Competition in youth sports is a topic of debate in the sports world. Youth participation in organized sports can have its advantages and disadvantages. Advantages include teamwork and physical fitness while common disadvantages include injury, unequal access and an overemphasis placed on winning. Two additional disadvantages that Livestrong.com detailed in an article posted by Aaron Matthew in 2011are burnout and sport specialization. Burnout occurs when athletes lose interest in a specific sport. This usually happens before athletes reach the peak of their performance ability. Burnout prevents athletes from benefitting from the time dedicated to their sport while growing up. In comparison, sports specialization occurs when athletes drop multiple sports in order to focus on training for one. Danger occurs in sport specialization as this trend is occurring with younger athletes at earlier ages preventing them from developing different motor skills and facing different challenges. I believe that in discussing this topic we need to take a step back and focus on how athletes are affected emotionally and developmentally instead of how their game is hindered or how they lose the benefit from training for their said sport.
Karlie Carlson
LT 22
Kin 577
The article and post point out the negatives of participating in organized sport, such as: the change in the athlete’s attitude, injury, and the negative aspects of poor coaching. I want to focus on the poor coaching part, the article states “Make sure your child's coach has an adult perspective and is not motivated to win at all costs.” From my own personal experience, and that of many athlete friends over the years, I have never once heard that someone regretted having a coach that pushed them to be winners. I find that athletes appreciate when a coach makes them work hard at practice, when athletes feel sore the next day, and when they are better than most of their competition. Of course I am not saying that coaches should be putting their athletes through pain, but I’ve found that we as athletes appreciate being pushed to our limits and later we like to brag about what we have done to get where we are. Long hours at practice and tough drills are not necessarily a bad thing, they teach athletes that they can accomplish their goals, that they are capable of doing better, and beating their competition is just the cherry on top of all the self accomplishments. Having a coach that does not have a mentality to teach his/her athletes to work hard to become better athletes is a disservice to the athlete. Athletes that do not want to work hard or participate in physically draining drills should consider playing just for fun or playing on organized teams that are at a lower level (which require less skill and dedication).
ReplyDeleteDiana Gonzalez
KIN 577
LT22
Read more: http://www.livestrong.com/article/94848-dangers-youth-sports/#ixzz1wJzfCYB6