doug in co wrote:
yet more evidence for the 'unique' approach of letting kids play,
https://www.scientificamerican.com/...to-win-a-gold-medal/ "The results showed that both the medalists and non-medalists started practicing in their main sport before the age of 12. However, the medalists started training in their main sport an average of 18 months later than the non-medalists. (The medalists started at age 11.8, on average, compared to age 10.3 for the non-medalists.) The medalists also accumulated significantly less training in their sport during adolescence and significantly more training in
other sports. This pattern of results held across a wide range of sports, from skiing to basketball to archery. "
I think most coaches underestimate the neural connections that your brain establishes doing other sports and activities that cross over and make athletes more intelligent when doing their core sport in ways that their core sports can't push their brains in terms of learning. While practice makes perfect in the core sport, perhaps the other sports enhance the overall neural plasticity that can they be applied back to the core sport to learn in new ways in the core sport because there has been different angles in terms of problem solving that can be applied backwards to the core sport. Take for example how a soccer ball spins, a baseball spins, a football spins, and how a tennis ball spins. You can still do a "knuckle ball" with all these balls with the ball floating through the air and not spinning and dropping suddenly as the speed changes and lift and drag around the ball changes. If I played goalie, or catcher or am on the other side of the tennis court, I now have different knuckle ball experiences being at the receiving end and will have a different set of velocity/size/pressure scenarios on multiple projectiles, which allow me to just eyeball that projectile coming towards me and do the right thing, but because of the diversity of my data set and my ability to do inference on my learning models and make better decisions than the guy beside me, who as just been doing the core sport.
I'm just using the example for convenience, but look at the snowboarder world champion who came from seed place 26 in the Super Giant Slalom and took the win from the pure speed event women. Don't tell me that her snowboard coordination did not come into play vaulting her past every SuperG athlete.
All those girls who came from figure skating to my group in Nordic Skiing were just the best athletes to teach.....you explained it once and they got it. If I got a guy off the track team, the transfer was not so easy, but if I got a kid would could run a 16 min 5K damn right I was going to try to make him a better technical skier, because as a coach I knew I was playing with an awesome engine and super power to weight ratio. Of course the track coach wants that kid running indoor track, not mucking around with me on skis, the figure skating coach wants that kid on skate, but does not realise I am giving her 3-4 minute endurance engine a massive boost for her figure skating long program. Meanwhile the soccer coach wants his kids indoor soccer, but when she's on my nordic, team, I am jacking up her 90 min game day endurance, I am improving her coordination at speed, improving her balance and spatial awareness and giving her other aspects of work ethic that she will take back to summer soccer.
But every coach things his/her sport is the most important sport on the planet and does not accept that the athlete may go away and do other sports and gain skills for the core sport that may not be so easily enhanced inside the core sport....and so it goes.