Harbinger Women’s Weight Belt: Review and Giveaway!! (contest closed)

I like to think that I can get big and strong by just using my sheer body and skills alone, but once in a while it is helpful to use various aids for assistance to see if there is hidden potential. When I was given an opportunity to try out the Harbinger Women’s Core Belt, I was unsure what to think, and honestly unsure how to use it, but since I read about others successfully using the belts I wanted to give it a try!

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Why should I wear a belt?

While there is much debate on the effectiveness or efficiency of using weight belts, it is always important to first be able to practice good form on your lifting without a belt. From there, you can then play around with using a belt to see if has a positive impact on your performance.

One of the main functions of a weight belt is to help stabilize your lower back and encourage the shoulders, back, and thighs to all work together. By placing pressure on the back and the waist, it limits the stress on your lower back, preventing hyperextension, and allowing you to lift safer. Ideally, the belt should not be used for all lifting and accessory work, but rather used only when doing your heaviest lifts.

What makes this belt special?

• Specifically targeted for women, with special shape to contour women’s curves and size
• Breatheable lining
• Adjustable buckle to provide the best fit possible
• Pink (I’m telling you, I’m a sucker for pink colored gear..)
• Affordable (around ~$20)

My Thoughts

I have had this belt for a little while but have not had a lot of opportunities to use it, especially since it is ideally not to be used for all lifting, but primarily just the heaviest lifting. However, once I returned from my mini vacation and after I had my two weeks of Crossfit, I was ready to get back into solitary heavy lifting. I have a small waist and large hips so was concerned about belt placement, but I followed the recommendations from Harbinger’s site and believe I sported it properly.

On my first day back to lifting in our home gym (don’t judge the classy wallpaper..), I was eager to lift heavy. I wanted to get right back into heavy squats and deadlifts, even though I had not really focused on either in about a month. And honestly, I struggled.. not doing a lift in a month kind of gets in the way of trying to make maximum progress in a short amount of time! Nonetheless, I was determined to crank out some solid reps at a heavy weight. While my one rep max for squats was 135lbs months ago (after consistently squatting 3x a week), I had not squatted in a while, so was not expecting to hit 135lbs again without proper training. I started off with 95lbs, which was surprisingly DIFFICULT! Bad juju.. I was very bummed that a weight I would typically warm up with was now a struggle. However, after a couple more one-reps at increasing weights, I threw on the belt and decided to go for it.

And made it to 135lbs!

While I should be a bit less than excited that I managed to only match my one rep max, I was quite pleased to be able to knock out that rep without training. Was it the magic of the belt? Possibly so!

I am going to continue to use this belt on my heavy lifts in the future and with extended use, plan on being able to understand the difference in attempting maximum lifts with our without the belt, but I recommend that you give this belt a try on your own if you are looking to do heavy lifting. If you are not ready to splurge on a belt for yourself, Harbinger has been awesome enough to offer up a belt to TWO of my lucky lady readers!!
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Tagged as: deadlift, harbinger, Squat, weight belt