Getting ripped or big—or both—aren’t exclusively the goals of fully-grown men. But teens and even younger 20-somethings aren’t yet grown men (sorry), so your training has to be a little different, too. Mostly in good ways, though; younger bodies respond better than older ones—all those raging hormones are good for something! With the right plan, you can and will put on muscle and become stronger or leaner or whatever your goal is, says Ewunike A. Akpan, BOKS (Build Our Kids’ Success) Fitness program developer and an ACE-certified personal trainer and owner of Lotus Fitness in Washington DC. And while of course you want to look good, training has other awesome benefits, including increasing strength, improving sports performance, and even preventing injury, she says.
But a lot of teens (like a lot of adults) don’t know where to start, even if they’ve spent a little time around a weight room. “When it comes to programming, we talk about training age, not just chronological age,” says Jim Kielbaso, MS, CSCS, International Youth Fitness Association expert and owner of Detroit-area Total Performance Training Center. “In general, teenagers are beginner lifters simply because they haven’t lifted weights long enough to really get great at it.” To safely get great at it, he suggests working with a professional trainer for at least a few sessions to learn good form.
Bulk Up
Getting ripped or big—or both—aren’t exclusively the goals of fully-grown men. But teens and even younger 20-somethings aren’t yet grown men (sorry), so your training has to be a little different, too. Mostly in good ways, though; younger bodies respond better than older ones—all those raging hormones are good for something! With the right plan, you can and will put on muscle and become stronger or leaner or whatever your goal is, says Ewunike A. Akpan, BOKS (Build Our Kids’ Success) Fitness program developer and an ACE-certified personal trainer and owner of Lotus Fitness in Washington DC. And while of course you want to look good, training has other awesome benefits, including increasing strength, improving sports performance, and even preventing injury, she says.
But a lot of teens (like a lot of adults) don’t know where to start, even if they’ve spent a little time around a weight room. “When it comes to programming, we talk about training age, not just chronological age,” says Jim Kielbaso, MS, CSCS, International Youth Fitness Association expert and owner of Detroit-area Total Performance Training Center. “In general, teenagers are beginner lifters simply because they haven’t lifted weights long enough to really get great at it.” To safely get great at it, he suggests working with a professional trainer for at least a few sessions to learn good form.
So what’s the “right plan”? Read on.
Youth is on your side, mostly
Some great news: In addition to those aforementioned hormones that will goose your muscles into responding to your new training program, a young body can ramp up and handle hard workouts better than an older one and doesn’t require as much recovery (more on that in a bit). But a young body can sometimes be unwieldy. “Some kids have grown so quickly that they might not have the body control or flexibility,” Kielbaso says. And, sorry to break it to you: Your body won’t be young forever. “My biggest concern with teens are their backs,” Kielbaso says. “Not as much in the short term, but any bad technique with weight loaded on the back may catch up later.”
Train your brain first
Many teens, once they’ve got their mind on it, will hit the gym with gusto. And while a little enthusiasm goes a long way, there’s a really important concept that you have to get your head around first before you start throwing weight around. And that’s progression. “You need to understand when to increase and when not to,” Kielbaso says. “A lot of young guys are more interested in demonstrating strength rather than developing it, and they’re more eager to compare how much they can lift compared to others versus building up safely.” So check your ego at the gym door and commit to taking it slowly, especially at first, for the greatest gains.
Training to build muscle, part 1
That means first learning the basic movement patterns, with the only load being your own body weight or very light (yes, light!) weights. These include lower-body squatting and hinging, the upper-body pulls of rowing and pull-ups or pulldowns, and the upper-body pushes of pushups, overhead presses, and chest presses.
“Bodyweight exercise are really important,” Akpan says. “We can’t overlook the gains that you can make just by doing those!” Her suggestion is to max out your endurance on moves like deep squats and pushups before hitting a bench or grabbing weights, then increasing resistance gradually. “It’s very important to keep a journal of what you’re doing—weight and number of reps and sets to see your progress,” she says.
You’ll also have to be consistent if you want to see results—a minimum of two days and max of four days per week will do it. You also want to take a day off at least every two days, to allow your muscles time to rest and recover. “Some kids will say, ‘I can be there every day,’ so we might do an upper day, lower day, a day off, then repeat for a total of four sessions a week,” Kielbaso says. However, you might’ve noticed that he didn’t say you should divide that into a “back and bis” day or a “chest and tris” day, etc. A traditional body-part-a-day split is actually counter-productive for encouraging a growing body to fill out, because the muscles can handle and should be stimulated more than once a week. “Doing total body three times a week is better than hitting the biceps only one day a week out of four sessions,” he says.
Most sessions for teenage guys just starting out should be an hour or less, comprised of a 5 to 10 minute dynamic warmup—this means movement-based stretching and maybe a few reps of the moves you’ll be doing in the workout—and then 3 to 6 sets per movement pattern of 8 to 15 reps each, maybe more for bodyweight moves but only if form doesn’t break.
Training to build muscle, part 2
Once you’ve done that basic mostly bodyweight program for four to six weeks, you can move onto phase two: heavier lifting. (Notice: That didn’t say “heavy.”) Here, you’ll test to figure out your estimated one-rep max (1RM) for each of the movements you’ve been doing, and then start a cycle in which you’ll lift in the 70-80% 1RM range for 1 to 3 sets of 8 to 15 reps, but first warming up all moves with some lightweight reps to get the muscles primed.
Trainling to lose weight
This section could almost just say “see last section” because for overweight teens, the strength training plan is identical. In fact, strength training is encouraged when weight loss is the goal, for several reasons. First, building muscle stimulates the metabolism, which will encourage more calorie burning in the body even at rest. Second, if done with short rest periods, it can have cardio benefits (more on that in a moment). And third, it’s an activity that someone who carries extra weight on his frame is already inclined to be good at. “For overweight teens, strength training is great and very empowering because they can do it and can often lift more than their trimmer peers,” Akpan says.
Training for athletic performance
This will really depend on your sport, and will often be dictated by your coach. But in general, plyometric moves done to improve power (say, for making a jump shot or being able to change direction quickly on the field) should be performed for relatively few reps (no more than 6) with a focus on explosiveness—and with ample recovery time in between sets. Why? Because if you do too many reps in a row, or don’t rest enough, you won’t really be working to improve your power; it becomes more about endurance—and with these kinds of big explosive movements, there’s a greater risk for injury if you keep going when fatigued. Power exercises should also be added into a routine after a good base of strength training has been established. “It’s great to start young with power because you’ll learn the neuromuscular aspects and get those patterns down early to have more success later on as an adult,” says Akpan.
Training for injury prevention
As if you needed another reason to strength-train, it can also help you reduce your risk of injury. A well-rounded routine can even out your muscles and boost ones that are weaker, either from your left to right side, or the front to back of your body. “Balanced muscle development can only enhance sports and even lower risk of injury,” Akpan says. Stronger muscles all around means your body is less likely to develop compensations and possibly overuse injuries. And strengthening particularly around the shoulders and hips will increase stability of those joints—and stable hips in particular are protective against knee injuries, such as torn ligaments (ACL, MCL) that occur all too often on the field.
Cardio training
Exercising to benefit your heart is important at any age. However, Akpan cautions against the thinking that “cardio” is something you do separately, involving long-slog sessions on some sort of large hulking equipment. “Programs should combine both [strength training and cardio] in the sessions, to be efficient for time as well as to develop whole-training mindset,” she says. In fact, strength training can and should get your heart rate up, simply by keeping a good pace and not taking too long for rest between exercises or sets. This doesn’t mean you shouldn’t also be active in general, nor does it mean you can skip those laps if your coach prescribes them as conditioning for your sport. But “if you’re doing cardio to ‘get ripped,’ you should address nutrition before they look to burn that off with cardio,” Kielbaso says.
Eating for performance
It’s actually a lot simpler than you think—at least in terms of what you should be doing (the implementation may be another story).
Too many teens often skip breakfast, and eat a lot of fast food and sugary food,” Kielbaso says. “But to make healthy gains, basic nutrition concepts should be applied.” That means eating lean sources of protein (chicken breast, fish, pork, or beef), fruits and veggies, and quality carbs. You know, real food. If you have weight to lose, Akpan recommends seeing a nutritionist. “You need proper fuel for workouts and growing, but also need to be at a calorie deficit,” she says. “Reducing food intake is a stress on the body so you should talk to someone with nutritional knowledge.”
In general, making sure you have a balance of all three macronutrients (protein, fat, and carbs) in every meal, including breakfast, should be your focus. “Most athletes are able to meet their protein requirements and then some with what they’re already eating,” says Akpan. “Keep track in a journal to see.”
The signs of overtraining
“Because teens can adapt so quickly, the first sign that you’ll see for overtraining is that your progress will stop,” says Kielbaso. Other issues might be fatigue, a general feeling of weakness, nagging soreness, or even acute pain from overuse injury, decreased motivation and bad attitude, trouble sleeping, and loss of appetite. Make sure you’re taking adequate recovery between sessions and consider seriously dialing it back if you notice any of these symptoms. To fend them off, aside from the obvious (not overdoing it), “proper nutrition and sleep are always essential,” says Akpan.