13 year old son

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My 13 yo son has recently become serious about his nutrition and work out routine. Any good recommendations of resources available for a young teen program? appropriate caloric intake, weight training, cardio, etc.? There is so much information on the google it's a bit overwhelming. He's an active kid. baseball nearly year round, football in the fall, swim team, etc. just figured I'd try the TD for advice. TIA

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i highly suggest looking at the 531 beginners prep school routine.

its in the 531 forever book. I suggest high intent rotational med ball throws for the jumpp/throw portion and getting after it. if you need to take a look see below, but i highly suggest buying the book. it will be the last book he will ever need for lifting and performance and will serve as his bible for rest of playing days and should beyond that.

you can email me at lsu777td

gmail

yes that is the book. it will talk him through everything. written by jim wendler who played cfb, one of the top powerlifters in the world at one time at westside and someone who is the strength coach at london hs in ohio where they turned the program around from a perinnial 1-2 win team to a 9-10 win team in a matter of 2 years.

thank you for the great resources and advice. one question, should I get the original 5/3/1 book by Jim W in addition to the 5/3/1 forever? just wondering if the 2nd book covers the basis of the program or builds onto it. thanks again!

531 is good. But, may I also suggest Mark Rippetoe's Starting Strength?

It is a program made for novice lifters to get strong in a relatively short amount of time. Mark also thoroughly covers the proper way to perform the lifts, and why you should perform them that way. There are tons of videos of Mark teaching proper lifting technique.

StartingStrength.com

Has he hit puberty yet? I have 2 son's (19,15), the oldest was a cross country runner and a state champion wrestler my youngest just got through with his freshman year of baseball. The oldest hit puberty between his soph and Jr year and my youngest is just starting. There wasn't much strength or muscle gains until puberty was reached. If he hasn't reached it yet, I would stick to body weight exercises such as push-ups, sit-ups, body squats and pull ups. You don't want to risk injuring a young developing kid who hasn't matured yet. Once my oldest reached it, it was like turning on a light switch, lots of muscle mass and strength gain. As far a diet, lots of chicken, rice, veggies and protein smoothies. Just my opinion and experience with young athlete sons, take it or leave it.

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Has he hit puberty yet? I have 2 son's (19,15), the oldest was a cross country runner and a state champion wrestler my youngest just got through with his freshman year of baseball. The oldest hit puberty between his soph and Jr year and my youngest is just starting. There wasn't much strength or muscle gains until puberty was reached. If he hasn't reached it yet, I would stick to body weight exercises such as push-ups, sit-ups, body squats and pull ups. You don't want to risk injuring a young developing kid who hasn't matured yet. Once my oldest reached it, it was like turning on a light switch, lots of muscle mass and strength gain. As far a diet, lots of chicken, rice, veggies and protein smoothies. Just my opinion and experience with young athlete sons, take it or leave it.

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no offense but science says you are wrong and we should start lifting as early as possible for athletic development. and puberty has different stages and i can promise your didnt just "hit" puberty at 16-17.

not lifting weights until freshman year already puts them behind or at the very least does not offer them the advantages starting early does.

starting between at 16-17 is laughably dumb to the point you are losing 3-4 years of gains that could have been made.

wanna learnt he science behind these statements? read this 3 part series from the doctors at Barbell medicine who do an extreme deep dive into it

LINK

Mike Boyle does a great job of goign over it in the complete youth training course as does the BrandX method PYCC course and the youth strength course.

trust me waiting until 16-17 is dumb from a long term athletic development standpoint.

as far as diet...should be beef, tons of beef. eggs, tons of eggs. rice and alot and lots of whey protein shakes.

if we are being honest, we would be following the russian model and we would be having kids lifting at 5 and 6.

are there things we need to be mindful of?

absolutely, things like spinal compression and how often/much we are squating, especially as we get stronger.

technique of course

regressions of course play a major role.

essentially we need to be training movement patterns not just strength but in the end you have to develop the strength to develop the intermuscular coordnation to be able to get stronger and transfer power.

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I was about to start this exact same thread except for a small 13 year old.

4’11 and 82 lbs. plays soccer and baseball, would like to play football.

Puberty hasn’t really kicked in for him yet. Is that a disqualifier for weight training?

I guess I really mean is it a disqualifier for progressively loading weights?

Will look at resources already linked.

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At 13 no, he can progressively overload easily but he would be better off cutting the progression down to 2.5 LB jumps on lower body and using frzctional plates to jump 1.25 or 1.5lbs on upper body. Have him really concentrate on the movement patterns and take it slow.

If yall are just wanting him to be able to do it himself then get the trainheroic app and put him on power athlete bedrock and then field strong programs to start.

531 is a Bible though as is starting strength. They will be only things you really ever need to get stronger snd way more athletic.

My greyskull thread is really good too.

Power athlete radio podcast is good to learn more. Field strong is episode 577, 599; 593 is good for learning about the bedrock beginner program.

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My concern is somehow wasting the novice phase on small gains, but I'm sure that doesn't make sense. I did the starting strength novice linear progression in my mid-30s, and it convinced me that everyone who is capable should do it (or something similar) at some point in their lives.

I guess my point is that my 13 year old is not going to get to 375lb squats in 6 months or whatever like he could if he did the novice progression a few years later. But is it the case that learning the movements now and getting small strength gains will just set him up better to do the big gains when the time comes?

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If you can get him to eat, his gais will follow. Starting Strength was created for training 13-14 year olds.

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These are paid options, right? I'm willing to pay, just don't want to pay for a bunch of different things

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Yes it's like 30 a month. Bedrock is essentially the total athlete version of starting strength. And essentially coaching through the train heroic app.

My son just turned 13 and he worked out for the first time with me last night. He's 5'8", 150lbs.

I didn't let him lift anything heavier than 5lb dumbbells last night.

We worked back and shoulders. I'm keeping his focus on form, form, and more form. Weirdly enough, the only exercise that tripped him up was reverse flies. He kept trying to turn it in to an ugly lateral raise.

Tomorrow is leg day. I hope he'll still love me Thursday and Friday!

I started at 10 at hatch’s with a broomstick. By 13 I was a junior Olympic champion. Coming into freshman year summer workouts I was the smallest but strongest pound for pound.

Start early. No drawbacks. Only benefits.