In the era of Hulk Hogan, The Incredible Hulk, and the WWF, my boys wanted to “pump up”. Looking at their sweet little faces I could see we were in the middle of something that only a doctor was going to have to look at them and say,” You are too young to lift weights. Your muscles aren’t ready for that yet.”. We would go home with discouraged kids, their fate always to be thin and willowy. But that is not the case.

For the novices of this particular topic, it would be a good idea to differentiate between strength training and weight lifting. The age is the factor in determining when and what and how much your son should be doing when it comes to strength training, power lifting, weight lifting, body building. Strength training is, in fact, encouraged and suggested for boys. This is especially good if they plan on entering any kind of youth sports or programs as it will benefit their muscles, stamina, and protect their ligaments and muscles and joints from injury.

Let us define weight lifting, power lifting and body building. This is done mostly for competition to enlarge and define the muscle and to lift huge amounts of weight. This is a decision that is made when they are young men and not children or adolescents. Strength training, however, has become more and more necessary as children have become obese and have remained indoors more than outdoors due to introduction of electronic games and the vast amount of television channels.

Strength training is a way to strengthen muscles, stretch and strengthen ligaments that support the muscles. It helps with cholesterol levels, bone density, lung and heart development, and provides and excellent start to a lifetime habit. Using free weights, tension bands and their own body weight is a great way to start the process.

When do they start this training? According to Nemours Foundation as long as your son can follow directions and be coached, at six years old he can start doing sit ups and push ups. It is more important at this age that he be focused on body awareness, balancing, and control. As they grow older, more and more can be added. If they are not able to do the repetitions involved with strength training, then its time to lower the weights or lessen the tension bands. A good coach is a great source to help your son. He is trained to know what a child should be doing and what he should not be doing as far as strength training and his age. If you have questions that perhaps he/she is pushing too hard or too much, by all means, ask!

Below I have entered two links to great places for information about the differences between strength training, weight lifting, body building, and power lifting. They are also great sources to advise you on how to strength train and really helpful hints about your son’s growth process and getting him ready for sports or simply get him and keep him healthy!

http://www.cnn.com/HEALTH/library/HQ/01010.html

http://kidshealth.org/parent/nutrition_fit/fitness/strength_training.html