What Age Should Young Athletes Start Strength Training?
One of the most common questions I get from parents of younger athletes is:
“Is my kid too young to start lifting weights?”
It’s a fair question.
When most parents picture strength training, they probably picture a loaded barbell on someone’s back, heavy deadlifts, or someone grinding through a max-effort bench press. Or they conjure images of scenes from Pumping Iron with Arnold.
If that’s what we mean by strength training, then no, I don’t think your 10-year-old needs to be maxing out their squat.
But that’s also not what strength training needs to look like for a young athlete.
What Does Strength Training Actually Mean?
Strength training is simply teaching the body to produce force against resistance.
For a young athlete, that might mean learning how to:
- Squat
- Hinge
- Push
- Pull
- Lunge
- Jump and land
- Sprint
- Carry something heavy
- Control their own bodyweight
Eventually, we can add resistance to those movements.
A goblet squat becomes heavier.
A push-up progresses.
A young athlete learns how to deadlift properly without weights that are too heavy impacting their form.
Maybe they eventually start learning Olympic weightlifting movements.
But we don’t need to start with a heavy barbell.
We start by teaching them how to move.
There Isn’t a Magic Age
I don’t think there’s one birthday where an athlete suddenly becomes ready to strength train. It's more about where they are developmentally and the intangibles.
Can they listen to coaching? Can they follow instructions? Are they mature enough to safely be in a weight room environment?
Some 10-year-olds are ready for that.
Some 13-year-olds aren’t.
The training should meet the athlete where they are.
That means the exercises, resistance, volume, and expectations should all be appropriate for that individual athlete.
Start With Movement, Then Add Resistance
With young athletes, I want to build a foundation.
Foundational movements might include a bodyweight or goblet squat, a RDL with a nice flat back and slight bend in the knees, learning how to control their body weight when landing from a jump, doing a proper push up or pull up, or some basic sprinting mechanics.
Once an athlete develops competency with basic movement patterns, we can gradually make those movements more challenging.
That’s where strength starts to develop.
We aren’t skipping the fundamentals just so we can say a 12-year-old squatted a certain amount of weight.
Strength Training Should Build Confidence
One of my favorite parts about coaching younger athletes is watching them realize they’re capable of doing things they couldn’t do before.
Their first good push-up.
Their first pull-up.
Learning how to use a barbell.
Jumping farther.
Running faster.
Adding weight to an exercise they struggled with a few months ago.
Those wins matter big time from a psychological perspective.
We want young athletes to associate training with getting better, learning new skills, and becoming more capable.
That’s a much better long-term outcome than making every workout brutally difficult.
The Goal Isn’t to Create the Strongest 11-Year-Old in Naperville
The goal is to build an athletic foundation that the kid can continue developing for years.
Teaching them how to move, train, and build themselves gradually is really what we're trying to do.
Expose them to sprinting, jumping, throwing, and different athletic movements.
And, most importantly, help them enjoy the process.
If we do that well, we’re setting them up to become stronger and more athletic as they move through middle school, high school, and beyond.
At STS Weightlifting and Performance in Naperville, that’s how we approach strength training for young athletes.
Meet the athlete where they are and build from there.
Looking for Youth Strength Training in Naperville?
Our Sports Performance program at STS helps young athletes develop strength, speed, power, coordination, and confidence in the weight room with age-appropriate coaching.
Learn more about Sports Performance Training at STS HERE.