This post was contributed by a community member. The views expressed here are the author's own.

Health & Fitness

Fitness and Nutrition Tips for Young Athletes

For young athletes, summer is also a perfect time to work on individual goals instead of team goals.

The end of the school year is here, and teens all over the North County are planning their summer. Many dream about a summer of “hanging out” with friends or traveling. Others have summer jobs or do volunteer work. There are also hundreds of students who go to some kind of camp every summer to try to gain an advantage in their field of interest or talent.

Today’s youth camps offer a wide variety of choices. For every interest, there seems to be a camp or program. St. Louis is a very competitive place, and youth camps are big businesses. A large number of sports organizations, churches, educational institutions and private companies offer specialized enrichment camps. Parents have been known to go to great lengths to secure a spot for their children in one of these high priced performance-enhancement programs.

For young athletes, summer is also a perfect time to work on individual goals instead of team goals. In schools, clubs and camps, trainers and coaches frequently work with large groups of athletes, which often limits the time they can spend with an individual athlete for personal improvement.

Find out what's happening in Florissantwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

Gyms and personal training studios can provide one-on-one attention that is so important to a young athlete’s development in their sport. They often have skilled trainers who are qualified to work with the athlete one-on-one or in small groups at affordable prices. Trainers can work on skills such as: improving the athlete’s form, power, speed, strength, agility, flexibility, and stabilization. They can also educate the athlete on injury prevention and post-rehabilitation training.

One-on-one or small group training/coaching can also help the athlete to:

Find out what's happening in Florissantwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

• Decide on at least one attainable goal to work towards over the summer

• Design a game plan to achieve the goal that has been set

• Provide accountability

• Disciplined programming to keep the athlete on track to the goal that has been set.

Physical improvement is achieved by regular exercise, hard work, proper rest and good nutrition. If the body does not receive the nutrition it needs for top performance, it can’t perform to the best of its ability. This is why summer is also a good time to start better eating habits. It gives an athlete time to develop good eating habits. My advice is to keep healthy, ready-to-eat snacks in the fridge so there is always an alternative to the chips, cookies and candy that too many people grab when they feel hungry.

A nutritionist can design individual meal plans to enhance the athlete’s training program and make sure that the athlete consumes the necessary calories and nutrients for top notch physical development and performance.

Hydration is very important. Too many young athletes do not properly hydrate. Fancy bottled sports drinks are often filled with artificial ingredients and sugar. They have their place in the hydration field, but generally the most effective hydration fluid is good old-fashioned water. Make sure to drink before, during, and after physical training.

Enough rest is also crucial to physical improvement, and this is especially true in the teen years of athletes. Muscles need to recover, rebuild and strengthen. Not allowing for proper rest in between training sessions can cause over-training or even more serious problems; over-training can cause the athlete to feel weak or even ill, it can decrease sports performance, and can increase the risk for injuries. It is important for the athlete to get eight hours of sleep every night and to go to bed before midnight as often as possible. Taking an afternoon nap is also helpful.

Remember to always focus on becoming better today than you were yesterday. Can you do it? Absolutely! Work smart, work hard and stay focused.

We’ve removed the ability to reply as we work to make improvements. Learn more here

The views expressed in this post are the author's own. Want to post on Patch?

More from Florissant