10 Fitness Tips For Teens!

Here are 10 fitness tips for teens. Your teenager will certainly profit from some of the guidance offered. But really, ...you can use them too!

Fitness Tips For Teens

1. Encourage your teens to participate in a wide variety of physical activities. Increasingly, the trend today is toward specialization. Kids and teens are often encouraged to specialize in their chosen field early on. It's not uncommon to see kids and teens spending hours a day practicing nothing but gymnastics, or ballet, or football, or swimming. Yet, motor performance skills, relationship building skills, and a wider experience base to draw from are best acquired from a variety of sources. Expose your teens to numerous activities and multiply their chances to develop their skills, enrich the quality and quantity of their experiences, and broaden their horizon.

2. A well-rounded youth fitness program incorporates all of the fundamental fitness training components. This means that teens should train their cardiovascular system, muscular system, and their flexibility. Cardiovascular exercise performed at proper intensities can either help to strengthen aerobic power (VO2Max) or build cardiovascular endurance. Resistance training helps to strengthen bones, tendons, and muscles. Flexibility training helps to maintain optimal extensibility of soft tissues. Include them all in your training and don't forget to warm up, cool down, and stretch every time you workout.

3. Teens should not weight train on their own. Although the risks associated with strength training are no greater than those of other sports and activities, teens should be competently supervised and properly instructed at all times. A safe training environment is necessary to reduce the potential of accidents occurring.

4. Set some goals. There are many types of goals. My favourites are attendance-related goals and specific workout objectives. An 'attendance' goal sets the number of workouts you're willing to perform such as 12 workouts this month, or 100 workouts this year. Committing to your attendance-related goals ensures you get all of your workouts done. Accomplishing your workouts, in turn, ensures you achieve all of your other fitness goals.

Setting specific workout objectives on the other hand, allows you to go into every workout knowing exactly what you want to accomplish. Many people fail to plan their workout ahead of time often deciding on the spur of the moment, leaving exercises out or simply reproducing the exact same workout. For faster results, put some thought into it and set specific workout objectives in terms of the number of exercises, repetitions, sets, and loads you want to complete. When setting your workout objectives, incorporate the principle of Progressive Overload- which brings us to the next fitness tips for teens.

5. Your body eventually adapts to any stress imposed. The only way to continue making gains is to progressively overload the stimulus applied to your muscles. This is one of the most important training principles. It applies to your cardiovascular training, your flexibility training, and your resistance training. Without it, you will never make any improvements. As your body adapts to the amount of exercise you are currently performing, add a little bit more to keep improving. By forcing your body to do more work than it is accustomed to doing, your muscles will respond by growing bigger and stronger. Progress gradually in small increments.

More fitness tips for teens...

6. Learn your exercises. Always perform your exercises using proper form and technique. Master exercise technique. A load that is too heavy for you will often cause you to lose your form. Too much swaying, swinging, or flinging the weights with momentum is also an indication that your load may be too heavy for you. Never sacrifice form for extra weights or extra reps. Excellent technique leads to faster gains, improper technique leads to potential injuries.

7. Train your mind to concentrate exclusively on the task ahead. Only the rep you're working on now matters. Even five perfectly executed reps are better than ten poorly performed reps. Count only the reps that are perfectly executed.

8. Train opposing muscle groups and opposite body sides equally. Balance your workout so you're training your body as a whole unit. Don’t neglect certain aspects of your body at the expense of other muscle groups. Train your whole body equally.

9. Get in, Get out, Get it over with. Come in, do your workout, and finish up. Don’t trail behind and spend hours in the gym for a workout that should last no more than 45 to 60 minutes. Stay focused, train hard, give your best effort. Then go rest.

10. Here's the secret to getting better. Practice, practice, practice. Whether you want to improve your time, your distance, get better at your sport, improve your skills or grow stronger muscles- you have to practice over and over again. Stick with it. Perfect your motions. Keep on training and your body will reward you with the results you want.

Follow these fitness tips for teens. If you keep the fun in fitness, you’ll keep on exercising for many years to come.

Remember that a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. High levels of fitness takes many years to achieve. The way to get better is through many small gains. Be patient. Be persistent. Use these fitness tips for teens and improve one step at a time. Small steps make big differences.

Jump from Fitness Tips For Teens back to Exercise Teen Section