Prime Time: T-Kids: Exercise & Diet

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21

Jillybop, thanks for helping me with my question by the way! As to yours, I’ve been doing martial arts for a very long time now, and speaking from my experience of being a kid at one point, and dealing with them at others, my answers would be as follows:

Age - There isn’t any specific age to get started. Brandon Lee (Bruce Lee’s son) started literally as a baby, and Frank Shamrock (5x Ultimate Fighting Champion) started either at 21 or 22. There are 3 things to think about when thinking of starting a kid in martial arts.

1)Does he like to fight? This could mean watching WWF, Dragonball Z, or some other show. Or it could mean playfighting with other kids, or even you or some other family member. If he doesn’t, he may not like a martial arts class. If your child likes to go around violently kicking other children’s asses, its probably not a good time to start in martial arts!

2)Now your child is 4, so I don’t think it applies, but usually when a kid hits grade 1-2, he experiences this little thing called bullying! This is a good time to start teaching a kid how to defend himself.

3)His maturity level! Again, a 4 year old is a 4 year old, so don’t put him into a class that teaches eye gouges, strikes to the groin, biting, bone breaking, and flesh ripping! You don’t want your kid going up to his friend and trying out some neck breaking move he learned in class to see if it works! If he wants to try martial arts, start him in a “flashy” style, like Tae Kwon Do or certain types of Kung Fu. I may get yelled at here, but these styles are mainly, “hey that was a cool jump kick” martial arts. Pretty worthless for streetfights.

Best Martial Arts - When the kid is old enough to know that he shouldn’t go around beating everyone up (which, sadly, is rare for anyone under the age of 18 these days), enroll him in a more “useful” martial art. Thai boxing, Jiu Jitsu, Boxing, Wrestling, Mixed Martial Arts, Krav Maga, Jeet Kune Do, etc. He could be ready for these at say, 10, but make a judgement call. These martial arts are good for knowing how to defend yourself in real life, and often you have to be between 14-16 to even START training in these styles.

Be warned, training for a real fight means training HARD! Your kid will come home many times with broken fingers, toes, a black eye or two, but its all in good fun!

Anyways, the most important thing to a young kid, is whether or not he likes it. You may have to force him to TRY the class, but after a while, he might be begging you to go again!

22

No nutrition questions or comments? I guess most T-Nation readers know this stuff, so no problem there. But here’s something interesting…

I’ve found two studies/surveys so far that say that kids who are given strict, treatless diets grow up and often rebound later in life and get overweight. (One study was only on girls; I can’t remember the details of the other.) So it appears that a diet a little too healthy may backfire.

I admit I was too harsh on my daughter at one time. And sure enough I once caught her hiding and eating some junk food her grandmother had given her (damn grandparents!) That’s when I knew to loosen up. The old “eat your dinner first and then you can have a little dessert” rule is pretty good actually.

I do try to keep her away from excess sugar, especially sodas. And when I can, I substitute healthy choices: natural PB instead of Skippy, sugar-free jellies and syrup, etc. She loves her little Low-Carb Grow! shakes too.

And again, the “provide the opportunity” trick works well. Fill the kitchen with healthy stuff and not many treats and your kids will choose the healthy stuff more often. Common sense really. But most kids have no choices except junk foods. Still, high activity can go a long way in battling this. Kids can often beat bad diets with high activity, at least when it comes to fat gain. Adults usually can’t.

23

On the nutrition thing - we’re not anal about what our kids eat. We just don’t keep a pantry full of crap for them to graze on all day. On Fridays, or Saturdays, we’ll buy a bunch of crap food and they think it’s a treat. But the other 6 days of the week they eat pretty much what we eat with a few modifacations for taste (read ketchup and ranch dressing).

I think if you totally restrict their diet to get rid of all bad foods, you do indeed run the risk of a rebound.

All things in moderation, and substitute crap food with healthy alternatives where ever you can. Hell they’re just kids. I think the Xbox makes them fatter than an occasional Snickers bar ever will.

24

Thank you for the martial arts info - very good to know! I think he might wind up being on the smaller side and I like the discipline side of martial arts, too. Definitely going to check into it in the next year or two.

As far as nutrition, I struggle just to get this kid to eat ANYTHING. There’s not too much junk around the house, but he doesn’t care much for it anyway. I try not to make too big a deal about it, but usually wind up getting frustrated. If he doesn’t start eating more food soon, the 1yo is going to be bigger than he is!

25

It’s a shame they don’t have smaller schools. I am sure I might have made a team or two if there had only been 600-800 students at my school instead of 2,000. I feel realy bad for schools with 5,000 plus, unless you are pretty damn gifted, you won’t make the team.

26

[quote]Dave2 wrote:
Should kids under, say eight years old, only use body weight exercises?
[/quote]

The only limiting factor here is maturity level and ability to take directions. If a 3 year-old sees daddy or mommy squatting and wants to try, that’s just fine, so long as they do it well.

Many professionals will spout the phrase “children are not miniature adults,” but many of the concerns are the same. Can they use good form? Will they listen to directions? Is lifting weights something they enjoy?

I forget who did the study, but a long-term following of a junior Olympic lifting club found no injuries brought about by using weights, which includes growth plate injury. One kid smacked himself in the wrist with the bar and had to sit out a week, but that’s along the lines of “you could be hit by a bus just walking out the door.” Bear in mind that weight used in the Olympic lifts is highly governed by technique - I’m not sure what the injury rates would be in, say, powerlifting, although probably not any higher if good form/instruction is considered.

There are a host of psychological benefits associated with lifting as well; positive body image, self-confidence, etc. Same as adults, basically, with a few others associated with growing up.

Of course kids need to do other activity, too, to develop basic motor skills and have fun, learn teamwork, etc., but resistance work with weights/bands/rocks is perfectly safe for kids who are mentally ready.

-Dan

Wish I had the references around from a paper I wrote on this a while ago… as I recall, Faigenbaum and Kraemer are everywhere in the literature on this subject.

27

One thing I’d like to add as someone who’s been doing MA on and off since I was 6:

Make sure the instructors are fun/goofy. They need to be tough and able to keep the kids inline, but should be genuinely fun people. Kids aren’t going to go to taekwondo class because it’s making their minds and bodies better. They want to go because Mr. Kim makes funny jokes and has them do fun exercises.

28

[quote]graphicsMan wrote:
Kids aren’t going to go to taekwondo class because it’s making their minds and bodies better. They want to go because Mr. Kim makes funny jokes and has them do fun exercises.[/quote]

This is a good point. I was talking to a university level soccer coach once about kids and sport skill development. He noted that in the first few years (usually ages 5, 6 and 7), the goal of a coach is to get the kids to love the game by making it fun. A coach at that age group is judged to be “good” if all his players sign back up for another season. It’s a long term approach really.

You can work on skills, but the #1 goal is fun. No practice is successful unless it was a fun practice for the kids. Otherwise, the kids won’t come back the next year and eventually grow into complete players. Unless you’re China of course, then you just take the talented kids away from their parents and force them to become little gold medal winning machines. . .

Anyway, if they’re having fun, they practice on their own and come back to play year after year. If not, they quit after one season, so of course all athletic development ceases. And as someone who’s coached youth teams, I can tell you that 6 year old girls don’t learn much if they’re crying or bored. (I think I’d rather deal with a prison riot than 12 bored/upset six year old girls!)

29

If anything, I would put my kids in golf or tennis. Something where they could get in early and make lots of money, so I can retire early.

There’s just no cash in gymnastics or soccer. Might as well have them doing house work.

30

[quote]monkeyarms wrote:
If anything, I would put my kids in golf or tennis. Something where they could get in early and make lots of money, so I can retire early.

There’s just no cash in gymnastics or soccer. Might as well have them doing house work.[/quote]

FYI, statistically speaking, it’s harder to become a professional golfer than it is to become professional in any other sport (touring, not teaching pro). That’s what I recall hearing, at least.

31

[quote]Eric Cressey wrote:
monkeyarms wrote:
If anything, I would put my kids in golf or tennis. Something where they could get in early and make lots of money, so I can retire early.

There’s just no cash in gymnastics or soccer. Might as well have them doing house work.

FYI, statistically speaking, it’s harder to become a professional golfer than it is to become professional in any other sport (touring, not teaching pro). That’s what I recall hearing, at least.[/quote]

OK, tennis it is then. lol

32

Ahem…

http://www.paklinks.com/gs/archive/index.php/t-102050.html

Soccer players are the highest paid atheletes in the world. Just because it’s not part of the big 3 in the U.S. (baseball, football, basketball; hockey’s out for obvious reasons), doesn’t mean it’s not played in the rest of the world.

33

You and Eric have completely ruined my joke. lol

34

[quote]monkeyarms wrote:
If anything, I would put my kids in golf or tennis. Something where they could get in early and make lots of money, so I can retire early.

There’s just no cash in gymnastics or soccer. Might as well have them doing house work.[/quote]

Maybe they can’t turn pro and support my lazy ass but a soccer scholarship might help me buy a boat instead of paying for tuition.

35

With our young kids (13-14) we are doing a series of calisthenics three days per week.

We start like this:
Parts of the Parisi Warmup Method
3 sets of 25 bodyweight squats
3 sets of 10-15 pushups
3 sets of 5 pullups
3 sets of 12 situps
1 set of competition Planks

This has worked very well with our young guys and we are seeing marked improvement in their abilities. I taught some of them to squat today and the ones who have been with me all summer were able to pick it up much faster than those who have been hit or miss.

For the real young kids I think it should center more around playing. Play all sports. Play on the playground. Jump on the trampoline. Throw every type of ball they can get their hands on. You can also teach kids the proper mechanics for throwing, jumping, running, hopping, skipping, etc. We went into a great deal of detail in this in my M.Ed. in Physical Education. Tom Myslinski has a great thesis on training young kids at elitefts.com.

36

I agree. Unless you have a young Nadia in your house, I see training for the 10 and under club as more of a what is fun for them time.

My 7yr old daughter is “working out” with me these days. She loves to bring down our water bottles and stop watch and “work out”. She sees ole dad get on the bench and she wants to get on the bench. I have told her that right now she gets to do these really “cool” exercises instead. I have shown her sits-ups, lunges, jump rope and some running exercises and she is eating it up. Now, my normal timed and meticulous 54 minute workout circuit now takes 90 minutes with the new added “talking intervals”, but it’s fun having her so engaged right now with me. My 5yr. old son is also getting into the mix. He makes up some kind of oriental travel circus moves and asks me, “how’s dat dad” and then begins with the sponge bob laugh that still is an unnerving today as it was the first time I heard it.

I really believe that our kids follow our lead even when they aren’t trying to. Obese parents usually have obese kids. Health conscience parents usually have health conscience kids. There is a proverb that says, “Train up your son in the way he should go, and when he’s old he will not depart from it”.

[quote]Chris Shugart wrote:
Dave2 wrote:
Should kids under, say eight years old, only use body weight exercises?

You know, every time I talk about kids and training, I can’t help but think about those little Soviet (?) kids that get pulled away from their parents practically at birth and trained hard until they win gold at age 14 or whatever. So I’m reminded that kids have a big capacity for training, bigger than we think… not that I’d put the average kid through what those Olympic hopefuls go through.

Anyway, I do like bodyweight work for younger kids. When weights are introduced, I never suggest training to or past failure (forced reps etc) or testing 1RMs. Heavy if fine for young teens, but 1RMs? Just not necessary for a 13 year old. But opinions vary there and it might be okay with the right coach, but I’d avoid it generally.

I’m also reminded of an old Charles Staley article where he talked about seeing kids playing on a playground. Get a couple of fat kids on the merry-go-round and spin it and it’s almost like pulling a car or running with a weight vest! Isn’t that resistance training to an extent? Climbing is too when you think about it.

My daughter does step-ups, sit-ups (100 at a time when the mood strikes her) pull-ups, lunges, rope climbs, push-ups, etc. She doesn’t have a “program” or a set schedule; to her she’s just playing and that’s fine for now. A few exercises in the gym are like games to her. Plus she plays a variety of sports and has been in gymnastics since around age two. [/quote]

37

[quote]Chris Shugart wrote:

And I remember sipping some pumped breastmilk once. Yeah, I’m weird.
[/quote]

Yeah, that is weird…if you are going to sample the breastmilk, get it straight from the source =)

It’s sweeter than you’d imagine =P

38

When should a kid start lifting “heavy” per se. There was this one kid in my weightlifting class (he’s a freshman) and I’am a senior (graduated) that was concerned about stunting growth. I told him it was fine to lift heavy but he didn’t believe me. So in regards to this topic Does heavy lifting lead to stunted growth in later years?

39

This is highly individualized and there is no perfect answer.

40

[quote]StrongMan wrote:
Chris Shugart wrote:

And I remember sipping some pumped breastmilk once. Yeah, I’m weird.

Yeah, that is weird…if you are going to sample the breastmilk, get it straight from the source =)

It’s sweeter than you’d imagine =P
[/quote]

I sampled it straight from the tap; felt a little weird doing it but it tasted alright.