Mindful = Purposeful: Creating Mindset with Purpose

In my last post I shared how successful coaches, like Karch Kiraly, created successful learning environments for their practice sessions by carefully priming the mindsets of athletes in order to get the most out of practice. The key used by many successful coaches to priming athletes for mindful, focused practices is to plan practices that target the fundamental skills of the sport as well as the specific game skills. However, the overall goal is to focus early practice time on one or two fundamental skills (with game-like intensity) that improve the skills needed most by the athletes in order to improve their game performances.

In case you didn’t read that blog, my message centered around:  Successful practices do not happen when the MINDSETS of the athletes and their emotions are not primed for LEARNING.

While coaching collegiate Track and Field, I found it helpful to have each athlete make a short-list of specific skills each week that they felt they needed to improve upon in order to continue improving their meet performances.

"This is what we're doing, this is why we're doing it, this is the expectation, this should be the flow, etc" Quote from Andreas Behm, Sprint/Hurdle Coach at World Athletic Center

Prior to each practice/training session, I had them quickly review their list of skills in order to prime themselves for a focused, mindful practice session.  I also found that by briefly explaining purpose of the daily practice drills, exercises, etc. I was creating a learning environment whereby the athletes were clear on the intended purpose of the daily practice. In addition, a daily reminder of seizing the opportunity to leave the day’s practice a better person and athlete, created the sense of a “higher purpose” than just “checking the box” next to another practice.

In a recent article explaining a study of successful coaches and their methods for teaching, there were some very critical messages to parents and coaches that I thought would provide true purpose for parents and young coaches. Below are some of the critical messages I took from this:

“It is well known that the development of talent in sport depends on the constructive relationships between athletes and coaches’ through their support, supervision and creation of a healthy learning environment.”

In the study it was found that expert coaches were task-driven rather than ego-driven. To achieve this they recognized they must focus on ensuring the player improved as a person during their time with them. The coaches were unanimous in their belief that by helping the player to improve as an individual, their performance could be improved as well. A collective statement by the coaches concerning “how they measured success” was summed up here…”if they’re better at skills, if they’re fitter, if they’re mentally stronger and they have a balanced lifestyle, then your’re a success as a coach.”

The article ended with this statement:  “However, the public and potential employers often measure success only on results.”

“Any athlete, myself included, would hope to train everyday with intention, focus and integrity; working at it with all your heart no matter what rep it is or how close you are to the goal you have set out after. But, alas we are human….so for me this little saying “one more to one more” is a reminder to make each rep or day count.”  Vera Schmitz, elite Pole Vaulter

Parents and coaches can stimulate successful growth through creation of positive learning environments that prime their children/athletes toward striving for continued improvements of themselves through “best efforts” rather than winning or being the best.  The goal is to improve the “whole” person. This can be effectively done through giving young athletes both fundamental movement skills and fundamental game skills while priming them to give their best efforts towards individual improvement…day by day, and walking away with a sense of improvement. That is the type of success that fosters a desire to return to the next practice to find out how much more they can improve BY GIVING THEIR BEST EFFORT while honing their skill for focused, mindful practice.

“Successful athletes practice fundamentals over and over with mindfulness and purpose.”—Andreas Behm

I am hoping the take-away from this post for parents would be to foster the growth mindset for their children that is encouraged by praising effort, improvement, learning FROM mistakes and the realization that attitude makes the fundamental difference in reaching whatever goals are meaningful in this life.

For coaches, I hope the message is that creating learning environments that are true vehicles to improving fundamental skills, game skills AND solid, personal values for their athletes should be the main focus of practice design.

“We are all apprentices in a craft where no one ever becomes a master.”—Ernest Hemmingway

We all  need to see each step forward as “one more to one more!”

PLEASE TAKE THE TIME TO READ VERN GAMBETTA’S post on Meaningful Practice below.

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Meaningful Practice --by Vern Gambetta

I know the term deliberate practice is the current buzzword but I don’t think it is getting the job done. I have always felt that words create images and images create action, so I use the term meaningful. Meaningful clearly communicates what I want from practice, it leaves little room for nuance. Practice must have a clear plan and purpose that the athlete understands. It must relate to the competitive demands of the sport the athlete is preparing for. It must be relevant to physical and developmental age of the athlete (Adult drills and training methods imposed on children are counterproductive). Mindless repetition does not count as practice. If you want examples go watch a typical tennis academy practice where they hit balls for four hours or watch a baseball infielder take 100 ground balls repetitively. Folks that is the norm just look around, nothing meaningful, just work. Each drill, each exercise must have a purpose that the athlete clearly understands or it is just time on their feet punching a clock accumulating time toward that magic 10,000 hour number. Focused, meaningful work that chooses to distort the competitive demands not replicate them is the answer. That is meaningful, the athlete relates to it because they see the relationship of the technique they must master or the game situation they must improve. At the end of the day less is more to make the practice meaningful.

Are you making your athletes better or are you just making them tired and predisposing them to injury? Don’t forget you play and compete the way you train therefore every training session needs to be close to your event/sport (Neural, Metabolic, Mechanical & Technical) in some form. Training is cumulative; give the training

Planning Successful Practices: Creating Mindsets for Engagement

“The whole idea is not to train failure, but to continue improvement.”---James Radcliffe

In my last post I started the “process” of discussing the importance of mindset to the overall development of young students/athletes.  Consider the profound quote from Jimmy Radcliffe above.  Whether you are a parent, teacher or coach, the goal should be continued improvement of our children ‘s skills in academics, basic value -systems, fitness, health or athletic participation.

In order to do this requires the skill of “teaching” proper mindsets from the very beginning of the developmental stage.  This requires knowing the different priming tools (words, phrases, types of feed-back, correctives, etc.) that create a learning environment geared towards the development of a growth mindset and the prevention of a fixed mindset.

These mindsets and their characteristics were defined in my last blog and can also be accessed in a more detailed source by using any online search engine and typing in MINDSET, Dr. Carol Dweck.

As mentioned in the previous post, this post will attempt to provide some thoughts on mindset and it’s importance to the creation of successful practice environments for any sport.

I believe it was Dan Pfaff who verbalized the following:  “Athlete success is not based on what we know as a coach—it’s based on what the athletes learn.”  Thus, the creation of a true learning environment should be the primary focus of any coach.

Daniel Coyle, author of The Talent Code, describes a successful practice as one in which everything clicks, everyone is engaged and working productively. In contrast, a bad practice session is one where on one is engaged, where no learning happens, and where you begin to suspect that it was a waste of time for the majority of athletes.

The bottom line is this: Successful practices do not happen when the MINDSETS of the athletes and their emotions are not primed for LEARNING.

This can be done through mindful planning of practices by coaching in regards to creating environments that engage the athletes in the process of learning AND improving. In essence, it is a DESIGN FEATURE based on the principle that learners need to be challenged by a degree of difficulty that is within their grasp; not too hard but not too easy. The key is to keep learners constantly on the edge of their ability.

It is apparent that this is best done with athletes that employ a growth mindset. Creation of an environment whereby the growth mindset is taught, through proper verbal cues, reinforcement methods, etc., IS critical to the success of each athlete and each practice session.

Former Olympic Team and Beach Volleyball Gold Medalist, Karch Kiraly, provides some ideas on creating a successful practice environment in his Volleyblog titled “Competition vs. Practice.  “Playing your best involves becoming solid enough at the fundamentals (my under-score!) that you can perform each skill without thinking about how to do what your doing. How do you get there? You guessed it—practice. Focused, mindful practice. And lots of it.” ….”In the USA gym, both when I was playing and now in my role as a coach for the U.S. Women’s National Volleyball Team, we strive every day to match the intensity level of tournament matches. If you’re treating each training session like a match, matches become little more than an extension of practice, and the familiarity of that environment helps you perform at a higher level.”

Kiraly also mentions New England Quarterback Tom Brady’s desire to improve as a key element in developing his emphasis on continuing to learn through analysis and correction mistakes. He points to the fact that after each season, regardless of the how successful it might have been Brady reviews his own performances and is extremely critical. He identifies a couple of things that he wants to do better, then he works on them in the off-season.

Kiraly says he sees this as important for two reasons:

1) it highlights that elite players never stop working in improving their fundamentals (there is that word again…fundamentals) AND

2) it underscores the importance of targeting one or two specific thing, not trying to improve everything at once.

To that I will add a third;

3 it shows the value of learning from mistakes.

Kiraly closes his blog with these comments on choosing a couple of things to work on during each practice, thereby creating a successful practice environment that stems from “priming” the proper mindset to get the most from each practice.  “That’s what I mean by focused, mindful practice. For example, your practice theme for today should be, ‘I’m going to get better at hitting.’ Instead, it shuld be, “I will go to the ball with my third step, OR I will get  my elbow up and back fast before I swing.’ If you focus on particular details within your whole game, your more likely to make lasting improvements.”

“It’s a journey that is ongoing, season after season, week after week, practice after practice.”—Karch Kiraly

STAY TUNED FOR MY NEXT POST THAT CONTINUES THE THEME OF DEVELOPING METHODS FOR CREATING SUCCESSFUL PRACTICE / LEARNING ENVIRONMENT VIA MINDSET.

Below is a great article from US Lacrosse’s continuing education director for coaching that plans practices kids WANT TO GO TO instead of Have to go to.... IF YOU ARE A YOUTH COACH OR PARENT YOU NEED TO READ IT.

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USOC Report: The Formula for Developing Elite Athletes

by TJ Buchanan
When developing your players for maximum performance, what really pushes them to an elite level?

The United States Olympic Committee (USOC) recently published a report based on a survey distributed to nearly 2,000 U.S. Olympic athletes. The survey intended to gauge what the USOC could do to improve the quality and effectiveness of programs focused on talent identification and development.

What do the Olympics have to do with your team of players you don’t choose and whose motivation varies? This information can help coaches of any sport and any age group guide their teams to success.

According to the USOC report, the top two reasons Olympic athletes gave for pursuing elite levels of performance were “intrinsic love of activity” (they liked being active) and love of the sport. What does that tell me as a coach? It’s my job to get my players to love being active and to love lacrosse.

It’s my job to make it fun.

Format your practices so that the mindset of the athletes becomes, “I want to go to practice,” as opposed to the all-too-often-heard, “I have to go to practice.” Get your players addicted to lacrosse. Implement drills with a fast pace, high touch counts and opportunities for frequent participation.

Another factor contributing to the desire to achieve at the highest level, according to the USOC report, was multi-sport athleticism. College lacrosse coaches almost universally prefer athletes who play multiple sports in high school. The data collected by the USOC reinforces that preference. Most Olympians did not specialize in their sport until very late in their development. Even then, some continued to participate in other sports.

It is downright painful to hear a 9-year-old say he or she solely plays lacrosse year-round, switching between teams based on the season. Research shows the best athletes in the world participated in at least two sports through high school. Ninety-seven percent of USOC respondents who followed that path credited multi-sport participation directly for their success.
If you ask your players to commit to lacrosse full time, you are holding them back and limiting their upside.

In his book, “Outliers,” Canadian journalist Malcolm Gladwell popularized the 10,000-hour rule that it takes 10,000 hours of practice to achieve mastery in a field. We might be tempted to interpret this to mean we must constantly practice one thing to become excellent at it. But would you want an athlete who 10,000 hours playing wall ball or one who divided 10,000 hours between basketball, hockey and lacrosse?

We can teach kids to catch and throw. Some say we can’t teach them to be athletes. I refute that. If we encourage and expect multi-sport participation, we indirectly teach them to be athletes.

The Path to Excellence

The USOC surveyed more than 300 athletes who competed in one or more Olympics between 2000 and 2012 to identify the factors and circumstances surrounding their success.

Factors Influencing Sport Decision (1-5 Scale)

Intrinsic love of activity – 4.32
Love of sport – 4.309
Early success – 3.583
Parental influence – 3.489
Coaches recruitment – 3.400
Peer recruitment – 2.805
Sibling recruitment – 2.557
PE teacher influence – 2.299

Implication

Coaches that can infuse competition with athlete-centric success and fun will set up athletes for a great experience.

Average Number of Sports Played

Age U10 – 3.11
Age 10-14 – 2.99
Age 15-18 – 2.2
Age 19-22 – 1.27
Age 22-older – 1.31

Implication

The findings indicate that Olympians were involved in an average of three sports per year until age 14, which belies the notion that early specialization is critical to long-term success. Multi-sport play appeared to be beneficial to these Olympians.
Over to you. How would you identify the factors that influence your lacrosse player’s sport decision? Is it one or more of the eight above, or something else? Let us know in the comments section.

TJ Buchanan is the coaching education content manager at US Lacrosse.

DEVELOPING A MINDSET: Establishing a Culture of Learning

“Vision without action is a dream. Action without vision is a nightmare.”---Japanese Proverb

In her latest of many articles on MINDSET, Psychology Professor Carol Dweck begins with the statement: “There are things that distinguish great athletes---champions---from others. Most of the sports world thinks it’s their talent, but I will argue that it’s their mindset.”

You can read her article; THE MINDSET OF A CHAMPION at Failure of parents & coaches to instill a growth mindset is also a major source of attrition in youth sports @ http://www.sportscotland.org.uk/media/894520/the-mindset-of-a-champion-by-carol-dweck.pdf

Coaching at both the collegiate and high school levels I learned early on to develop a strategy to create an environment whereby MINDSET could be taught and learned on a daily basis.

The challenge for both teams and individuals in any sport is to always get better, always improve. To do this takes the cultivation of a growth mindset. In a growth mindset, students and/or athletes truly believe that they can cultivate their own abilities through effort and that through doing so, they will get better over time. Thus, the growth mindset creates an environment where students and/or athletes always get better. 

The contrasting fixed mindset is characterized by the belief that students and/or athletes see their abilities as fixed traits. In this view, talents are gifts ---you either have them or you don’t.

From an early age, mindset can determine success in academics or athletics. People can hold one mindset about intellect/ intelligence and another about athletic ability. Whichever mindset they adopt about athletic ability will guide their choices in regards to certain sports or athletics in general.

The most important fact for parents and coaches to consider is that mindsets of youngsters are not related to their level of ability in academic or athletic avenues AT FIRST. What is important, as pointed out by Dr. Dweck, is that those with the GROWTH MINDSET appear to gain an advantage over time.

The younger that parents cultivate the proper growth mindset in their children, the more successful their children will be at any chosen endeavor. This provides the “Why” for parents to learn to develop an atmosphere where learning growth mindsets can take place.

To better understand “HOW” this can be done I have provided an adaptation from Dr. Dweck’s theory on changing mindsets in table format below. 

Better to develop the proper mindset EARLY so that it will not be needed to CHANGE  it at a later date!

                                    GROWTH MINDSET      vs.        FIXED MINDSET

                                                            Growth Mindset

I believe that my character, personality and intelligence can be developed. My true potential is unknown.

DESIRE: To push myself, take risks and constantly learn new things. I enjoy challenge.

EVALUATION OF SITUATIONS:  Will it allow me to grow? Will it help me to overcome challenges?

Attitude to Setbacks: I failed. I’ll learn from it an move on. I’ll try harder next time.

Attitude to Challenges:  I embrace challenges and persist when thing get tough.

Effort:  I believe that personal growth and learning require EFFORT.

Criticism: I try to learn from criticism. What can I do to improve?

The Success of Others:  I find lessons and inspiration in other people’s successes.

RESULT: They achiever ever-higher levels of success.

                                                            Fixed Mindset

I believe that my character, personality, potential and intelligence are carved in stone and determined at birth.

DESIRE: I need to look smart in every situation and to prove myself again and again. I must never fail.

EVALUATION OF SITUATIONS:  Will I succeed at it or fail? Will it make me look intelligent or stupid?

Attitude to Setbacks: I’m a failure. I knew I’d fail. I’m an idiot.

Attitude to Challenges:  I avoid challenges. I get defensive and give up easily.

Effort:  Why bother with effort? It’s not going to change a thing.

Criticism: I ignore criticism. I do things my way.

The Success of Others:  I feel threatened by the successes of others. If they succeed, I fail.

RESULT: They plateau early and never reach their full potential.

“The environment that people live in is the environment they LEARN to live in, respect and perpetuate.”---Ellen S. Richards

Parents should recognize that from an early age that the learning environment they establish at home cultivates the initial development of their children’s mindset.  Creating a mindset where children want to get better, where they are always improving and where a sense of purpose is established comes from establishing a structure that teaches children a sense of purpose, belonging, teamwork and personal responsibility. Once a family structure is set up to teach these values, the chances are good that the children will not only develop proper values but make them habitual.

I think what we all want our children and/or athletes to LEARN can be summed up by Sean Fitzpatrick’s words from his WINNING MATTERS. In this book, former Rugby star Fitzpatrick shares what he learned from a teacher of his…”it didn’t matter what level of talent had been given to us, what size we were or how fast or slow we ran. It was what we did with the talent that we had that counted…no excuses, no exceptions. The only thing I want you to be is the best you can possibly be.” 

One thing parents, coaches and teachers can do to cultivate this drive to continually improve on a daily basis is to introduce insightful and inspiring influences to the learning environment.

My next Blog will continue the MINDSET theme by expanding the need for creating learning environments to the athletic practice arena. Until then, whether you are a parent, teacher or coach, I invite you to ponder this quote from Pericles…WHAT YOU LEAVE BEHIND IS NOT WHAT IS ENGRAVED IN STONE MONUMENTS BUT WHAT IS WOVEN INTO THE LIVES OF OTHERS. YOUR LEGACY IS THAT WHICH YOU TEACH.”  TO THIS I WOULD ADD THE WORD….DAILY!

Take the time read the short article by Hamza Khan regarding BEGGINER MINDSET development.

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For Real Innovation, Get a Beginner’s Mindset

In his story about accidental leadership, Drew Dudley quotes a man named Mustapha, who referred to each day at work as his “first day of work.” Mind you, Mustapha had been working in that very job for 18 years:

“I go to work every day like it’s my first day. On your first day of work you dress your best, you listen the hardest, you are nice to everyone that you work with. On your first day you work to impress your new bosses and your new coworkers, and you hope and believe it will be a job you love. But we let that all start to go away on our second day.”

Whether you’re an agency of one or a corporate giant like Microsoft, losing what SalesForce.com CEO Marc Benioff calls “the beginner’s mind” can prove fatal. As you mature, you grow less open and spontaneous and you focus on protecting rather than innovating:

“Are you going to be that innovator again? The ones who are getting in trouble are the ones who lose that beginner’s mind…A beginner’s mind is one of the most difficult things to have…You need to have a beginner’s mind to create bold innovation.”

by Hamza Khan

“THE MASTER HAS FAILED MORE TIMES THAN THE BEGINNER HAS EVEN TRIED”---Chinese Proverb

                       

“If your child could only study one subject at school you’d worry about their development & the missed opportunities for them to learn new skills.

So why for some sports/coaches is EARLY SPECIALIZATION perceived as acceptable?”---taken from a Twitter Post from a coach/teacher to a youth sport coach.

Asking the Right Questions: Creating a Learning Process for Young Athletes

Since resolutions are part of the New Year for many people, I believe a good thought provoking question to begin a “process” of growth for this year might be in order.  In searching for the right question for parents and/or coaches, I came upon a short blog by Kelvin Giles.

 In it, Kelvin pretty much took care of formulating the types of questions that should be asked by parents, teachers, coaches, administrators and performance leaders of any type. Below is an excerpt of his Nov.7, 2014 Blog.

For Physical Education, Junior Sports Clubs, Talent Development Strategies:  “are you developing the ability to Squat, Lunge, Pull, Push, Brace, Rotate and Hinge in every direction, plane, speed, amplitude and against all parts of the force continuum?” 

For all of the above AND parents, teachers and school administrators:

“What about nutrition and sleep?”

“Are you developing concentration, commitment, perseverance and self-discipline?”

“Are you also developing other life-skills including humility and respect?”

For coaches of youth and school sports:

“Is this your process for all participants regardless of their ability? Or are you just trying to win the next contest?”

Kelvin closes with the statement “I am looking forward to the day when these questions don’t have to be asked.

If you are a parent or coach who has just asked yourself those questions, “What is your response?”

Can you adequately assess whether life-skills like respect and humility are actually being taught?

Do you know for sure whether your children or athletes are eating correctly and getting enough sleep?

Have you spent time “teaching” the values of self-discipline, perseverance, concentration, commitment, respect, good nutrition and proper sleep habits?

Do specific sport skills take precedent over the basic movement skills (ability to Squat, Lunge, Pull, Push, Brace, Rotate and Hinge in every direction, plane, speed, amplitude and against all parts of the force continuum)  in your children’s sports team?

If all of the above questions are of concern to you then it may be time to consider HOW YOU CAN CREATE an environment for teaching/learning all of the above skills and traits.

According to Karen Cogen, Senior Sport Psychologist for the U.S. Olympic Committee, the following points can help to create an environment that leads to success without a focus on winning!

KEEP IT PERFORMANCE BASED by setting Performance or Process Goals rather than Outcome goals.

PLAY in the moment with the process of focus being the critical factor.

PRACTICE MINDFULNESS (paying attention to detail IN the moment).

TURN OFF YOUR BRAIN. To help athletes stay in the moment and practice Mindfulness, athletes should be encouraged to operate more on instinct and not think about movements.

TAKE “WIN” OUT OF YOUR VOCABULARY. The less a coach talks about winning and more about process and staying in the moment, the more likely it is that athletes will adopt that focus as well.

TALK TO ATHLETES’ PARENTS AND SIGNIFICANT OTHERS IN THEIR LIVES about adopting a performance approach. Coaches need to help influential people around an athlete to understand the performance-and-process philosophy and ask for cooperation in developing this approach.

Shifting the focus away from “winning” at all costs while learning focus on performance, one thing at a time, are successful ways of taking the pressure off athletes OF ALL AGES and teaching them that THE PROCESS is key to improving performances.

In the next few Blogs I will be continuing to focus on ways to create learning environments for young athletes and students. THESE will include development of MINDSET, GOAL SETTING, MOVEMENT BASED SKILL SETS (that enhance specific sport skills), and PROCESS-BASED MINDFULNESS.

Below are TWO articles with more information on Injuries to young athletes. The first involves recent information regarding arm (elbow and shoulder) injuries to young baseball players that sheds a “new light” on what most coaches have believed to be true.

The second offers Guidelines for Injury Prevention for young athletes.  Enjoy!

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A Connected Sleeve Finds That Pitchers Need To Alter Their Warm-Ups

Motus's Sleeve is taking aim at baseball's UCL surgery epidemic, and its first set of findings are counterintuitive.

By Matt Hartigan

The rapid rise of ulnar collateral ligament reconstructions, better known as Tommy John surgery, is hurting baseball. More than 20 major league pitchers have had surgery already in 2014, and this particular problem has begun appearing in players as young as 13 years old. It could become a serious legal liability for leagues and coaches if someone doesn't figure out how to curb the problem soon.

To date, understanding the stress a pitcher places on his or her ulnar collateral ligament (UCL) has been a function of rudimentary measures like height, weight, and velocity. But in September, pitchers from nine Fall Instructional League baseball teams wore a sensor-connected armband called the Motus Sleeve to establish a baseline understanding of the load placed on a player's most valuable ligament.

Screen of prototype application, consumer version to be released in early 2015

"Basically," explains Ben Hansen, vice president and CTO of Motus, "the Sleeve provides trends of performance and workloads on that UCL and that allows coaches to make better decision with their pitchers and managing their arms, as well as the players themselves."
The newly released findings are insightful, albeit counterintuitive. The startling conclusion: Traditional training and warm-up methods might be doing more harm than good.

"The numbers show that UCL stress between long toss (warm-up throws of over 180 feet), dry work (throwing motion sans baseball), bullpens, and live throws are not as proportional as we may have thought," reveals Hansen, "with each throw placing cumulative stress on the UCL. The sleeve now allows us to measure exactly how much each throw adds to this. You could never do this with your eyes, and now we can tell pitchers when they are throwing too much and with too much stress."
Motus found that a "long toss" taxes a player's UCL more than live, in-game throws–-a startling statistic considering the practice's prevalence during pre-game drills.

The sleeve itself contains reactive accelerometers and gyroscopes, and identifies different pitching motions on board. When a pitch is thrown, the data recorded is stored in the sleeve and then downloaded, either in real time or whenever an appropriate device is within Bluetooth range.

Motus's physics engine then takes the raw data from the sleeve's sensors, including arm speed and angle, and converts it into smart data. Measures such as arm torque and UCL stress become clear, allowing pitchers and coaches to better understand where there's a potential for injury.

Historically, the eye test and self-report have been the only reliable ways to determine player fatigue. Reflective markers and high-speed video technology have been used to develop 3-D models of players' bodies, but that takes the kind of time and effort that limits the tech's availability to maybe once or twice a year.

But Motus has found that pitchers sometimes drop their arm slot—from overhand toward sidearm—by as much as 19%during games. This change happens slowly, however. Over the first few innings, only about a 3% drop in arm angle occurs on average, meaning that over the course of the next few innings there can be a much sharper decline. Identifying when the dropoff occurs, then, is crucial not only to protecting a one-run lead, but also the pitcher's ligament.
When an athlete is stressed by too many throws, or too many high-torque throws," Hansen explains, "we can kind of see when they're at the end of these ranges where they break down. We also look at if their elbow is dropping or if their arm slot is changing dramatically, if it's a good release point anymore."

Where the sleeve truly excels is in its ability to map delivery or, the motion responsible for the wear and tear on a player's arm. "The hardware can detect any kind of throw," says Hansen, "from a Little Leaguer playing catch, to Justin Verlander's fastball, to Mitch Stetter's sidearm or underarm delivery. What we are really good at is then taking that data and getting mechanics off of it and computing things like torque at the elbow at different velocities."
Motus is aiming to use the sleeve to track throw mechanics during live competition as well, in order to pinpoint when a player is peaking. These single game numbers can then be compared to season averages to isolate an individual players' tendencies.

"We've been doing assessments, and specifically pitching assessments at our biomechanics lab for about four years now," says Joe Nolan, cofounder and CEO at Motus. "But the goal has always been to take these analytics that are specifically focused on optimizing performance and reducing the risk of injury, taking that lab experience and bringing it to the players on the field."

A consumer version of the Sleeve and accompanying app are in development, but for now Motus is working to improve their own data. Instead of simply tracking individual mechanics as a whole, the next version of the Sleeve will provide pitch-specific breakdowns so that coaches can compare stress across a pitcher's entire repertoire.
"Some feedback we've got from coaches already," says Hansen, "has been the ability to see if [a pitcher] has the same mechanics—the same arm speed and arm slot—for a fastball versus your curve ball. Coaches really preach that same delivery, that repeatable delivery. We're giving them a space to analyze that."

With the data already collected at the Fall Instructional League, Motus hopes to help stem the rash of Tommy John surgeries. The 3-D motion capture lab—which maps players' deliveries and mechanics on-site once the data is uploaded from the Sleeve—is portable and the company is confident that it will be used in spring training for as many as 20 teams when pitchers and catchers report in February.
And ultimately the Sleeve could be used in other sports as well.

"We've been collecting data and building the physics engines specifically for general mobility and stability, golf swing analysis, baseball batting, tennis, la crosse," says Nolan. "We're prepared to launch on a much wider basis. Right now, our focus and immediate goal is to perfect pitching and get to the market and prove it out. But right on the heels there's definitely multiple sports and multiple opportunities for the company."

For youth athletes, whichever sport they are training for is pretty irrelevant. Better movement patterns =better athlete in any sport.

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Guidelines for Young Athletes to Reduce Injuries

How Parents Can Set Age-Specific Time Limits

By Sumathi Reddy

Children are dedicating themselves to a single sport too early and spending too much time playing it, say doctors who are seeing more children coming in with overuse injuries.
Playing multiple sports leads to fewer overuse injuries, lower burnout rates and better overall athletes, experts say. Focusing on a single sport should only begin around the age of puberty or even later, when a child’s body has developed enough to handle the stress.

“The perception is you train early and only do a single sport and do as much as you can until you’re better than everyone else,” says Neeru Jayanthi, medical director of primary care sports medicine at Loyola University Health System in Chicago. “I think it’s pretty clear from the injury and performance-data side that that’s a terrible developmental model.”
In addition to acute injuries, such as concussions, doctors say they are seeing an increase in serious overuse injuries, such as stress fractures in the back, elbow-ligament injuries and damage to cartilage and underlying bone, known as osteochondral injuries. Such incidents can sideline athletes for one to six months or more.

Doctors are increasingly recommending that children diversify their sports activities to avoid overuse injuries. Dr. Neeru Jayanthi explains the risks on Lunch Break. Photo: Getty

Overuse injuries develop over time due to the repeated stress on the same bone, muscle or tendon. Children are at greater risk in part because their bones are still growing. Experts say as much as 50% or 60% of injuries in young athletes are due to overuse.

Enrollment in youth-sports programs is high, although participation in some team sports, including basketball, soccer and football, appears to have declined in recent years. A National Council of Youth Sports survey in 2008, the latest available, found that 60 million children between the ages of 6 and 18 years participated in an organized sport; 44 million of them did more than one sport.

Dr. Jayanthi and co-investigators have followed a group of 1,200 young athletes in the Chicago area, ages 7 to 18 years, since 2010. The research found that young athletes who are highly specialized in a single sport were 1.5 times more likely to develop injuries of any type compared with diversified athletes, even when the results were controlled for age and the number of hours spent playing. Serious overuse injuries were 2.3 times more common in highly specialized athletes than in others.

Dr. Jayanthi’s study also highlighted the risk of spending too many hours a week at sports. When the number of hours exceeded the age of the athletes, they were more likely to get injured and to suffer serious overuse injuries. And for young children, spending more than twice the time playing organized sports than in free play led to greater rates of injuries. The research, parts of which have been presented at medical conferences, has been accepted for publication in the American Journal of Sports Medicine, he said.

“This adult-driven, organized environment doesn’t allow a kid to self-regulate and say, ‘OK, I’m tired, I’m hurt, I don’t want to play right now,’ ” says Dr. Jayanthi.
Paul Stricker, a pediatrics sports medicine specialist at Scripps Clinic in San Diego, estimates he has seen a 25% to 30% jump in overuse injuries in athletes between the ages of 8 and 12 over the past five years. He recalls the first time an 8-year-old came in with a stress fracture to the shinbone, the youngest he had seen. The boy played soccer on four different teams. “It was complete overload,” says Dr. Stricker. “He was running and running constantly and the bone cracked.”

Preventing Injury

Youth-sports medical experts say overuse injuries are growing. Here are some rules of thumb to reduce risk:

·       Specializing in a single sport should be avoided until around puberty, when the body has matured. Earlier specialization can boost risk for overuse injuries and burnout and isn’t linked to better performance later.

Children shouldn’t participate in sports more hours a week than their age. They should also take off at least one to two days a week for physical and psychological recovery.

Young athletes should take at least two to three months away from a specific sport during the year and a week to two weeks off between seasons.

Free play should be encouraged. Studies show children and teens who spend twice as many hours a week in organized sports than in free play are prone to injuries at a greater rate. 

By the age of puberty, around 12 to 14, children who have been playing various sports have multiple skill sets that can be transferred from one sport to another. Their physical motor skills have developed, their vision has matured to fully track objects and their physiological growth gives them greater aerobic capacity and endurance, Dr. Stricker says.
“The body is much more capable of specializing at that age for multiple reasons,” he says.
A few sports are exceptions. In gymnastics and figure skating, for instance, peak athletic performance is often reached before full physical maturity.

Still, injuries are common for young people in these sports.
“I know I get injured a lot and I know that it’s just something that comes with so much gymnastics,” says Cecilia Doyle, a 13-year-old in Oak Park, Ill. “But I get really disappointed when I get injured because I don’t like taking a break from practice.”

Cecilia’s mother, Ana Garcia Doyle, last week brought her to Dr. Jayanthi because of suspected injuries. The doctor told her to take it easy for a while because of a strained back. She left the office with a cast on her right hand because of a stress fracture on the growth plate in her wrist, a problem she has had before. She has also had ankle issues. Cecilia does 15 hours of gymnastics a week, in addition to competitions.

Dr. Jayanthi has talked with Ms. Doyle and her husband, Jim, a corporate senior finance director, about the importance of the children playing a variety of sports. But Cecilia is “not going to pick up tennis at this point, she’s just not,” says the 44-year-old digital-media consultant. “She loves gymnastics.”

Ms. Doyle’s middle child—11-year-old Simon—is an avid soccer player, on a travel team. He has also taken up running. Dr. Jayanthi told the Doyles running can be considered diversification even though it is using many of the same muscle groups.

“I worry about my soccer player,” Ms. Doyle says. “He hasn’t had any serious injuries. But can he get all the way to high school without one? I really doubt it.”

The youngest child, Claudia, 5 years old, is enrolled in ballet and gymnastics, and will probably start soccer this summer, as she figures out what she likes.

“People often think overuse injuries are relatively benign and get better on their own,” says John P. DiFiori, chief of the division of sports medicine and nonoperative orthopaedics at the David Geffen School of Medicine at the University of California, Los Angeles and a past president of the American Medical Society for Sports Medicine. “In some cases the recovery time is quite prolonged and they can have long term growth complications.”

Dr. DiFiori, who wrote the medical society’s first position paper on overuse injuries and burnout in youth sports, published this year in the Clinical Journal of Sport Medicine, said athletes who excel in youth sports often are children who mature earlier. They may be taller and stronger than others their age and have advanced behavioral or cognitive abilities, which help in following instructions and making swift decisions.

For parents, it can be difficult to balance between encouraging children to pursue what they love and worrying about injuries.

Mike Brown, an attorney in Chicago, introduced his children—Nyah, 11, and Kaden, 8—to tennis at age 3. They both love the sport, and Nyah by age 7 decided she wanted to focus on tennis, he says. Now she plays tennis year-round, four to five days a week. She suffered an overuse injury on her shoulder last year, which kept her out of competitions for a month. Kaden plays about the same amount of tennis but also plays other sports at various times of the year.

“I definitely worry about overuse injuries,” says Mr. Brown, who played tennis competitively in college. “But it’s tough. If you want to be good at tennis you really have to put in a lot of time and there are only so many hours.”