Research

Mixed

Women exhibit a significantly greater relative increase in maximal strength (1RM Bench Press) compared to men after 16 weeks of resistance training, although absolute strength gains may be larger in men.

If you are a woman, expect your relative strength gains (percentage increase) to be higher than men's on upper body pushing movements like the bench press. This may be due to neural adaptations or less prior familiarity with the exercise. Men may still lift more absolute weight, but women often see bigger percentage jumps.

GoodQualifiesHIGH confidence
There was a significant (p<0.05) time-by-group interaction in 1RM BP (men=+16%, women=+26%)
Alex S. Ribeiro et al. · Journal of Human Kinetics · 2014

Why this rating

Robust study design with significant interaction effects.

Source

Effect of 16 Weeks of Resistance Training on Fatigue Resistance in Men and Women

Alex S. Ribeiro et al. · Journal of Human Kinetics · 2014

DOI 10.2478/hukin-2014-0071

rct · n=123Cited 28×
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DOI resolved against Crossref · corpus check 2026-06-10

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