Greetings
I have asked you for advice in the past on my 13 yo age group swimming son and the feedback has been great. So, here goes again. He has lifted weights in school this semester with great results. He wants to continue after the class ends next month at our health club. I have to admit the results have been dramatic in the pool as well as his appearance. I would like to see him continue but need suggestions as to his program in terms of frequency, specific lifts etc. Any suggestions or links would be appreciated.
Regards
Spudfin
First off, I think this decision depends heavily on your philosophy, short/long term goals and what events your child is training for. My background/biases: Divison I distance swimmer, current Master's swimmer and swimming parent (all girls, all 12 & under now). I am not a coach.
Maybe I'm too conservative on this, but I tend to look at swimming progression for age groupers as a long term endeavor, ideally culminating with fast swims in college while still leaving the individual with a love for the sport. I think that progression is best served by slowly added in "extra components" to the training regimen (e.g., double workouts, weights, etc.) so that you don't overload a young body too early and so that you definitely don't burn a kid out. Particularly for boys, who can and should easily continue to get stronger and faster through college, I would think it would be better to add weight training in later in their high school career. With that said, I think there are body-weight based training tools you can add in at this stage that focus more on core and whole body balance like Pilates and Yoga.
I swam with a lot of guys who were great at 13,14,15, but then didn't progress from there ... very often, IMHO, because they pushed too hard too soon. Conversely, I swam with guys at the elite collegiate and international level who came to Texas with relatively modest prior training backgrounds and then took off in college as they both matured more physically and added in a wide range of cross-training activities (that their more physically mature bodies were better able to adapt to).
First off, I think this decision depends heavily on your philosophy, short/long term goals and what events your child is training for. My background/biases: Divison I distance swimmer, current Master's swimmer and swimming parent (all girls, all 12 & under now). I am not a coach.
Maybe I'm too conservative on this, but I tend to look at swimming progression for age groupers as a long term endeavor, ideally culminating with fast swims in college while still leaving the individual with a love for the sport. I think that progression is best served by slowly added in "extra components" to the training regimen (e.g., double workouts, weights, etc.) so that you don't overload a young body too early and so that you definitely don't burn a kid out. Particularly for boys, who can and should easily continue to get stronger and faster through college, I would think it would be better to add weight training in later in their high school career. With that said, I think there are body-weight based training tools you can add in at this stage that focus more on core and whole body balance like Pilates and Yoga.
I swam with a lot of guys who were great at 13,14,15, but then didn't progress from there ... very often, IMHO, because they pushed too hard too soon. Conversely, I swam with guys at the elite collegiate and international level who came to Texas with relatively modest prior training backgrounds and then took off in college as they both matured more physically and added in a wide range of cross-training activities (that their more physically mature bodies were better able to adapt to).
