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Today’s sports are more competitive than ever, with youth athletes devoting their lives to a sport as young as 5 years old, on occasion with pressure from parents.

But does specializing this early in a sport give a child a competitive advantage in both the short and long term?

The latest research proves that there is more downside than upside.

The Consequence of Specializing Too Early

Even though focusing on a single sport develops the skills, coordination, and sport specific conditioning for doing well in that sport in the short term, the athlete is limited in building transferable sport skills.

Increasing transferable sport skills allows the athlete to participate in a variety of sporting and social situations which increase the likelihood they will have a positive experience in their sport life according the Long Term Athlete Development Principles.

Some of the negative consequences of specializing are overuse injuries and chronic injuries such as rotator cuff injuries in throwing sports, tennis elbow, stress fractures, and acl injuries.

From a psychological standpoint, young athletes face pressure from coaches, parents, and themselves, stressing themselves to always do well and emotionally devastated if they fail having to face their parents and coaches.

They may become obsessed with just winning and overly frustrated when they don’t (even though who wants to be satisfied with losing.)

This typically leads to an unbalanced lifestyle in which social and personal life is compromised for the sake of competition, inevitably detracting the ability to build the true social skills necessary in building a successful life outside of sports.

“Specialization in one sport leads to a progressive loss of freedom in exchange for increased excellence and precision”

Ultimately, specializing in sport too early that requires a year round commitment can lead to psychological burnout.

Such busy lives can make a youth athlete feel as if they have no control over their own lives, which can lead to depression, chronic fatigue, and even eating disorders.

The initial intention of trying to create a high caliber athlete can ironically lead to an athlete who burns out and drops out due to the anxiety.

Specializing at the Right Time

A study conducted by Naker, Côté, and Abernathy (2003) demonstrated the importance of youth athletes playing multiple sports.

The finding showed a positive correlation between athletes who played multiple sports growing up and their chances of succeeding and becoming an elite athlete.

This is most likely due the development of a broader range of movement skills and decision making skills.

Youth athletes who try a number of different sports and specialize at an older age reach higher performance levels than those who specialize too early.

They are less likely to burn out and not develop the perfectionist mentality typical of early specialization.

It should be understood that unless a sport like gymnastics that does require early specialization, committing to just a single sport too early is not the ultimate determinant of athletic success.

Developing physical literacy and specializing at the right time is.

It is unfortunate that younger athletes face such pressures. It is vital that parents coaches and even the athlete is aware of the consequences both mentally and physically of committing to a single sport to early.

We have all experienced at some point tightness. Whether it be from a previous workout that has made you sore, or just naturally lacking “limberness”.

However, for a long time there has been the adage that you should be stretching before workouts, but what you will see most commonly are people holding static stretches before activity as a part of their warmup.

But is this really good?

Before delving into the question it is necessary to get a better understanding of exactly what flexibility means, the different types of flexibility, and the anatomical components that collectively make up flexibility.

The Anatomy

In simple terms, flexibility is the gross range of motion across a joint. However there are multiple factors that contribute to being flexible. One is basic joint mobility which plays a significant role in flexibility.

Joint mobility is heavily dependent on joint capsule integrity and the corresponding ligaments of the capsule.

The capsule surrounds a synovial joint and is comprised of two layers, with the innermost layer being the synovial membrane.

Capsule mobility will adapt based on an individual’s activity and is a necessary response to capacitate the demands of activity, especially for athletes.

Another factor is muscle length and tone. Muscle is a contractile tissue also significantly involved in flexibility.

Within each muscle are sarcomeres that contain proteins called actin and myosin that slide past each other during contraction. Through different chemical reactions, these proteins bind to each other causing contractions and relaxation of the muscle.

Thus, optimal contractile ability ultimately depends on the length-tension relationship of the muscle and muscle cells, including the sarcomeres. The overlap of these protein filaments in a lengthened or shortened state are less efficient than when in mid-range, thus bringing into question the benefits of static stretching before explosive activity.

Another component to flexibility is fascia mobility. The glue that holds all other tissues together, the fascia is made up of adjacent layers of collagen fibers, intertwined with elastic fibers and layered with adipose tissue.

Its composition of collagen and elastic fibers makes it resistant to traction, but adaptable to stretching. Thus fascia is extremely pliable and resistant, and almost inextensible.

This rare physiological makeup makes the fascia interesting in its role in flexibility and the techniques to stretch it as research continues to discover it’s full capabilities.

Anatomically, these factors collectively contribute to overall flexibility.

So Is Flexibility a Benefit To Overall Performance?

Research on this topic has been contradictory with parties divided saying both yes and no.

Some studies have shown that the acute effects of stretching can be detrimental to performance and static stretching can reduce muscle stiffness, reducing its ability to quickly contract.

To better understand, we have to consider the basic physiology of the muscle and the sliding filament theory. This is where actin slides across myosin, grabbing it to create muscular contraction. When the muscle gets to stretched out, those actin fibers get far apart from each other, making it less efficient to grab the myosin filament decreasing the muscles ability to contract.

If a muscles’ contractibility has been compromised, then its strength and power generation potential decreases having a negative impact on performance.

Dynamic vs Static Flexibility

Research has however proven that there is a clear advantage in doing Dynamic stretching versus static stretching before performance and training.

Dynamic stretching involves more movement of joints, muscles, and tendons preparing the body for specific movement as well as elevating internal temperature.

Dynamic, or active stretching has been shown to improve immediate power and agility as long as it is performed within 60 minutes of activity.

Static flexibility (standing still and touching your toes) has been shown to have negative acute effects on performance, but beneficial long term effects on overall flexibility and joint health.

Static, or passive stretching reduces rate of force development by compromising the viscosity of muscle tissue, furthering the argument on its effectiveness immediately to performance.

For this reason it is recommended that static stretches be reserved for post workout cool down and done on off days.

So is flexibility beneficial?

While research is still ongoing, the short answer is yes depending on your lifestyle.

For the active person or athlete, dynamic stretching is more appropriate immediate to performance and activity while passive stretching better for afterwards or off days because of the physiological properties of muscles.

Both provide benefits both short and long term when used accordingly.

What kind of diet should you be on?

Keto? Low Carb? Intermittent fasting?

While each of these can have there place in the committed person’s dieting routine, often time when you take a look at the root cause of the current eating patterns that make you want to try any of these in the first place, we see that you can make some small tweaks to your habits.

If you are trying to simply lose weight, or just trying to improve your overall eating habits, here are a few places to start.

1.) Plan Ahead

One of the biggest reasons that “busy” people have for eating out at restaurants if because of lack of time. Poor time management accounts for poor food choices. When you take some time each week to prepare a menu of foods ahead of time, you eliminate the need to want to go to that fast food restaurant to satisfy your appetite.

Make a list of foods that you enjoy, create a grocery list, and take an hour or so on Sundays to prepare your meals for the week. This will not only save you poor food choices, but will save you money in the long run.

2.) Eat in Peace

Are you watching tv while you eat? Are you on your phone scrolling through you timeline? If so, you are not eating mindfully. You are distracted.

When this happens, you are not as aware of your body’s fullness ques that let you know when it does not want any more food. After a certain point, you just keep eating past your hungers limit, causing you to eat in excess.

When you eliminate these distractions, and eat mindfully, then you are more in tune with your body’s fullness cue and will eat less. Try keeping the TV off, and putting your phone away when you eat.

3.) Get to Bed On Time

When you go to bed later, you are doing more than just setting yourself up to have a lower energy day. The longer you stay awake, the more opportunity you create to eat those midnight snacks. As you ease past your body’s natural sleep times, your brain literally craves food since it is past it’s bedtime. It sends signals to you to replenish it with food for energy, specifically sugars since they absorb the fastest and can be used more quickly.

This is why you may tend to crave sweets later in the night.

When you are in bed on time, you don’t give your brain the opportunity to crave foods.

4.) Prepare Healthy Snacks

So you literally may NOT have the time to prepare the foods on the weekend, or you could just be a terrible cook.

One strategy that can help you is to create a roster of health snacks that you enjoy, and keep them handy. It can be fruits, trail mix, nuts, seeds, as long as its something that you actually enjoy, and its versatile enough to have close by when you need some extra fuel.

When you create a list of foods that you already enjoy, and are easy to prepare, you are setting yourself up for success.

Notice anything about these 4 tips?

They don’t mention calories, they don’t mentions carbs, and they don’t mention starving yourself before your next beach vacation.

Each of these addresses fundamental behaviors that when followed consistently, can drastically improve your eating habits, which in turn can help you achieve your desired goals.

Try implementing at least one of these behaviors for 3 weeks, and then try another. You don’t have to rush all of them at once. Just start somewhere!

If you would like more information on how we help people improve their eating habits, check out our nutritional coaching program here!

You know you have the work ethic.

You know you have the potential to be a contributor on your team.

You see other athletes who work nowhere near as hard as you, but coach stays patting them on the ass.

Your coach doesn’t take you seriously. He looks right by you and seems to always criticize you before sharing any positive reinforcement.

You have thought about quitting. A sport that you were once passionate about is now void of any passion, and you dread going to practices, and hate the game because you barely get any playing time. It’s embarrassing.

I personally understand your situation. It is a roller coaster of emotion that can leave you so drained, it’s borderline depressing.

BUT, while some of these things are out of your control, here are a few things that you can do to prevent discouragement, boost your own self-esteem, and help you to improve as a player AND person.

1.) Focus on what you CAN control

Who the coach decides to make his favorite, or how his politically driven coaching system operates is not immediately in your control. It sucks, yes it does. But if you make a mental shift, and view it as an opportunity to work harder, then instantly you change the outcome of your emotion.

When you fret and dwell on things that are out of your immediate control, it’s like running in quicksand.

When you set foot onto the practice field, or the basketball court, lacrosse field etc, make it a point to get better at ONE aspect of your game every single time. No one can affect that process but you.

Regardless of whether you get time in with the “ones”, you still got better. Imagine doing this for a 3 month long season, 30 days in a month, you can potentially be 90x better than you were at the beginning.

Believe me when I tell you that others will take notice.

Control what YOU can control.

2.) Try to get Feedback

This one might put you in an uncomfortable position and may take a little bit of time to build up to, but I strongly recommend it.

Approach your coach one day after practice or pull him or her aside and ask if they have just 5 minutes to meet with you.

When you meet with them, ask them this:

“Coach, what specifically do I need to do to get an opportunity to prove myself on the field?”

This is a straight shot question that will force the coach to be as direct as possible.

This question is powerful. Essentially what you are doing is asking for your coach’s advice to give you your opportunity. If he intentionally gives you instruction on what do to, but still does not give you your opportunity, then he has to come to terms with the fact that he is dishonest. He told you what to do, and still didn’t give you your shot.

I don’t care how untrustworthy a coach is, from outside looking in, they never want to look like a flat liar IN FRONT of others.

When you ask this question, he may say, “Just keep working hard, and be patient.” Something along those lines. And hey, if this is really the case, sometimes you DO just have to be patient. However, if you feel like the coach is blowing you off, then ask a follow up question:

“Thanks coach. Can you be more specific. What’s one thing that I should work on to increase my shot?”

Here they should literally tell you what it is, and you work at it with insane focus to improve.

Again, it might take a little courage to approach your coach with this question, but any feedback you can get to streamline your improvement and chance of getting on the field is huge.

3.) Get A Strong Support System

This is probably one of the most important aspects of this journey to understand.

Have someone in your corner who encourages you and understands what you are going through. That may be family, another teammate, or even an assistant coach on the team who recognizes what you can do, but does not have the power to make the change.

Get with them.

They will be the ones who will keep you up when you are at your lowest. They will also help keep you accountable.

Don’t go it alone.

There will be times you will feel like you are on a lonely island. Having a strong support system is key in keeping you moving forward.

If it weren’t for my best friend in high school, who is to this day my best friend, I would not have gotten through it.

Find someone.

****

It’s not the easiest thing to go through, but if you trust in and follow these 3 steps, the journey will not only bring you closer to opportunity, but will make you an incredibly stronger, more perseverant person in the end.

It does not take much to get an effective workout.

Resistance bands are a staple in our training programs not only for our elite athletes, but our general fitness clientele. They are a great tool to have at home when you don’t necessarily have access to a full gym, but you still want an effective workout that can target multiple muscle groups.

Bands are inexpensive, you can travel with them easily, are great because of the accommodating resistance, and also they don’t stress the joints as much as traditional weights but still are an effective way of training.

Below are 6 exercises that we use at our training facility often, and that you can do right from home!

The Pallof Press

This is a great exercise for “core” strengthening and also the hips. This exercise is also a great one to do before heavy structural exercises like squats as it gets the deeper muscle surrounding the spine working.

Pallof Lift

A slightly different version of the Pallof press, only lifting the band instead of pressing. This engages the shoulders more than the standard press.

Chop

A great rotational exercise for the core and the hips. You can vary your positions to increase the challenge, and isolate the trunk more by doing it from kneeling, staggered stance, half kneeling. We use this very often.

Lateral Band Walk

Great exercise that strengthens the hip and abductors of the legs.

Band Squat:

A different variation of the traditional squat. Using the band in this sense loads the quads and hips slightly more, creating more stimulus to gain strength.

Banded Deadlift

Another variation of the traditional deadlift, taking more stress off of the joints but still engaging the hips, glutes, quads, and hamstrings.

Try incorporating these exercises into your training regimen to have a more complete in home or gym program. You can increase the sets and reps, or the actual speed of the exercise to increase or reduce the challenge of the exercise!

If you are interesting in having us create a custom training program for you, let’s set up call and see how we might be able to help you!

Train hard. Enjoy !