The snake oil salesmen in the youth sports industry just won’t tell you that.
“Sport coaches who encourage an abundance of sport specific ‘lessons’, especially during the season, at the expense of GPP are no different than doctors overprescribing meds.
You unknowing draw to palatability is lining thieves pockets & detracting from your kid’s development.”
-Ray Zingler on Twitter
What are sport practices? Sport Specific Lessons.
What are games? Sport Specific Lessons.
What are showcases? Sport Specific Lessons.
You honestly think your kid needs more sport specific lessons on top of what is already (heavily) overdosed?
At the expense of General Physical Preparation (Sound Strength & Conditioning Training), the construct that is solely responsible for maximizing potential within a given sport?
In the athletic development pyramid, guess what’s at the bottom? GENERAL Physical Prep.
The reason it is at the bottom is so that we can work towards the top of the pyramid where you’ll find Sport Specific Prep.
So, quite literally speaking, an athlete’s potential relies solely on the quality of their base.
We are taking generally underprepared kids and stacking sport specific lessons on top of practices, games, showcase, and tournaments?
I mean not only is this logically speaking, ludicrous from a physiological and athletic development standpoint, its straight criminal that those who claim to be “in it for the kids” are selling this snake oil.
If you’re that good of a coach and you have them all week long in practice, games, film study, and etc. do you really need to sell them “extra” on the side?
Or are you doing it because you know you can exploit the relationship and earn some extra cash on the side?
Mmhhmm.
Parents, I don’t care how much you or your kid “like” this coach.
He can be the coolest guy in the world.
You can think he has the best intentions ever.
But your child’s physiology and development care NOTHING about a nice coach who is good at making easy money.
Do you really want to help your kid develop?
I can assure you it’s not going to come from that 7th sport specific stimulus of the week.
Invest in their base.
Stop trying to raise their ceiling. They’ll hit it very quickly without a rock solid, ever evolving base.
The key to enhancing sport performance in the modern youth athlete is found in elevating their floor.
This is done with less flashy, but (significantly) more important general training.
Build strength, speed, power, and resilience off the field and then watch what happens on it.
