I like horses, but I’m going to beat this one to smithereens.
For the love of whatever you believe in, knock it off with the year round single sport stuff. (And even similar sports).
The body is not designed to race all year round. Not even close. And especially not as it’s developing.
Here’s what I typically see from kids who are destined to blow up:
1. Sport
2. Another version of the same sport or a “speed camp” from some hack capitalizing on parents desire for performance.
3. Spring sport
4. Summer camp for that sport.
I sure hope you see the problem here. Fast, fast, fast, fast, kaboom!
Catastrophic injury or nagging overuse injury.
If you truly want your kids to play sports successfully and without undue risk of overuse injury do what professional athletes do:
1. Play the season.
2. Rest from the season.
3. Have them do something generalized like a well designed strength and conditioning program, that will allow their bodies the opportunity to slow down and focus on rebuilding proper movement patterns as well as recuperate from what can be a grueling season.
4. After a few months of 3, they can move back to sport specialization (slowly).
Here’s why it works:
1. The body is not well equipped to perform at peak levels all the time.
2. The body is however, remarkably well designed to adapt and get more resilient if allowed the time to rest.
3. Ligaments, tissues, bones, muscles, brains, etc adapt and get stronger through strength training, which if done properly, allows the body to go even faster when it’s let out of the stable at the appropriate time.
Strong kids don’t get hurt.
And if you want professional help for your kid to do this, we have a phenomenally talented coach here at Sandpoint Strength.
Nick Bandy knows his stuff and has helped hundreds of kids build a physical foundation to succeed for decades to come.
