and something I have my clients do, too.

If you’ve never done it before though, it can feel a bit overwhelming! So, I wanted to provide you with some tools and ideas so you can start weight training in a way that supports the health of your thyroid… not to mention all the other physical and mental benefits from regular workouts! 

Now, if you’re an advanced athlete with a lot of training experience, this workout strategy may not be right for you. But if you’re just getting into weight training, this blog post is meant to provide some guidance and instructions so you can plan great thyroid-friendly workouts.

What equipment should you use?

The type of equipment you’ll want to use will depend on a few things: where you’re working out, the accessibility and availability of equipment, and the focus of your workout.

You can create great workout plans that just use dumbbells or resistance bands for an at-home workout. Or you can use weight machines at the gym, if that works for you. What is important is to have some sort of resistance. Bodyweight exercises can be great, but adding even just a little bit of weight and resistance to your workouts can bring so many more benefits, including higher metabolism and stronger bones. 

Workout duration and focus

For beginners, an optimal workout plan will have you exercising 3-4 times a week for 30-45 minutes per session. As I’ve talked about in other blog posts, we want to keep the focus on short bursts of energy, versus super prolonged high-cardio states. This will help manage our stress hormones and keep the thyroid happy.

An easy way to plan out your workouts is by having an upper vs. lower body focus. So, your weekly split can look like this:

• 3 workouts a week: 1x upper body, 1x lower body, 1x both

• 4 workouts a week: 2x upper body, 2x lower body

I always recommend including a few core exercises in each workout, as the core is so foundational to every movement.

Types of movements

A key foundation to an effective exercise plan is to ensure you’re working a variety of muscles and muscle groups. This is why an upper-lower body routine is an easy way for beginners to ensure workouts are well-rounded.

From there, you can organize the movements within each workout between push movements and pull movements.

Push movements are when you push the weight or floor away from your body with force. This includes movements such as squats, pushups, tricep extensions and overhead presses.

Pull movements are when you pull the weight towards your body, or your body towards the equipment. Pull-ups, hamstring curls, deadlifts, and bicep curls are all good examples.

Now, the push-pull framework is just one way to plan your workouts! It might not be what works best for everyone, but I find that it is a good framework to introduce to beginners who want to start planning their own routines.

Push & pull exercises

Here’s a pretty comprehensive list of push and pull exercises, broken out by upper and lower body. If you don’t know what some of these are, I recommend quickly throwing them into the YouTube search bar, and you’ll get lots of different videos showing you how to do the movement! In fact, one of the places I love to point beginners to is the Bowflex “How-to” YouTube Playlist (this isn’t sponsored by the way - I just really love these videos!).

Upper Body Push

• Push up

• Chest press

• Shoulder press

• Chest fly

• Reverse fly

• Tricep extension

Upper Body Pull

• Pull up

• Bicep curl

• Hammer curl

• Bent over row

• Lat pulldown (machine) or lat pullover (weight)

• Upright row

• Cable pulls

• Shoulder raise

Lower Body Push

• Squat (including back squat, front squat, goblet squat, sumo squat, single-leg squat, split squat, etc.)

• Leg press (machine)

• Forward lunge

• Calf raise

• Glute bridges

• Hip thrust

Lower Body Pull

• Deadlift (including conventional, Romanian, single-leg, sumo, etc.)

• Good morning

• Reverse lunge

• Walking lunge

• Leg curl

Core exercises (can use on either a push or pull day!)

• Bridge

• Toe taps

• Crunch

• Side crunch

• Bicycle

• Bird-dog

• 4-point hold

• Bear crawl

• Plank

• Side plank

• Shoulder tap

• Russian twist

• Leg raise

• Dead bug

• Side bend

Workout template

From there, you can take these exercises and plug them into the below template. I recommend planning out your workouts week-by-week, and that way you can ensure you’re getting a good variety of movements using multiple muscle groups.

Set 1: 3-4 rounds of 8-12 repetitions per exercise OR 3-4 rounds of each exercise, 45 seconds on, 15 seconds rest.

• Exercise 1a

• Exercise 1b

• Exercise 1c

Set 2: 3-4 rounds of 8-12 repetitions per exercise OR 3-4 rounds of each exercise, 45 seconds on, 15 seconds rest.

• Exercise 2a

• Exercise 2b

• Exercise 2c

Set 3: 3-4 rounds of 8-12 repetitions per exercise OR 3-4 rounds of each exercise, 45 seconds on, 15 seconds rest.

• Exercise 3a

• Exercise 3b

• Exercise 3c

Core set: 3-4 rounds of 15-20 repetitions per exercise OR 4-5 rounds of each exercise, 45 seconds on, 15 seconds rest.

• Core exercise A

• Core exercise B

• Core exercise C

I hope this helps you get excited about weight training, as it really is one of the best types of exercise for a happy, healthy thyroid. If you ever have questions about exercising or want some help with exercise planning, please reach out to me.