What Exactly is LTAD? How Do Parents and Athletes Make the Correct Choices?

Reading “The Race to Nowhere in Youth Sports” (click on the top article in the Specific Topics Column to the right) brings up many issues that confront parents of young athletes.  I would suggest reading it first and then reading my thoughts here.

When I was young (many decades ago) there were only two Youth Sports for boys that existed where I lived; Little League Baseball (ages 9-12) and AAU Swimming (ages 8 > 18). Girls had the Swim Club and Baton Club (yes, Baton Twirling!!) and that was IT.

But, in those days, schools taught the Fundamental Movement Skills (FMS) beginning in Kindergarten and continuing through Junior High School. Even more important, PE was mandatory every day in JR. High and High School. Five, Six and Seven Year Olds were taught Basic Motor Skills BEFORE being introduced into Advanced Motor Skills. By the time children were in Sixth Grade, they had a large and varied “Movement Vocabulary” that made transition into Jr. High sports successful for many students who were participating in Basketball, Flag Football, Track and Field, Softball, etc. In addition, many minor sports (Volleyball, Wrestling, Gymnastics, etc.) were introduced.

The disappearance of this valuable PHYSICAL EDUCATION, in favor of playing recreational games with little or no instruction along with the elimination of daily PE instruction for Elementary Schools created a severe lack of both physical activity AND the development of Basic and Advanced Motor Skills (or Movement Skills).

Rigorous Physical Fitness programs in Jr. High and High Schools (along with Fitness Testing with comparison to the National Norms…remember the President’s Fitness Test?) were also eliminated.

This void of physical instruction and regular physical activity in the schools gave rise to many youth sports offered through various sources such as City Rec. Departments and parent groups forming Sports Leagues through associations already established like Little League, Pony League, etc.

As  “The Race to Nowhere in Youth Sports” points out “The path is a race to nowhere, and it does not lead to better athletes. It produces bitter athletes who get hurt, burnout and quit sports altogether”.

There are many reasons for these assertions and many studies and large volumes of data to prove the claims.  BUT, there are better choices for parents and young athletes who truly want to develop as athletes. LTAD, or Long Term Athlete Development, involves a step-by-step plan to best develop the “total athlete” BEFORE deciding to specialize in a particular sport AT THE RIGHT AGE.

The various paths open to parents and young, aspiring athletes for successful preparation for later sports success can be chosen with proper education on all the research data and the kind of information that I will attempt to provide with articles and research like to the two that I have added below that may be useful. You may also click on the 2nd link under Specific Topics to read a current article on Vanderbilt winning the College Baseball World Series and the LTAD their athletes prescribed to. MORE TO COME…as Stuart McMillan recommends, Analyze and Synthesize!

 

Effectiveness of early sport specialization limited in most sports, sport diversification may be better approach at young ages

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April 23, 2013

American Medical Society for Sports Medicine

Ever-increasing requirements for success in competitive sports has created added pressure for young athletes to train with greater intensity at earlier ages. The goal to become the next Olympian or more commonly, to obtain a college scholarship, motivates many parents to encourage their children to specialize in one sport at a young age. This has resulted in an increased demand for year-round sport training programs, facilities and products. But is this approach really an effective way to generate long-term success in competitive athletics?

Ever-increasing requirements for success in competitive sports has created added pressure for young athletes to train with greater intensity at earlier ages. The goal to become the next Olympian or more commonly, to obtain a college scholarship, motivates many parents to encourage their children to specialize in one sport at a young age. This has resulted in an increased demand for year-round sport training programs, facilities and products. But is this approach really an effective way to generate long-term success in competitive athletics?

John P. DiFiori, MD, President of the American Medical Society for Sports Medicine, Chief of the Division of Sports Medicine and Non-Operative Orthopaedics at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA and Team Physician for the UCLA Department of Intercollegiate Athletics, says that few who specialize in one sport at a very young age make it to elite levels. "With the exception of select sports such as gymnastics in which the elite competitors are very young, the best data we have would suggest that the odds of achieving elite levels with this method are exceedingly poor. In fact, some studies indicate that early specialization is less likely to result in success than participating in several sports as a youth, and then specializing at older ages."

Dr. DiFiori encourages youth attempt to a variety of sports and activities. He says this allows children to discover sports that they enjoy participating in, and offers them the opportunity to develop a broader array of motor skills. In addition, this may have the added benefit of limiting overuse injury and burnout.

A UCLA sports specialization study surveying 296 NCAA Division I male and female athletes, average age 19, found that 88 percent participated in an average of two to three sports as a children, and 70 percent did not specialize in one sport until after the age of 12. In a similar study of Olympians in Germany, results found that on average, the Olympians had participated in two other sports during childhood before or parallel to their main sport. Both studies support the concept of sports diversification in adolescence -- not specialization.

In his nearly 20 years serving as a team physician for the UCLA Department of Intercollegiate Athletics, Dr. DiFiori appreciates the benefits of sports participation in general -- increased self-esteem, self-discipline, development of leadership qualities and social skills, and overall health and well-being. But he warns external pressure on a child to train and compete in one sport at an early age may cause more harm than good. Social isolation, lack of independence, preferential treatment, abusive relationship, burnout and injury are some of the potential negative effects.

"Physical activity contributes to a happy and healthy childhood," says Dr. DiFiori, "however, parents, coaches and children should monitor and measure their involvement level in a singular sport against the overall well-being and future success of the participant."

Dr. DiFiori presented, "Early Sports Participation: A Prescription for Success?" on Thursday, April 18, 2013, at the annual meeting of the American Medical Society for Sports Medicine in San Diego, Calif.

Sports specialization, hours spent in organized sports may predict young athlete injury

October 28, 201

American Academy of Pediatrics

Athletes ages eight to 18 who spend twice as many hours per week in organized sports than in free play, and especially in a single sport, are more likely to be injured.

Athletes ages 8 to 18 who spend twice as many hours per week in organized sports than in free play, and especially in a single sport, are more likely to be injured, according to an abstract presented Monday, Oct. 28 at the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) National Conference and Exhibition in Orlando.

The study, "Risks of Specialized Training and Growth for Injury in Young Athletes: A Prospective Cohort Study," found athletes who played more hours per week than their age -- for example, an 8-year-old who played more than 8 hours per week -- were more likely to be injured. In addition, athletes who spend more than twice as much time in organized sports than in free play, whatever their age or sport, are more likely to be injured and have serious overuse injuries.

The study involved more than 1,200 child and adolescent athletes who came to one of two Chicago hospitals and affiliated clinics for either a sports-related injury or a sports physical. Researchers collected information from each patient at enrollment, including the intensity and length of training, degree of sports specialization, Tanner stage (a measure of physical development), and height and weight. The same data was collected from each participant at 6-month intervals for up to three years between 2010 and 2012.

The degree of sports specialization was determined by a 6-point score based on whether or not the athlete: Trains more than 75 percent of the time in one sport; trains to improve skill; misses time with friends; has quit other sports to focus on one sport; considers one sport more important than other sports; regularly travels out of state; trains more than eight months a year or competes more than six months per year.

"The young athletes who more intensely specialized in a single sport were more likely to have an injury and a serious overuse injury," which typically keeps athletes out of play for a longer period of time, said lead study author Neeru Jayanthi, MD.

There were 837 injured participants with 859 unique injuries, and 360 uninjured participants. Injured athletes were older than uninjured athletes (14 +/- 2.2 years vs. 12.9 +/- 2.6 years), reported a higher average number of hours per week playing organized sports (11.3 +/- 6.9 hours vs. 9.4 +/-8.2 hours), and higher average hours per week in total sports activity including gym, free play and organized sports activities (19.7 hours +/- 9 hours vs. 17.6 +/- 10.3).

Injured athletes also had significantly higher sports specialization scores than uninjured athletes (3.3+/- 1.6 vs. 2.7 +/- 1.6), even after adjusting for hours per week in total sports activity and age.

"We found that kids on average play organized sports nearly twice as much as free play," said Dr. Jayanthi. "Those kids who exceed that two-to-one ratio are more likely to be injured."

"Our next goal is to research whether educating parents and kids about this ratio of time spent in sports versus free play, and providing them with more specific guidelines, will reduce overuse injuries in youth sports," said co-investigator Cynthia R. LaBella, MD, FAAP.

RECOVERY & REGENERATION: The Forgotten Fifty-Percent of High Performance Training

It is important for young athletes to realize at an early age that "balance" in their lives is critical to their emotional, mental and physical growth. Training like collegiate or professional athletes should not be something they should replace their "youthful play" years with!

It is far more important to learn to eat a well balanced diet, avoid "fast foods", get the right amount of sleep nightly and engage in as many various types of sports and physical activities as they can. 

Of the above factors, Sleep is probably is least known PERFORMANCE & GROWTH ENHANCEMENT and, in addition, it is critical to the overall well being and development of all of the bodies organs and systems. So, to the right of this column, under the Specific Topics Column, you can click on Optimizing Performance (second on the list) to read Tim Lathean's fine article on the importance of sleep for adolescents.
For those young athletes who are involved with high school sport programs throughout the school year (and even the Summer now), I would suggest adopting the use of a Training Diary. 

Use a simple Composition Book (200 pages) take a few minutes each day to record vital data that can be of great benefit to alleviating illness, injury, mental and emotional fatigue, over training, lower cognitive abilities, lowering of motivation and drop in performance. Follow the guidelines below and learn to KEEP ALL THINGS IN LIFE IN BALANCE!

Tracking Stress Scores, Sleep and A.M. Resting Heart Rate for boosting academics, mood and athletic abilities.

When students and athletes are happy and in a positive mood state they are more likely to do everything that much better. Happy athletes tend to be stronger/faster and they are stronger/faster for longer periods of time. It’s all because of the Central Nervous System.

The central nervous system is the manager of all other physical systems in the body, and must be considered central to any training plan you undertake. Respiration, excretion, reproduction, digestion and, obviously, the action of our muscles are directly and indirectly affected by the central nervous system either directly or indirectly.

Finding ways to keep the central nervous system stimulated and healthy should be a top priority. Training/Practicing that becomes mundane or tedious, regardless of its merit, becomes a burden to the athlete, destroying motivation and thus growth. It takes a motivated athlete to produce consistent long-term results. The greatest talent still needs the drive to push through season after season. A semi-talented athlete, with only mediocre numbers, can still achieve great success with perseverance and hard work, both qualities empowered by the central nervous system. The greatest challenge is to nurture the motivation, that ignition, as Daniel Coyle points out in “The Talent Code”, that is one part of the trilogy required to succeed. (the other two being Deep Practice and Master Coach)

A system of accounting for the various factors that affect the central nervous system can be an early warning system for you to reduce stress loads to prevent overtraining, fatigue or sickness if used properly.

Doing frequent inventory of your stresses will help you learn to maximize the positives and minimize the negatives. The spark needed from the central nervous system for an athlete to excel can be entirely burned out by any number of the random events that happen in life: anxiety at home, financial stress, work/school worry and all of the other challenges you face on a daily basis.

The Stress Score is a simple way to inventory stress: rate the three major categories of stress each day on a scale of 1-10, with 10 being the greatest amount of stress. The three stress categories are Physical, Mental and Emotional. Then rate the three major recovery categories on a scale of 1-10, with 10 being the most beneficial. The three major recovery categories are Sleep, Rest and Therapy.

Physical stress is work that you do with your muscles, or traumatic stress done to your body. Keep in mind that training/competing is physical work but you may score it higher as it may involve Mental, Emotional AND Physical stresses for some athletes.

Mental stress is cerebral work like studying, doing taxes, creating training programs, writing software and so on. If your job is cerebral, but you really love it and see it as therapeutic, consider yourself very lucky, and fill in the blanks on both the stress side and recovery side.

Emotional stress is not to be confused with mental stress. No work gets done on the emotional column, just lots of energy going down the drain: anger, fear, sadness, worry, anxiety, etc. These are the kinds of things that can do as much damage to a good athlete as a good student.

It’s the recovery side that counteracts stress. Sleep is a critical recovery factor and should be graded in terms of both quality and quantity.

Rest is what you’re doing when you’re not sleeping. Reading, listening to music with your feet up or watching TV is rest.  Gardening, writing a paper, studying or working a part time job (even if no physical labor is required) is not rest/

Therapy is any active aspect that makes you feel better or directly counteracts stress: massage, foam roller, light pool exercise, food/recovery meals, light exercise, things that make you happy and well.

Athletes should consider exercise as therapy. If not, then they are more likely to be outperformed by athletes who exercise therapeutically. You can see that scoring this is very subjective, as it should be! Your central nervous system is unique to you, and only you can score yourself accurately.

Once all categories are filled in, add up the stress and recovery totals. Which side is larger? What are your trends? What are you going to do about it? It’s good to know if you’re writing checks with your body that your central nervous system can’t cover. If the stress side of your equation is chronically overwhelming the recovery side, then you need to analyze the deficit and fix it. In essence, you need to stop bouncing checks.

To extend that financial metaphor, balance stress and recovery blocks like a bank statement. Stress accumulated through a work block should be systematically eliminated in a rest block. Don’t start the next training block while still tired or stressed. As intangible as stress is, it has a very tangible effect on energy levels and power output levels. The Stress Score should help you systematically manage your central nervous system.

Be aware that your success is not random and that your ability to train long and hard for a long time depends on how happy you are doing it. Be happy and you’ll train/practice for a longer period of time and have a better time doing it. All training programs are 50% recovery/ regeneration.

How much sleep you are getting each night is just as important as how much practice /training time you spend each day.

Daily morning pulse checks can be a way of getting an advanced warning signal that you are not recovered, on the verge of being sick or being over-trained.

Recording daily morning pulse checks and hours of sleep along with your Stress Score can be a great way to “take control” of your training, studying and emotional stability. It only takes about 4-5 minutes each day to insure you are on the right track.

                                    MOVING BACKWARD TO GO FORWARD
As a teacher, coach, athlete and lifelong learner I must admit that moving up through the teaching and coaching ranks from Elementary School to the Collegiate Level has left me looking backwards in order to provide plans for optimal development of young athletes.

After working at the Collegiate Level for a few decades, I am finding my return to working with high school/jr. high athletes involves looking "way back" for the correct approach towards building a strong foundation for athletic development.

The trend towards "Early Specialization" of youth in a sport or two has taken the place of teaching "fundamental movement skills'  and basic biomotor qualities and movement patterns FIRST. Squat, hinge, push, pull, crawl, skip, run, climb, jump, hop and combinations of all PROVIDE the essential foundation for building the highest pyramid of athletic development for each individual.

It is the purpose of this Blog to provide parents, coaches, young athletes and teachers with access to information on RETURNING TO THE BASICS before the "rush to early sport specialization".

Essentially, Diet, Sleep, Posture, Teaching Methods (pedagogy), psychology, movement education and motivation will make up most of the information I hope to share.

In this "crazed rush" to early Sport Specializtion, we must take a step back and ask "if we expect every sports-specific action or posture to be executed efficiently, consistently and resiliently, we must provide all children with the widest and deepest "movement vocabulary"BEFORE specificity begins. A school curriculum that guarantees this "movement vocabulary" plus the practices of good posture and the development of basic fitness to provide a work capacity for play SHOULD be the foundation of Physical Education at all Elementary and Junior High Schools.

Check out this School's Posture Education emphasis!

If we cannot "influence" this type of focus in the primary years then let's substitute the video games for the Jump Rope, Monkey Bars, BMX bikes, roller skates and progress to Skate Boards, Snow Boards, Surf Boards, Tree Climbing, Rock Climbing, Mt. Biking, Hiking and Swimming.

It is a simple matter of providing a balance of many activities and allowing children to "explore" various movements, develop strength and range of motion in all three planes from a variety of "PLAY" and movement exploration. LET THE KID'S PLAY!!! Sandbox to sandlot to A.T.&T just doesn't happen when 6 year olds are subjected to "sports training" before they have the basic motor skills.