Free Kick

The current mindset of school sports is designed for short term competitive performance, but is there associated long term benefits from this?

While this mindset may facilitate performance in the early years it may be detrimental to the optimal development of the young athlete and compromise future performance. Moreover, it is likely to lead to burnout and possibly increase their relative risk of sustaining overuse injuries in their young careers. (Jefferys, I. 2008; SCJ)

“It is evident that many / most 1st  year high school’ers lack much basic fitness and athleticism, thus starting out on a very low base level of physical fitness and possibly technical skill. Even though to some degree general sports skill may be fairly well developed, the same is often not true for fundamental movement patterns. Therefore, the need for effective programming to redress these issues is paramount and possibly requires a new model of development to be devised which builds these elements into long term model rather than a short term “fix”.” (Jefferys, I. 2008; SCJ)

What are your thoughts?

Wayne Lombard