Archive for “Young Person” Tag

Outcome Based Coaching In A Nutshell

Posted on: April 30th, 2012 by IYCA 3 Comments

Young Athletes Coaching Style In A Nutshell

By Dave Gleason

The primary coaching style we want to use with our youngest athletes is called outcome based coaching. This style of coaching puts more emphasis on the outcome of the activity or exercise you have asked for from from your athletes.

Outcome based coaching utilizes very little cueing or technique modifications if any. Our 6-9 year old athletes can suffer from goal confusion, leading to frustration and a less than average experience. As athletic revolution franchisees our goal must be to provide an exciting, memorable and remarkable experience – EVERY TIME.

A communicative coaching style such as outcome based coaching is exactly what a young person needs to ensure the indoctrination of a healthy physical culture. At some point in life every athletic career ends. Our role is to provide an opportunity for their ability to move and exercise to continue long into their adult lives…no matter their current level of sporting success.

In addition, it is imperative that a young athlete discovers movement patterns on their own as much as possible. The central nervous system is considered more plastic for a young athlete. That is, a young athlete’s CNS is very sponge like or magnet like. Internal and external stimulus is more readily assimilated, learned from and transferred to movement patterns. This aspect of neural development is a crucial component of the natural development of a child. Let your young athletes “Discover” movement patterns on their own.

Here are some practical concepts to think about as you engage in outcome based coaching:

Be careful what you ask for. If you cue your athletes to skip across the length of your facility and what a few of them perform is a high skip in a zig pattern…they are STILL giving you what you asked for. Encourage their creativity followed by layering one or two appropriate boundaries with simple cueing. In this example ask the entire group to skip in a straight line on the next try.

Be a reflective coach. During and after your sessions reflect on the effectiveness of your coaching cues. Take note of what was successful and what you and your coaches need to improve on. Communicating more effectively with your young athletes will only result in more fun for them..and you!

Praise and praise often. When a child gives you their interpretation of what you asked of them praise them for it. If modifications or boundaries need to be communicated use simple cuing. For instance, a lunge walk with a pronounced forward lean at the hips can be corrected by saying “heads up, eyes up, or reach for the sky”.

Use names. Calling and praising a child by name will add tremendous value to the relationship building process and significantly increase the enjoyment your young athletes experience while in your care. In short, it makes it personal.

Take these concepts and coach your young athletes with your heart first, head second.

Keep changing lives!

Youth Fitness Business: Training Adults is More Difficult?

Posted on: November 15th, 2010 by IYCA 1 Comment

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Youth Fitness Business Comparisons

You can (and should) take a look at John’s entire article here.

Now, our industry is full of people who seem to enjoy taking shots at their peers. Almost like a sport, they feel somehow empowered and or compelled to lobby opinions at what other people have to say and cloak their oftentimes defaming commentary with “this isn’t personal”.

My ‘retort’ article is not anywhere near a ‘shot’ at John. I was just so intrigued by his thoughts and feelings on the matter, I wanted to test the merits of his conclusions based on what I know about developing young athletes.

And by ‘testing the merits’ I mean to decide for myself if I think his deductions are correct. Not whether he’s right – he believes he is and I respect that wholly.

Below are the enumerated reasons John has outlined as to why adults are more difficult to train. My thoughts are below each point in italics.

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Young Athletes: Are We Too Results Oriented?

Posted on: August 10th, 2009 by IYCA 10 Comments

Goals of Young Athletes

So I was in Long Beach California last week giving a talk at the Perform
Better Summit on the state of youth fitness and sports training.

I got to the portion of my presentation where I hash out the difference
between Principles and Results when it comes to fitness and the
objectives we carry for our client or young athletes success.

I have long maintained that we are far too results-focused and that, in
fact, results are quite easy to achieve when it comes to fitness-related
goals.

But they are often short-lived and extremely temporary because they
are unilaterally pursued and not anchored by the realities of principle-based
methodology.

Simply put, it’s very easy to have a young person lose 10 pounds or
increase their vertical jump by 4 inches in a short-period of time, but
if we do not focus on the long-term success points and create training
routines appropriate to that, then any of the "goals" we achieve will be
gone almost as quickly as they came.

Got me thinking…

How backwards is our industry?

Consistently promising any and all who will listen that we have their
solution.

And it is an "EASY" solution that will only require a "MINIMAL" amount
of work on their part and show results in a very "SHORT" period of time.

Are we really that messed up or am I dreaming up this problem?

What say you?

Let me know below:

ACL Injuries and Young Athletes

Posted on: July 20th, 2009 by IYCA 9 Comments

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Young Athletes Commn Injury

Sooner or later you’re going to get hurt. That’s what happens when athletes train hard and play intensely. But thanks to professionals like Erin Perry, young athletes are returning to action better and faster than ever before. Not to mention, her tips in this article will help you avoid injuries before they happen.

Erin is a sought-after athletic therapist in Toronto, Canada, specializing in pediatric elite athletes. She has worked with the women’s national soccer teams for 8 years, as well as the national gymnastics team, and regional teams including hockey, rugby, soccer, swimming, basketball, and volleyball to name a few. Erin also runs Developing Athletics Canada and the EOS Performance Institute.

Brian: Erin, can you tell us about the young athletes you typically work with and how you got into athletic therapy?

Erin Perry: As a young person, I was athletic, I enjoyed soccer, swimming, rowing, and skiing. I experienced some injuries, but it was the concussions that caused me to ‘hang ’em up’. I figured then and there that if I couldn’t be an athlete, that I would work hard to take care of other athletes in helping them realizing their dreams. Now I specialize in pediatric elite athletes both in clinic and field situations. Their development, training and treatment are my focus. So many injuries that I treat are preventable.

Brian: One of the most common injuries in female athletes is a torn ACL. What are your experiences in treating this injury and your thoughts on injury prevention?

EP: I am so happy that you asked. Most ACL injuries are what we call non-traumatic, which simply means that it is an injury that no contact was made in. For example, a soccer player running down the line with the ball, works to move the ball inside, and suddenly falls down while hearing a pop; an ACL tear. These are all preventable! The number one cause of these types of injuries is tight hamstrings. The three hamstrings should be stretched separately, and when tested in a straight leg raise, attention must be made that the findings are made with the pelvis remaining stationary. As soon as the pelvis rotates posteriorly, the test is negated. Most females have good straight leg raise range of motion, but have poor hamstring flexibility. The difference here is crucial. Normal is 80-90degrees. Please be tested, do the tests, and tell all of your friends and teammates, so that we decrease the incidence of ACLs! The other preventable cause is a muscle imbalance between the quadriceps and hamstrings. I will say that this is crucial, that the three hamstrings need to be strengthened again individually. Closed kinetic chain strengthening should be done all of the time, unless it is a rehab program.

Brian: Is the ACL injury common among all sports?

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Youth Sports Training: Do You Confuse Your Young Athletes?

Posted on: March 24th, 2009 by IYCA 8 Comments

Youth sports training with kids

You could open an interesting debate with respect to teaching sporting skills to kids.

I did last week during a presentation I gave to area basketball coaches.

Some trainers and coaches have decided that the skills required to achieve a certain task should be taught from the beginning.

Others believe in the concept of motor patterning – allowing the young athlete to find his or her own way of achieving a task.

The debate gets even trickier when you factor in the varying nuances and therefore objectives of different sports.

For example, in basketball, if the ball goes in the hoop, it doesn’t really matter how it got there.

But in diving, you know going in that once you jump off the platform, gravity will pull you into the water – the style in which you get there is all that really matters.

Where do you sit on this debate?

I asked the coaches in my audience the same question.

Should you teach or over-teach a certain style of execution to young athletes from day one, or should you allow the young athletes to learn the relative motor patterning via exploration and natural refinement?

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Kids Fitness Professionals: 3 Words to Change Your Life

Posted on: March 5th, 2009 by IYCA 7 Comments

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Kids Fitness coaching principles

Here they are –

1) Integrity

Personal honor, consistence in applying your personal values

to every action.

Every young person I train is important.

They require and deserve attention and my very best.

In the highest value of integrity, I care deeply about every single

young athlete I have ever worked with and given them everything

I had in order to make them better.

I applied the same sense of integrity when creating the IYCA.

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