7yo wants to work out! Please help

It is never too early for body weight excercises. The trick is to make it fun so he doesn't get bored. Keep reps low and vary the different excercises.

Also take him rock climbing and run up and down the levee if one is near you. More importantly whatever you do do it with him.

I don’t think 14 is too early to start lifting some weights. Nothing wrong with learning good technique and using manageable weight.

Basic body weight exercises are just fine. Probably better to start off that way and learn movement before starting to load. Get a sled or a prowler. Fun way to get stronger without any direct loading on the body.

I have 4 kids from 6-14, and they all work out.

At that age:
-Weighted carries teach bracing. Make him a little sandbag.

-Get a small medicine ball and play “catch” with traditional med ball throws.

-Inchworms and bear crawls will set him up better than any other upper body movement

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I have 4 kids from 6-14, and they all work out.

At that age:
-Weighted carries teach bracing. Make him a little sandbag.

-Get a small medicine ball and play “catch” with traditional med ball throws.

-Inchworms and bear crawls will set him up better than any other upper body movement

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yep

ok so i have 3 boys ranging from 6-10.

all workout in some form.

my 9 and 10 year old lift weights, do bodyweight and carries/throws/jumps.

It is 100% safe to do bodyweight and even lift weights if taught properly. The biggest thing on kids working out is them having the attention span to not hurt themselves and having someone to surpervise as kids do not have the ability to hit the brakes.

a properly designed kids program looks something like this, note this is just how i do mine, its not the only way. OP there are places to do these things if you do not feel comfortable teaching him

I call the way i do it, the 5 P's-

A) Primal- we start with a warm up of performing primal movements, going 40 yards for each: Bear crawl, duck walk, crab walk, reverse bear crawl.

B) Prime- we perform shoulder mobility with doing shoulder dislocates, band pull aparts, YWTs, jefferson curls, overhead squats held at the bottom with a brooms stick. Also my boys play baseball so we do some shoulder stibility and rotator cuff work. This includes lots of hangs from the bar for shoulder health. also includes handstands against the wall.

C) Perform- we look at this as jumps and throws. With my kids being rotational sports kids(baseball & Soccer) along with traditional plane sports (football & Basketball) we do lots of rotational throws, but also others to work triple extension. I do not monitor mph on this yet but will once they reach middle school. right now the goal is to make each throw as hard as possible. the balls weigh anywhere from 1-5 lbs for the older kids. For my 6 year old it goes from the small basketball to a large basketball. we perform a max of 10 throws, taking 20-30s rest between each. most of the time its 5 of one type and then 5 of another.

on jumps we do a minimum of 5 depth drops each workout. then a minimum of 5 jumps per workout. might be box jump, may be broad jump, may be a triple type jump. doesnt matter, the key is just doign everythign with intent.


D) Pump- after that we move to some pump work to make sure we have plenty of blood in the muscles before performing any heavier type lift. muscle and joints that have blood in them. This will look like the following done in a circuit fashion:

3-5 rounds of 5-10 reps each

1) pushups- concentrate on elbow tracking back not out.
2) assisted chins/ring rows
3) KOT split squat
4) tib raises
5) GHD Progression


E) Power- this is were we "train" to get stronger

1) squat pattern/hip hinge pattern- goblet box squats and KB sumo deadlift, belt squats, overhead 1 arm squat, kb swing(hard style focusing on the hip hinge power) etc

2) horizontal push/vertical push pattern- for these i use a 5lbs training bar and we perform bench and press. you could easily use very light dumbbells. Key is lots of volume with light weight learning to control the eccentric as most can kids can not do that. these are lighter than pushups for most kids and allow a slow progression into pushups.

3) horizontal pull/vertical pull- we do ring rows, lat pulldowns(neutral grip), fat man rows, assisted chins with iso holds etc.

4) lunge pattern- split squats, lunges, reverse lunges etc. this is unilateral work. if you want as they get older you can start introducing hand supported single leg straight leg or romanian deadlifts.

5) carry- this may be farmers walk, sandbag carry on the chest, sandbag shoulder and carry, overhead waiters walk with one arm or both or with a bar or suitcase carries. also we will use a thick wooden dowels and hang weights from the bands on them to work the stability of overhead walks. Also do zerchers carries with sandbags.

6) core/rotation/anti-rotation- leg lifts, GHD Situp iso holds, full situps for core. for rotation we use bands to get stronger rotating (work both sides), anti rotation is pallof press with the band. Also in place of all of this, many times we will work turkish get ups.

we lay it out like this

Day A- vertical day

1) Goblet Box Squats supersetted with Glute ham raise
2) Vertical push supersetted with Verical Pull
3) lunge pattern supersetted with a carry
4) anti-rotation supersetted with core

Day B-
1) hip hinge pattern supersetted with Glute ham raise
2) horizontal push supersetted with horizontal pull
3) lunge pattern supersetted with a carry(different exercises)
4) rotation supersetted with Core

whole thing takes about 45 min and we do twice a week when they have any other sport going on. offseason we up to 3 days with the off days being speed work.

OP honestly with a 7 year old remember a couple things

1) it has to be fun
2) bodyweight is more than enough resistance and in many cases too much
3) teach them to do everything with intent
4) teach them to control the eccentric and explode at the bottom.
5) anything will make a difference.

if you do not feel comfortable i suggest looking for different places to help. many places have crossfit kids or even better a place that teaches the brand X method. if cant find that, find one of the many ninja warrior places that teaches kids or a gymnastics place that teaches the gymnastics strength training (GST) program.

if you want to do at home, the late john meadows created a youth program for his kids that he sells that is very good and very thorough.

LINK


here are some links on training kids, you can alos read about the brand X method.

The first link is to the barbell medicine series where they look at the history and the actual science behind everything. its a long read but the best there is on training. it is written by 2 different doctors
LINK

article by travis mash who is one of the best coaches in the country-
LINK

here is the recommendation of the american academy of pediatrics
LINK

mayo clinic
LINK



in the end, ignore and run from anyone that says that it will stunt their growth and run from anyone trying to sell you on "speed & agility".


:cheers: :cheers:

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i started at almost 14 and it was not early enough.

there is not age that it is not safe so long as its done properly.

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And there is significant value in getting to control the learning of fundamentals.

I know my 13yr old will have to squat in 9th grade as part of track practice, so even though I wasn't 100% sure he was ready to put a bar on his back, I let him as soon as he turned 13 - so I will be comfortable that he won't get hurt at practice (even if he has a bad coach).

We are running a true linear progression and started with just the bar, 5lbs added ever workout if his technique is solid. He just hit bodyweight this weekend and has a good runway ahead of him before he stalls.

Jesus. You people. Let the kids live life, eat some debbie cakes, drink some koolaid. Be kids

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I started lifting at 14 and that was too early

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bullshite. I started lifting at 11 and I’m 6’3”, in great shape, and perfectly healthy and I would 100% do it again if I could. If you’re short you’re short genetically, don’t blame weightlifting on whatever you want to blame on it.

Definitely encourage this!