Building upper arm strength and strengthening my core?
Question by Christina: Building upper arm strength and strengthening my core?
So I’m only 13 and i’m a girl. But i was looking for a way to strengthen my upper arms and my stomach core because i always feel so weak in those areas. (: Every now and then when I remember, or think about it, I will do a couple push-ups, and sit-ups, but i’m not so sure that is helping too much. Also it’s summer time, so I’ve got plenty of time on my hands to exercise.
And whats the best exercise to build strength in those areas?
Also i’m looking for some routine to exercise for the rest of the summer. Just please anything will work, Thank-you guys!!! (:
Best answer:
Answer by Mack James
Generally weightlifting does not affect growth, but sometimes care has to be taken especially if your growth plates have not yet fused.
Also it all depends on the sort of weights you do. The heavier they are the more likely it will affect your growth. Also the sort of exercises you do can affect your growth. Also the age you start and the level you start when weightlifting can also affect your growth. Now lets deal with them one at a time.
Generally you shouldn’t start weightlifting when you are still growing as you are now I’m sure. After about the age 17 years it reasonable to do weightlifting starting slow and gradually building up muscular strenght but more importantly bone strength. Remember that you do not stop growing until the age of about 21. This is when the growth plates you have as kid fuse together in your arms and legs (thats why you stop growing because once they fuse there is no space for the ends of the bone to grow).
Secondly if you do exercises which put stress on your bones so that it is acting along the bone, then that will act to compress the bones resulting in less growth in the bone than normal. If you do it for a long time at a young age that compression can be permanent. Doing exercises which put strain on your spine like military press, squats, dumbell curls while standing, overhead press etc, will also affect your height if you start at a to early age. I suggest you do exercises where you are lying down, or at least sitting in a chair. And even then don’t go to more than half your body weight. Sometimes people have defect in the major artery that leads from the heart, the aorta. The problem is that in some people part of this artery is genitically weak and due to blood flowing through it (ie: blood pressure) this overtime balloons outwards. Now under normal conditions this is usually not fatal and is undetected. But doing weights which are more than half your body weight, can cause instant death, because the aorta will rupture. This has killed more people in America in the past year than AIDS has. Most of the time people didnt even know or their doctors that they had this condition.
So generally if I was you, I would stick to running , pushups, situps, shadow boxing and squats (all without weights). Do these things until you drop, to get a good workout. This way you get the maximum growth and strength out of your body while you are growing. So when u do stop growing then your bones are strong and your muscles conditioned. This way when u start weightlifting u can have great progress, but even then u build up slowly.
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