Okay, I'm going to post this up as a program that will be generally suited to most of the kids on here with athletic fitness goals in mind. This isn't a ground-breaking porgram that's better than all the rest. There is no best program in the world. But all good programs are built on a common-ground of sound training principles that have stood the test of time.
In this program you will get a general base of strength and conditioning. This is not a sports-specific program, so your sport may have other specific requirements that demand other training protocols, especially on the conditioning side of things. That's okay. You can jump off that bridge when you come to it. But, for a general base of strength and conditioning, this program will suit you well.
Strength
The strength side of this program is where we'll put most of our focus up front. A lot of trainng programs have dozens of intricate, fiddley little exercises to get specific stabiliser muscles firing and work each muscle individually. If you have specific pre-existing muscle imbalances, some of these exercises may be required to get your body functioning properly. But, if you're an able-bodied person, simple movements performed with good technique with get your muscles in balance with each other, and will train the whole body quite efficiently.
The program is simple. It's an A/B fullbody split, with 3 lifts per day.
Day A
Squats 3x6-8
Press 3x6-8
Power Snatch 5x3-5
Day B
Squats 3x6-8
Dips 3x6-8
Pull Ups/Chin Ups 3x6-8
Begin with light weights for squats, presses and power snatches, and focus on form above weight. Begin with 3x6 (or 5x3), and if you get all your reps with good form, move up to 3x7 (or 5x4). Again, if you get all your reps with good form, move up to 3x8 (or 5x5). Then add 2.5kg/5lb to the bar, and start over at 3x8 (5x3). I repeat once again, START WITH LIGHT WEIGHTS AND FOCUS ON FORM. If you perform a rep with bad form, the rep doesn't count, and the set is to be stopped immediately. Rest as long as you need, then try again, working on your form.
For pull ups/chin ups and dips, starting light may not be an option. Instead, begin by doing as many sets as is necessary to perform 10-15 good reps, trying to always stop 1-2 reps short of failure. Once you can comfortably do 3x6-8 with good form, begin adding weight in small doses - 1.25kg/2.5lb at a time. Follow the rep progression laid out for squats and presses.
If you can't do a single chin up or pull up, begin with scapular pull ups - get in a dead hang position, and without bending your arms, try to pull your shoulder blades down (which will, in effect, pull your chest up slightly). Perform 3x15-20 before moving onto the next exercise.
The next exercise is isometric pull ups. There are 4 positions: the top position (chin above the bar, preferably with the bar touching your upper sternum), the upper middle position (eyes in line with the bar), the lower middle position (head just below the bar) and just above the bottom position (like the position of the scapular pull up, but with your elbows bent about 30 degrees. Build up to being able to hold each of these positions for 2x20sec.
Once you can do that, alternate between eccentric pull ups (starting at the top position and very slowly lowering yourself down) and partial pull ups (going from the upper middle to top for reps, lower middle to upper middle for reps, and above bottom to lower middle for reps. Build up to being able to do sets of 6 eccentric pull ups for 6 seconds/rep or longer, and sets of 5-10 partial pull ups, before attempting full pull ups or chin ups.
If you can't do a single dip, grab a seat or a box, have your feet on the floor or on another box, and use your legs to assist you while dipping. You won't get your shoulders below your elbows dipping this way, because of the difference in torso angle. That's okay. Go as low as you can comfortably go, then drive back up to lockout. You may add weight by laying it across your lap to progress until you can perform dips without using your legs.
Perform both Day A and Day B at least 1x/wk if possible, training 2-3x/wk total on non-consecutive days (eg Mon/Wed/Fri, Tue/Thur/Sat). Alternate between A and B every time you train (so week 1 is ABA, week 2 is BAB, etc). If you start failing on your sets, decrease the weight by 10-20%, return to 3x6 (or 5x3) and start working back up. Always do warm up sets for each exercise. With working weights sets of 3x8x100kg, a good warm up would look like this: 10x20kg, 6x40kg, 4x60kg, 2x80kg.
Conditioning
If you're completely deconditioned cardio-wise, start by just walking for 20-30min 2-3 days per week at most if you're training for a strength/power sport. If it's a strength sport, then this is the most volume of conditioning you really want. For other sports, or for general health you can gradually build up more frequency. For endurance sports, more volume/duration may also be a good thing. This can be done after your strength training or on off-days, but don't do your conditioning before strength training on the same day. For strength/power athletes and people after general health and fitness, gradually build up the intensity of your conditioning, rather than duration.
After a month of walking, maybe start jogging (or cycling/swimming/etc), or doing 1:1 intervals of walking/running (or slow/fast or light/heavy for whatever exercise you want to work with). For athletes where strength is the main priority, ease into increased intensities for conditioning, as conditioning can eat into your recovery from strength training, slowing down progress or even causing you to stall. For athletes where both strength and conditioning are fairly equal in needs, it may help to periodize your training - so, for a few months you'll focusing on increasing your strength while maintaining your conditioning, probably doing 3 strength sessions and 2 conditioning sessions per week. Then for the next few months you'll focus on increasing conditioning with 3 sessions per week, and maintain strength with only 2 strength sessions per week.
After a couple months of training, evaluate what kinds of conditioning you need for your sport. Do you need lots of aerobic fitness? Anaerobic? Alactic? You should have already built up a decent base of aerobic fitness by this time, along with a good base of strength. If you need more anaerobic conditioning, start performing high speed bursts of 45sec, with 2:15 rest between each burst (so starting every 3min, on the min). The rest should be active - don't just lie down; keep walking, doing arm circles, etc, to keep the blood flowing through the working muscles, to assist in clearing out the built up lactic acid.
After another month of this, assess, how long the bursts of activity are in your sport. You've built up your aerobic and lactic thresholds, now it's time to make things sport-specific. There are too many variables hear for me to cover, but train how you play. If in your sport you do little 5sec bursts of activity every 20sec, then train like that. If you do 1min all out efforts every 5min, then train like that. If you do 5min rounds with only 1min rest between rounds, then train like that.
Nutrition
I'm not a nutritionist, so there aren't any diet plans here. But you might be wondering what you should be eating, or how much you should be eating, while on a program like this. Well, the short answer is, eat enough to progress. If you can add 2.5kg to your squats every week, and to your press and power snatch every other week, then you're probably eating enough. If your progress stalls, then other than resetting the weights and easing off conditioning to give your body some more recovery, you may need to add more to your dinner plate to get results coming again.
You should be getting plenty of protein in your diet. For most athletes 1g/lb bodyweight (2.2g/kg bodyweight) is a good amount. The best sources of protein are animal proteins - meat, eggs and milk. If you're a vegetarian or vegan, then you can get protein from plant sources, but my experience tells me that even if you get the same amount of protein as you would on an omnivorous diet, you probably won't progress as quickly as you would on an omnivorous diet. You'll either have to change your attitudes to food, or you'll have to accept that results won't come as quickly as you'd like them to. I've seen vegans on good programs make the same progress in 6 months that omnivores will on an equally good program in 6 weeks.
You should also be getting lots of vegetables, some fruit and some nuts. Add in some water, and you're good to go.
How many calories should you eat? Well, that depends on your sport, your other activities, your body composition needs, etc. As a rule of thumb, anything under 2,000kcal/day is probably not enough. I direct this mostly to the girls, but to some boys, also: 600kcal/day diets are not going to allow you to get anywhere in your sport. In fact, even if you have no sport and you just want to do this program to improve your body shape/size, low calorie diets still aren't enough. Aim for 2,000kcal/day, even if you have bodyfat to lose - with otherwise good nutrition and progressing through the program, your body composition should take care of itself. If you have no other sport, you're trying to reduce bodyfat% and after a couple months 2,000kcal does prove to be too much to have any changes, go no lower than 1,500kcal/day.
For those of you who need more bulk, then you'll need more calories, still. For someone starting out, 2,500-3,000kcal/day is not a bad place to start. Some of you may need even more than that. It's not uncommon to see young male football players who need to bulk up consuming 4,000+ calories, daily.
In this program you will get a general base of strength and conditioning. This is not a sports-specific program, so your sport may have other specific requirements that demand other training protocols, especially on the conditioning side of things. That's okay. You can jump off that bridge when you come to it. But, for a general base of strength and conditioning, this program will suit you well.
Strength
The strength side of this program is where we'll put most of our focus up front. A lot of trainng programs have dozens of intricate, fiddley little exercises to get specific stabiliser muscles firing and work each muscle individually. If you have specific pre-existing muscle imbalances, some of these exercises may be required to get your body functioning properly. But, if you're an able-bodied person, simple movements performed with good technique with get your muscles in balance with each other, and will train the whole body quite efficiently.
The program is simple. It's an A/B fullbody split, with 3 lifts per day.
Day A
Squats 3x6-8
Press 3x6-8
Power Snatch 5x3-5
Day B
Squats 3x6-8
Dips 3x6-8
Pull Ups/Chin Ups 3x6-8
Begin with light weights for squats, presses and power snatches, and focus on form above weight. Begin with 3x6 (or 5x3), and if you get all your reps with good form, move up to 3x7 (or 5x4). Again, if you get all your reps with good form, move up to 3x8 (or 5x5). Then add 2.5kg/5lb to the bar, and start over at 3x8 (5x3). I repeat once again, START WITH LIGHT WEIGHTS AND FOCUS ON FORM. If you perform a rep with bad form, the rep doesn't count, and the set is to be stopped immediately. Rest as long as you need, then try again, working on your form.
For pull ups/chin ups and dips, starting light may not be an option. Instead, begin by doing as many sets as is necessary to perform 10-15 good reps, trying to always stop 1-2 reps short of failure. Once you can comfortably do 3x6-8 with good form, begin adding weight in small doses - 1.25kg/2.5lb at a time. Follow the rep progression laid out for squats and presses.
If you can't do a single chin up or pull up, begin with scapular pull ups - get in a dead hang position, and without bending your arms, try to pull your shoulder blades down (which will, in effect, pull your chest up slightly). Perform 3x15-20 before moving onto the next exercise.
The next exercise is isometric pull ups. There are 4 positions: the top position (chin above the bar, preferably with the bar touching your upper sternum), the upper middle position (eyes in line with the bar), the lower middle position (head just below the bar) and just above the bottom position (like the position of the scapular pull up, but with your elbows bent about 30 degrees. Build up to being able to hold each of these positions for 2x20sec.
Once you can do that, alternate between eccentric pull ups (starting at the top position and very slowly lowering yourself down) and partial pull ups (going from the upper middle to top for reps, lower middle to upper middle for reps, and above bottom to lower middle for reps. Build up to being able to do sets of 6 eccentric pull ups for 6 seconds/rep or longer, and sets of 5-10 partial pull ups, before attempting full pull ups or chin ups.
If you can't do a single dip, grab a seat or a box, have your feet on the floor or on another box, and use your legs to assist you while dipping. You won't get your shoulders below your elbows dipping this way, because of the difference in torso angle. That's okay. Go as low as you can comfortably go, then drive back up to lockout. You may add weight by laying it across your lap to progress until you can perform dips without using your legs.
Perform both Day A and Day B at least 1x/wk if possible, training 2-3x/wk total on non-consecutive days (eg Mon/Wed/Fri, Tue/Thur/Sat). Alternate between A and B every time you train (so week 1 is ABA, week 2 is BAB, etc). If you start failing on your sets, decrease the weight by 10-20%, return to 3x6 (or 5x3) and start working back up. Always do warm up sets for each exercise. With working weights sets of 3x8x100kg, a good warm up would look like this: 10x20kg, 6x40kg, 4x60kg, 2x80kg.
Conditioning
If you're completely deconditioned cardio-wise, start by just walking for 20-30min 2-3 days per week at most if you're training for a strength/power sport. If it's a strength sport, then this is the most volume of conditioning you really want. For other sports, or for general health you can gradually build up more frequency. For endurance sports, more volume/duration may also be a good thing. This can be done after your strength training or on off-days, but don't do your conditioning before strength training on the same day. For strength/power athletes and people after general health and fitness, gradually build up the intensity of your conditioning, rather than duration.
After a month of walking, maybe start jogging (or cycling/swimming/etc), or doing 1:1 intervals of walking/running (or slow/fast or light/heavy for whatever exercise you want to work with). For athletes where strength is the main priority, ease into increased intensities for conditioning, as conditioning can eat into your recovery from strength training, slowing down progress or even causing you to stall. For athletes where both strength and conditioning are fairly equal in needs, it may help to periodize your training - so, for a few months you'll focusing on increasing your strength while maintaining your conditioning, probably doing 3 strength sessions and 2 conditioning sessions per week. Then for the next few months you'll focus on increasing conditioning with 3 sessions per week, and maintain strength with only 2 strength sessions per week.
After a couple months of training, evaluate what kinds of conditioning you need for your sport. Do you need lots of aerobic fitness? Anaerobic? Alactic? You should have already built up a decent base of aerobic fitness by this time, along with a good base of strength. If you need more anaerobic conditioning, start performing high speed bursts of 45sec, with 2:15 rest between each burst (so starting every 3min, on the min). The rest should be active - don't just lie down; keep walking, doing arm circles, etc, to keep the blood flowing through the working muscles, to assist in clearing out the built up lactic acid.
After another month of this, assess, how long the bursts of activity are in your sport. You've built up your aerobic and lactic thresholds, now it's time to make things sport-specific. There are too many variables hear for me to cover, but train how you play. If in your sport you do little 5sec bursts of activity every 20sec, then train like that. If you do 1min all out efforts every 5min, then train like that. If you do 5min rounds with only 1min rest between rounds, then train like that.
Nutrition
I'm not a nutritionist, so there aren't any diet plans here. But you might be wondering what you should be eating, or how much you should be eating, while on a program like this. Well, the short answer is, eat enough to progress. If you can add 2.5kg to your squats every week, and to your press and power snatch every other week, then you're probably eating enough. If your progress stalls, then other than resetting the weights and easing off conditioning to give your body some more recovery, you may need to add more to your dinner plate to get results coming again.
You should be getting plenty of protein in your diet. For most athletes 1g/lb bodyweight (2.2g/kg bodyweight) is a good amount. The best sources of protein are animal proteins - meat, eggs and milk. If you're a vegetarian or vegan, then you can get protein from plant sources, but my experience tells me that even if you get the same amount of protein as you would on an omnivorous diet, you probably won't progress as quickly as you would on an omnivorous diet. You'll either have to change your attitudes to food, or you'll have to accept that results won't come as quickly as you'd like them to. I've seen vegans on good programs make the same progress in 6 months that omnivores will on an equally good program in 6 weeks.
You should also be getting lots of vegetables, some fruit and some nuts. Add in some water, and you're good to go.
How many calories should you eat? Well, that depends on your sport, your other activities, your body composition needs, etc. As a rule of thumb, anything under 2,000kcal/day is probably not enough. I direct this mostly to the girls, but to some boys, also: 600kcal/day diets are not going to allow you to get anywhere in your sport. In fact, even if you have no sport and you just want to do this program to improve your body shape/size, low calorie diets still aren't enough. Aim for 2,000kcal/day, even if you have bodyfat to lose - with otherwise good nutrition and progressing through the program, your body composition should take care of itself. If you have no other sport, you're trying to reduce bodyfat% and after a couple months 2,000kcal does prove to be too much to have any changes, go no lower than 1,500kcal/day.
For those of you who need more bulk, then you'll need more calories, still. For someone starting out, 2,500-3,000kcal/day is not a bad place to start. Some of you may need even more than that. It's not uncommon to see young male football players who need to bulk up consuming 4,000+ calories, daily.
