Body mass squats make teenagers more muscular and slimmer

Definition: "An ergogenic aid is any substance or phenomenon that enhances performance "

26.12.2013

If adolescents spend a couple of minutes each day doing squats without weights, they build up muscle mass, lose fat and their leg muscles become stronger. Japanese sports scientists discovered this when they got a group of teenagers aged 13-14 to do about one hundred body mass squats daily.
If adolescents spend a couple of minutes each day doing squats without weights, they build up muscle mass, lose fat and their leg muscles become stronger. Japanese sports scientists discovered this when they got a group of teenagers aged 13-14 to do about one hundred body mass squats daily.

Sports scientists are in no doubt. Strength training is healthy. But the jury is still out on what the optimal age is for young males to start doing strength training.

Study

The researchers, who work at the Japanese National Institute of Fitness and Sports, suspect that 13-14 year-olds can start to benefit from strength training as long as they only use their own bodyweight as the load. They carried out their study, which was published in the Journal of Sports Science and Medicine, to test this idea.

The researchers did an 8-week experiment with a group of nearly one hundred boys, all of whom did sports at a high level and trained on average five days a week. Of the group, 58 just kept to their own training – the control group.

The experimental group was made up of 36 boys. Every day after school, 4-6 times a week, the researchers got the boys to do a short squat training session. The boys had to do knee bends with their own weight as the load, for a few minutes. The boys had to squat until their upper legs were parallel with the floor.

They did this at high speed: they did a rep every two seconds, and the aim was to build up to 100 reps without a break.

Results
At the end of the eight weeks, the researchers noticed small but significant changes in the body composition of the boys in the experimental group. Their fat percentage percentage had decreased by almost 1 point and the muscle mass in their legs had increased.

MTQF = muscle thickness of anterior of thigh.

At the end of the eight weeks the boys in the experimental group were also capable of generating more strength on a leg-extension machine [KES]. Their sprint speed had not increased, but they could jump a centimetre higher.

Conclusion
"In summary, the current results indicate that body mass-based squat training for 8 weeks is a feasible and effective method for improving body composition and muscular strength of the knee extensors, and jump performance in adolescent boys", the researchers conclude.

Source:
J Sports Sci Med. 2013 Mar 1;12(1):60-5.

More:
Back squat or front squat? Makes no difference to your leg muscles 14.10.2010
Squats for training your adductors? Doesn't work 07.10.2010
Squats best done with your feet apart 01.10.2010

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The single leg squat for the gluteal muscles, the split squat for the quads Researchers at the University of St. Thomas in the US have compared the effect of the single leg squat on the leg muscles with that of the split squat.	This is the difference between the belt-squat and the back-squat If you would like to squat, but have an injury somewhere in your midsection that makes squatting impossible, then the belt-squat might be an alternative option.	For glutes & hamstrings, single-leg squats are better than regular squats or stiff-leg deadlifts Bodybuilders or who fitness enthusiasts who want to develop their glutes as well as their hamstrings, should consider adding single-leg squats to their workouts.