Just looking for some ideas
Thanks
I’m sorry, but I think this may be an unfair judgment. Have you ever stopped to think he may be autistic? Not weird, not lazy, not unmotivated, not mentally slow, but could have a condition that affects his coordination that you take for granted?
He may simply not be able to do what you are asking of him.
Mix it up. Sometimes walking, sometimes running. See which he prefers and have him do that most often. Keeping him motivated is going to be a big part of your job so keep that in mind when picking exercises.
You can’t really go too far wrong with anything really. A good 30 seconds or so of effort at a time would be great. I would do that with like a minute rest. Or if you choose a distance, just try and make him either cover that distance faster or with more weight. Anything’ll work.
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I suppose he could. It’s totally possible.
He’s pretty good socially (he often has friends over to play) and as far as the laziness goes, you should see how fast this kid can run when some ice cream is made available or when it’s his turn to play video games at his house.
He’s wrestled as a little kid, played soccer & football before, and continues to swim (for fun, not as in swimming laps) and play baseball pretty much every day during the summer, so he’s fairly coordinated. Just seems to be when something’s expected of him he can’t do it.
He has been found to act dumb when he needs to do something. Chores, homework, etc. All of a sudden he has a headache, or somehow hurt himself. I’ve gotten the feeling before that he just doesn’t try hard at the workouts so he doesn’t have to actually do much work.
He has a pretty dysfunctional homelife. He’s never gone without anything, or been abused or suffered through much, just has absent (emotionally) parents who split up randomly and for long periods of time, don’t encourage their children to do much good for them, and who are rarely sober. He has yet to realize this - he seems pretty oblivious to the drug use but is aware that his parents fight often and I’m sure that’s stressful.
I live in a similar home (I’m only 18), and it can be rough and lead to some strange coping skills, so I think food is a comfort for him, and the lack of never really being pushed or having to do anything hard means the workouts are outside of his comfort zone.
All that being said, maybe he does have a condition, but I doubt it. My opinion of him though is kept to myself - I never say anything regarding it to him. I try to keep the workouts pretty positive and upbeat.
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I’ve worked with many beginners and we always started squats at the wall. I learned to give them an extra couple of inches though so leave a few inches between their feet and the wall. They have to do it correctly or they hit the wall. They’ll try to move their knees wide to cheat but you’ll see it. Eventually they get it.
In the meantime, lunges. All sorts of lunges. For posterior muscles we’d have kids do a straight leg bridge for time. They put their feet on a phys ball and just lifted their hips like a plank, but they were face up. You could use a fixed object instead of a ball. Once they could hold steady we’d have them roll the ball in and out like a leg curl.
You have to be creative to teach people how to use their muscles. You might have to touch him. Put your fingers between his shoulder blades and tell him to squeeze them. Pull his shoulders back while he holds a quarter squat to let him feel the right positions.
If he’s as weak as you say then I’d do prehab work with bands for the upper back. Face pulls, reverse fly’s, rows, pull apart, etc.
It sounds like he’ll get the most benefit from figuring out how to tighten his back to hold it neutral.
I have always considered glute ham raises a fairly advanced exercise . It is not what I would recommend to beginners. Not even if I didn’t like them lol. Sled work will build up the posterior chain without being overly dangerous. Granted you could fall but wear gloves. It’s also quite forgiving of bad form too. Not that that’s an excuse.
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Stay on the toes and elevate the hands on a bench, smith machine, or even the wall. Doing them on the knees is too biomechanically different and, psychologically, a lot of guys think they"re “girl push-ups” and are reluctant to do them.
Also, doing them from the toes sneaks in core work while he maintains a solid position. Set the feet wider to make them even easier.
Definitely a good idea to use the sled. It’ll help drop fat and build strength. There’s almost no wrong way to program it (other than simply doing too much) and there’s a lot of leeway for technique.
One other way to regress the squat is sort of the opposite of the face-the-wall drill. Hold on to a solid object and lean back. It takes the upper body mostly out of it and he can assist himself do get the reps in
So much yes. SHELCs are awesome. A foam roller works if the ball is too high:
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I too like the honorary stooge from The 3 Stooges
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Here’s what he did today:
He biked over to my house from his, which is about a mile, so I didn’t have him walk on a treadmill like I normally would to start off.
We did the Agile 8 as a warmup, minus the foam rolling since I couldn’t find my foam roller, and then 25 shoulder dislocates w/ a PVC pipe, and 50 pull aparts. I don’t think his lower body is that tight, but I figured it’d be good for him to keep it that way, and this honestly seemed like a workout for him - the mountain climbers made him work pretty hard. And his shoulders do seem quite tight - that’s why the dislocates.
Anyways, then we did the squats that Chris recommended - holding onto a rack and I tried to emphasize sitting his butt back, and keeping his back straight. He figured out how to sit back, but keeping his back straight didn’t happen. These were tough for him - he got pretty tired from them. We did 3x10.
Then we just practiced hip hinging - again, 3x10, once he’d practiced for a bit and gotten it down. Just moving slowly through them, and focusing on the motion. Our goal was just to be a certain distance from the wall and get his butt on the wall. We’ll start doing band pull throughs after a few more tries (I don’t have a cable machine). He did decent here.
Then split squats supersetted with pushups with his hands elevated. 3x8/leg on the split squats and 3x10 for the pushups. He leaned forward quite a bit and his knee would always drop pretty heavily onto the ground, so our goal here is to practice controlling it, moving a little slower, at least on the negative, and staying upright. I set a barbell up in a rack for the pushups, and it was about chest height, but these weren’t too easy for him.
Then we did what I’ve heard called a straight-leg, incline glute bridge. Sorta like the straight leg bridge, but instead of holding it we’d go up and down, pausing for a second at the top to squeeze. We did 3x20 for those, and supersetted with inverted rows using some rings. The bridges were good - it’s hard to mess those up but he said he definitely felt the burn, and the rows were good. His body was quite vertical so the goal is just to slowly lower it into a more horizontal position over time.
Then we did seal rows with some 10 lb dumbbells (this was pretty easy - we’ll probably use 15 or 20 next time) supersetted with reverse flyes. 2x10 for each. He said he could really feel his lats/traps/rear delts working on those.
Then he rode his bike home again. We’re continuing to meet 3 days a week, and this summer when he’s out of school and I’ve been able to buy a sled, we’ll definitely start incorporating that.
I think the goal is just to use the tips you guys have given me for helping teach him how to squat and hip hinge properly, strengthen his legs through lunges/split squats and bodyweight posterior chain work, progressing on pushups and rows (hopefully eventually dips and chin-ups!), and doing some extra upper back work.
He’s biking about 6 miles a week just coming to see me, and as I said, sled work will start soon, and I’ll try to figure out how to get in some more walking/biking on days I don’t see him. I’ll keep preaching about the importance of a good diet and even sleep, which I don’t think will change, but hopefully the combo of working out and being more active now that it’s nicer outside will help drop some fat.
Thanks for all the advice and I’ll post updates every so often if something notable happens.
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Don’t be quick to move his weight up. He is 13. He still has open growth plates and damage from incorrect form and heavy weights can cause permanent damage.
Slow and steady. Get the extra fat off, get his form solid, and a simple linear progression will work wonders for him.
Maybe it’s a motor control thing then. And weakness. I know I had very bad coordination at 13…growing taller and everything. My advice (read: total fucking guess) is to have him keep working on what he can work on in the gym, have him do some sports too, and hopefully he builds better awareness of his body.
One question after reading all the problems your seem to be having with the kid. Does the kid really want to train ?
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Nope. Doesn’t seem like it at all. His brother is making him come though.
That’s the thing - if he’s not into it and doesn’t care about it, I don’t think I’ll be getting his best efforts.
Think his brother just wants him to be healthier and to have some type of positive outlet. I’ll just work with what I get from him
Sounds like a loosing battle. Maybe he will see some gains and catch the bug. Doubtful…
Or some lil chick comes along and notices him 
That may build a fire under his ass!
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My advice would be for you not to let yourself get too wrapped up with it. All you can do is be a source of help but you cannot make him want it if the actual desire is not there.
I’ll just leave this right here
Thanks, that was helpful.
Not taking him to a gym though, as I no longer have a membership to any in town, and he has never had one.
We’re just working out in my garage, where I have a treadmill, rack, barbell, plates, reverse hyper, GHD, pull up bar, a couple adjustable dumbbells going from 5 lbs - 85 lbs, and some bands.
No leg press or any other machines.
Shoot…
Maybe BW squats progressing into dumbell squats or goblet squats then?