But here is precisely why adults don’t value generalized training for their kids:
“The reason many adults don’t value generalized training for their kids is because they’ve never been generally physically prepared themselves.
They don’t understand the value.
This is the reason they subject their kids to the zero sum game that is premature specialization.”
-Ray Zingler on X
It’s not my opinion, but fact that our athletic performance potential hinges on the quality and robustness of our general base.
Despite an evolving base of general preparation being critical to sustained athletic performance, many people undervalue it because A) general training isn’t sexy, and B) they are under the illusion that they can get away without it.
But here is a fact, Jack, despite “feeling like” you can get away without it, you’re by default leaving your own potential on the table.
Sure, you can compare yourself to “that guy” over there and assume you don’t need it because you’re already “better than him”, but by doing so, I can promise you’ll never come close to being better than who YOU could be.
Using somebody else’s performance or lack thereof to justify your own personal laziness is a recipe for disaster, not only for sport, but for life.
But this is precisely the reason our kids are subject to this premature specialization and skip out on the most critical componentry of athletic performance.
It boils down to laziness. And this laziness is learned.
Most adults have never been generally physically prepared themselves, so they don’t at all understand the value of it.
There is no frame of reference whatsoever.
“Start and continue to build on a foundation with modalities that lack sex appeal? When we could just use inflated perceptions of our children’s abilities to justify skipping over the fundamentals and prematurely advancing them?”
This is why we are where we are in the youth sports world.
The toxic, money driven rat race, full of kids who burn out and/or get injured before even gaining access to scratch the surface of their true potential.
We throw copious amounts of money at snake oil salesman because everybody else is and then we wonder why we all receive similar net outcomes.
The system is broken and the only way the pendulum will shift in the other direction is if responsible adults toe the line and call the mess what it is: A farce.
It is only when we acknowledge what it actually is that we can take action to shift the tide.
Our kids are losing every day because we are teaching them to expect the very concept of instant gratification.
