The Middle School Kids Bootcamp That Changed Lives

I was working out in the gym recently, when a guy in his early 20s approached me. Though I didn’t recognize him, he was one of the hundreds of middle school kids who had passed through my boot camp. He told me that those sessions were the motivation that got him into a health and fitness lifestyle at a time in his life where he could have easily gone down a far more destructive path.

That guy’s story wasn’t unique. I’ve heard it from many other youngsters who were able to discover the physical and mental benefits of getting into a regular workout routine as a result of joining bootcamp. 

I started the middle school bootcamp in 2002. My motivation in doing so was to provide kids with the opportunity to discover a healthy alternative to all of the unhealthy addictions that were confronting them on a daily basis. That’s why my tagline was ‘addicted to bootcamp’. 

In this article, I’ll detail the training programs I put together over the years for the middle school boot camp.

Getting Started

I introduced the idea of a fitness bootcamp to the 1200 students at a friday afternoon assembly. At the time, a new recreation center was being built alongside the school hall. For a long time the kids had watched as the construction workers labored away at the foundations. Week after week it seemed like nothing changed. But then, with the foundations all in place, the rest of the structure came together pretty quickly.

I used the example of that construction project and related it to the kids’ own bodies. They were at the age – between 11 and 13 – where the foundations of their lives were being laid. The foundation they set would determine the course that the rest of their lives would take. And just as setting a foundation pillar at a wrong angle in cement would be very hard to correct, so, too, setting the wrong life’s foundations are extremely hard to overcome. 

I told the kids that our first session would be the following Tuesday morning at 7:30. I had no idea how many would turn up, but had to be prepared for anything. So, I asked three of my personal training staff to come along to help with a potential overflow. They were all in on the whole boot camp for kids concept and readily agreed to volunteer their time.

The first session would be a fitness assessment so we could group the kids according to their fitness level. We came up with a modified version of the general fitness assessment we used with our adult clients. It consisted of a 12 minute run around a set of cones, push ups, body weight squats, the Beep fitness test and the sit and reach flexibility test.

We turned up at the school at 6:30 and set up four fitness assessment stations. We then waited, not knowing how many, if any, kids would turn up. The first few started trickling in around 7 am. Then more and more bodies turned up. By the time it was time to kick things off, there were more than a hundred kids standing before me. 

The first assessment went well. We were able to get the kids into four leveled groups, each one with an assigned instructor. The average size of each group was 25 kids. 

Boot Camp Structure

The boot camp workouts were held every Tuesday and Thursday morning. They’d start at 7:30 and finish at 8:15. The school bell rang at 8:30, which was the time that the kids had to be lined up outside their classroom. 

It was the middle of summer when we kicked off, so we were able to make use of the school field. We also had access to the school gym, which consisted of a basketball court, with a climbing wall at one end and an adjoining hall with bleachers. 

From the very start I stressed that discipline and order were going to  be the hallmarks of our boot camp. I told the kids that they should expect other students to make fun of them as they watched them go through their paces on the field. But I reminded them that they were the ones who had the guts and determination to get in the arena and do something to make themselves better. They should be proud about that and not worry about those wannabes who were too weak and lazy to improve themselves. 

Each group would spend 12 minutes at a station. They would then jog in a line to the next station. That meant that each student would go through three stations every workout. A trainer would be assigned to a set workout station and adjust for the fitness level of the incoming group.

The Workout Stations

Each of the four workout stations were designed to work on a different aspect of fitness. Two stations were based on the field, while the other two were in the gym, one in the main gym and the other in the secondary hall.

The four stations were:

• Station 1 ( Gym): Cardio, plyo, bodyweight 
• Station 2 (Hall): Core training circuit
• Station 3: (Field): Tire workout
• Station 4: (Field): T-Sprint 

Here’s an overview of each workout …

Station One

When the kids came into this station, they would begin my jogging up and down the basketball court for two minutes. During that time the trainer would call out 7 actions with corresponding numbers, as follows:

1. Push ups
2. Plank
3. Wall Sit
4. Touch the right side wall
5. Touch the left side wall
6. Jumping Jacks
7. Burpees

In the very first session, the trainer demonstrated how to do each exercise properly. 

After the two minute warm-up, the trainer would call out a random number. The students would have to immediately stop jogging and do the corresponding exercise. Part of the challenge was to remember the exercise that corresponded with each number. In this way we were getting their minds as well as their bodies active.

The trainer would judge the length of time that each action was carried on for based on the fitness level of the group. He would then blow his whistle to indicate to the kids to resume jogging. Over the course of the session,each of the seven exercises would be covered 2-3 times. 

Station Two

In preparation for this station, the trainer would lay out a set of playing cards on each side of the bleachers. There would also be a board at the other end of the hall that listed the playing cards with a corresponding exercise and rep count to match it. 

The kids were divided into two even groups. The aim of the sessions was to compete against the other group to collect the most number of playing cards. A runner from each group would sprint from the end of the hall to the bleachers, run up them and grab the card. On the way back he would call out the playing card number. The moment he got over the line, the entire group had to do the matching exercise for the stated number of reps. 

When everyone in the group had completed the required rep count, another runner would head off for the next card. Every member of the group had to do a  run before anyone could do a second run. 

Here are the exercises and rep counts we used:

• Ace: Burpees x 10
• One: Mountain climbers x 10
• Two: Plank x 30 seconds
• Three: Push-ups x 10
• Four: V-ups x 10
• Five: High Knees x 30 seconds
• Six: Butt Kicks x 30 seconds
• Seven: Wall sit x 30 seconds
• Eight: Crunches x 15
• Nine: Shoulder taps x 10
• Ten: Lying leg raises x 10
• Jack: Vertical jump x 10
• Queen: Glute bridge x 10
• King: Donkey kick x 15

Station Three

The group of kids would arrive on the field to find five tires laid out. Each tire had a sledge hammer alongside it. Three sets of cones marked 5 yard advancements from the tires. 

The students would be put into five groups and lined up, sitting behind a tire. There was a three yard distance from the beginning of the line to the tire.

When the trainer blew his whistle, the first student in each line would jump up and sprint to the tire. They would then grab the sledgehammer and begin slamming the tire. After 15 slams, they would then flip the tire to the first cone. 

Once they reached the cone, the students would roll the tire to the second cone. They would then have to carry the cone to the last cone. They could use any means to do so but the tire was not to touch the ground. 

The kids would then have to flip the tire all the way back to the start position. Then the next kid in the group would set off. 

We used ordinary car tires for this challenge. 

Station Four

This station was a straight out agility and speed developer.  Two sets of five cones would be laid out to form lower case ‘t’s. The distance between each cone was 5 yards. 

The kids would be divided into four equal groups. Two groups were assigned to each set of cones. Groups were placed at each of the top and bottom cones seated in line. On the whistle, the first student in each group was to jump up and sprint to the middle cone, touching it with their hand. They would then pivot and run to the right side, against touching. Next they would run back to the central cone and keep going to touch the left side cone. They’d then run back to the middle cone, touch and sprint back to the start position. Then the next kid would go. 

The Monthly Challenge

Every four weeks, we would hold a group challenge. The kids would be put into groups of four. We made sure that each group had an even representation of the different fitness ability levels. Each group would then be handed a list of challenges that had to be completed. The first group to report back to the start position with their completed checklist would be the winner.

I left it up to the kids to monitor themselves, so there would be no adults to make sure they didn’t cheat. This was all a part of training them to be honest with themselves and to realize that by cheating on a physical task they are only robbing themselves. 

Here is what a typical challenge task sheet looked like:

1. 200 push ups
2. 2 x round the school perimeter
3. 10 minutes wall sit
4. 100 crunches
5. 100 burpees
6. 10 basketball hoops with a medicine ball
7. 10 minutes plank
8. Carry on member across the football field 2 times

A task like 200 push ups represented the combined group total. They had the voice of doing 50 each or having just one or two members pump out the entire number. So success depended on the strategy that was worked out at the start in the division of the tasks. 

The Gym Workout

Eventually we ended up with a pretty well equipped gym on the school ground as part of our training resources. That gave us more scope in terms of our training options and allowed us to introduce the kids to the more conventional bodyweight training that is done in commercial gyms. 

The gym was equipped with a combination of resistance bands, suspension trainers, dumbbells, barbells, benches and a Smith machine. 

The challenge was to keep all 25 members of a fitness group constantly engaged during the workouts. The obvious way to do that was with circuit weight training. As a result we arranged the equipment in circuit fashion, with a resistance exercise being situated alongside a cardio station. That way students were able to move seamlessly around the circuit, alternating from a resistance movement to work a specific muscle group to an aerobic exercise to improve their heart fitness and burn calories.  

Here is how we set up the circuit:

• Station One: Leg press
• Station Two: Mini trampoline
• Station Three: Dumbbell bench press
• Station Four: Jump rope
• Station Five: Renegade row
• Station Six: Exercise bike
• Station Seven: Squats
• Station Eight: High Knees
• Station Nine: Wall sit
• Station Ten: Mini trampoline
• Station Eleven: Lunges
• Station Twelve: Step ups
• Station Thirteen: Lat pulldown
• Station Fourteen: Burpees
• Station Fifteen: Dips
• Station Sixteen: Mini trampoline
• Station Seventeen: Resistance band bicep curls
• Station Eighteen: Jump Rope
• Station Nineteen Resistance band shoulder press
• Station Twenty: Exercise bike
• Station Twenty-One: Superman
• Station Twenty-Two: Step ups
• Station Twenty Three: V-Ups
• Station Twenty-Four: Tire slam
• Station Twenty-Five: Treadmill

We set up a red light system that beeped every 30 seconds, and then gave the kids fifteen seconds to move to the next station before beeping again. 

During the winter months, when we were unable to use the field, we would only have two stations per session: the gym circuit and some sort of challenge game in the hall. 

Wrap Up

I ran the kid’s boot camp for more than a decade. Over that time, hundreds of kids were introduced to the fitness lifestyle and I’m confident that many of them still have health and fitness as a central part of their lives. 

I  believe that there is a desperate need for more initiatives such as the fitness boot camp for middle school kids that I introduced a couple of decades ago today. Our youngsters are more unhealthy, more overweight and more depressed than ever. 

If you are a personal trainer, why not take up the mantle and get a fitness boot camp for kids going in your area? All you have to do is follow the template that I’ve laid out for you!