Speaking for myself: I started programming at age 9, but as a child, I loved to tinker with my father's toolbox [melting lead into copper tubes for improvised firecrackers, making bird traps, manufacturing soap, doing pottery, carving wood, making beautiful, robust, slingshots by bending thicker wires and using thick rubbers, making beautiful darts with X-Ray film and wood, modifying spinning-tops by removing the pin and replacing it with a thicker nail I cut and filed with gradually finer sand-paper to get smooth spinning faster than you'd get if you relied on using it to "break-it" in. I also had "caches" camouflaged in the ground in different locations where I hid items]. For physical activity: I practiced Judo (competitions) for so many years (up to blue belt) [we had military instructors and we made a great use of the obstacle course and beach jogging] and training was many hours pretty much daily or every other day. I played football and was about to sign with a club, but prioritized not to; I also played basketball with friends.
I was lucky in that we lived in a very large compound/closed community that had everything inside and where the thousands of people worked for the same employer, so there was no "risk" of "going out" because you were still "in". That's not something other parents could do elsewhere without fearing their child will be abducted or something.