Sport helps a person develop, strengthen their muscles and grow. It is generally accepted that not all types of physical activity are suitable for a child. Weightlifting, is it bad or good for a growing body?
When choosing a sports direction for their child, parents try to find out in advance about the positive and negative aspects of this species. Those who want to send the baby to the weightlifting section or to powerlifting are wondering if physical activity will affect the child's growth?
Do barbell exercises make a person shorter?
It is noticed that girls can grow up to 19 years old, boys up to 22. The active phase of growth in adolescents begins:
• For girls - from 11 to 13
• For guys - from 13 to 16.
During this period, a child can add 7-10 cm per year. Therefore, parents do not want to give them to the weightlifting section, so as not to slow down this process.
There is an opinion that active exercises and heavy loads will harm a fragile body. Growth hormones will be wasted on gaining muscle mass, energy and nutrients will be diverted in the wrong direction. The growing body will not cope with the load, which will negatively affect the formation of the child's body and the work of his internal organs and systems.
Research has shown that this is not the case. Subject to proper nutrition, all the norms for performing exercises and accurate calculation of loads, weightlifting will not bring any harm to health. Exercise, on the other hand, helps to strengthen both bones and muscles.
If you measure a person's height before and after exercising with a barbell, then he will change and the person will "decrease" by 3 cm. This is an acceptable norm.
The growth of any person changes during the day. Without loads, the difference between measurements taken in the morning and in the evening will be 1 - 2 cm. If you carried heavy bags or pulled furniture, then you could become shorter by 1, 5 cm or more, for a while.
The changes will be associated with the compaction of the intervertebral vertebrae. With age, any person begins to decrease in height. At 60 years old, you will become lower by 2-3 cm, and at 80 - by 5-7 cm, as opposed to 22 years old.
Power loads do not affect a person's height
Usually in the sections associated with heavy physical activity, such as powerlifting, weightlifting and bodybuilding, they begin to recruit toddlers at the age of 8-9 years. The child's body begins to form, and physical activity helps to properly develop the bone structure and muscles. It is believed that barbell exercises slow down these processes. Allegedly, the barbell on the shoulders presses on the spine and this does not allow the child to grow.
A weightlifting coach will tell you that this is a myth.
A week is spent on training about 8 hours, the net time spent on the barbell on the shoulders will be only 30 minutes. This is 0.3% of the total time, the remaining 99.7%, nothing presses on the spine, and the child grows.
It has been proven that physical activity, including exercises with a barbell, stimulates the production of growth hormones. Most of them in children are spent on the development and growth of the bone skeleton.
Judging by the height of famous weightlifters, it should be borne in mind that stocky and short people are more stable on their feet. Due to this, success is achieved mainly by stunted stalwarts. They can lift more weight and hold it for longer.
Therefore, if you or your child is looking to do weightlifting, do not hesitate. Any physical activity under the supervision of an experienced trainer will not bring harm.
