Transitioning – ideas
on becoming an adolescent athlete
Somewhere between 11 and 13, kids, their parents, or coaches
get the idea that maybe trying a race would be good. For some adolescents this comes easily – maybe
they have had broad experience with competitive situations as a younger child
and think nothing of it. For others it
takes a fair bit of encouraging, reassuring, and framing to get them to the
start line. Really, it shouldn’t be surprising
that hesitation sometimes happens with some kids as it takes some confidence to
try something new, to take a risk, to put yourself out there, especially when
you`re unsure of your abilities. In our
world today, there are a lot of families that protect their child from every
possible risk. It seems especially so when
it comes to sport if parents weren’t athletes themselves as younger
people. It leads me to thinking about a
question that comes up lots when chatting with other coaches – how do you
transition kids successfully from introductory instructional focused ski
programs to engaging these same kids in trying competitive cross country
skiing. If you’ve got the answer to that
question nailed, you’ve got something good cooking and I would love to hear
from you – lots of good sized brains have thought about that one for I’m sure a
number of years and are still struggling with it.
So much happens for early adolescents – rapid skeletal,
muscular, hormonal development -
increased importance of peers and independence - every sport they are involved with is seeking
increased commitment and time – the need for ever higher quality of equipment,
coaching, training and racing opportunities.
Kids this age have a lot going on – and so, it shouldn’t really come as
a surprise that some of them just check out, and decide becoming a racer isn’t
really for them. Despite this reality, I
have seen many, many young athletes stick it out and grow to become excellent
high level athletes at a later age. What
gets them there? What pivotal experience
occurred to get them to say ‘this is for me’?
If we really want to bridge kids from instructional to
competitive skiing, we really need to reach out to their parents. It is parents who decide the parameters of a
child’s existence – parents decide ‘we’ll spend this amount on equipment’,
‘we’ll travel this weekend to that event’, or ‘we’ll pay the club fees for this
program or that one’. And so, it’s parents who we need to reach out
to if we want to increase the percentage of kids engaged as adolescents in
competitive cross country skiing. So
many parents, even in a ski town like Canmore, have never had the experience of
being a racer. Thinking about their
child as an ‘athlete’ is a pretty foreign concept to some parents. These folks need to be brought along, to see
the next steps. They need some
experiences that show them where it goes and why their child should be a part
of it all. These parents need to see
that it isn’t about elitism – that it’s not just for children of parents who
were high level racers. Parents need opportunities to learn from experienced
mentors, to become engaged in events and conversations about what it looks like
and the benefits of having their child involved in ski racing as an adolescent.
I recently attended a session by a
social activist from Toronto, Dave Meslin – Dave shared his beliefs that he doesn’t
really think apathy exists, but rather alienation exists. Maybe this offers an explanation as to why so
many parents don’t move their kids on to racing programs at 12 or 13 years old –
its not because people don’t care that there would be some benefit to their
child to become an athlete, but rather the disengagement occurs because people
haven’t been invited in, in a way that is meaningful to them. At our ski club in Canmore, we work at being
intentional about the invitation, by engaging parents and kids to try out the
next level a couple of times during the season.
It takes hard work to transition kids from introductory instructional
ski experiences to ‘train to train’ programs.
Its hard work everywhere. Its
hard work at a small club where there is no tradition of racing, and it is hard
work at a club that has large and successful racing programs. I hear folks saying ‘oh, you guys have it
easy in Canmore, you have a great facility and lots of high level athletes around’
– and the fact is we do have access to a great facility and there are many high
level athletes in town. But the work of
transitioning kids from ' you need to be there' to
adolescents that see themselves as a ski racer is hard work and no easier in
Canmore than anywhere else. It is the
deliberate work of creating a positive space, and providing experiences where
that transition to ‘athlete’ occurs.
One of the important pieces I have always felt that would
help that transition is to embed ‘competition’ in regular practice
sessions. Other sports do this all the
time – can you imagine enrolling in hockey and never playing a game? Or enrolling
in golf but always staying on the putting greens and driving range. Other sports do a great job of normalizing
competition, of making it a part of each practice or at least once per
week. Practice to competition ratio is
something that has had quite a bit of discussion the last number of years. Sports such as hockey have been criticized
for having too many games in relation to the number of practices. The problem with so many introductory cross
country ski experiences is that there is so little competition relative to the
number of practice sessions. This is
understandable because so few leaders of children’s cross country skiing have
ever participated in a ski race – so why would they organize one, when it is a
foreign concept to them. We need to find
ways to involve young skiers in regular competition. Wouldn’t it be great if every club in a
region hosted a club championship event aimed at their club, but open to every
club in the region. Wouldn’t it be great if coaches found ways to embed some
competition regularly in club practices?
Wouldn’t it be great if competition for young skiers didn’t mirror adult
competition formats?
What we really need to help young skiers transition to
racing in Canada is not a one size fits all approach to adolescent competitive
ski experiences. Maybe its time to look
at a tiered regional race series – one for adolescents who have been at it
awhile and another for kids just getting going.
If we are interested in serving the diverse needs of kids, we really
need to rethink how we are organizing things.
I’d really love to see a southern Alberta development race series aimed
at novice skiers, and then a different series for kids to graduate to which involved
adolescents who have a bit more experience.
These are all projects I’d love
to put some time into and will. There
are 10-12 ski clubs who work with children in southern Alberta of which two are
regular participants at regional and provincial races. I think we could be doing something
differently to advance competitive cross country skiing in southern Alberta.
Transitioning kids to competitive cross country skiing is
work that is important and requires nurturing.
If we really want to be a leading ski nation, we need to think about
supporting the good work of coaches in all clubs. This begins by having a conversation with
each other about how we can work together for the advancement of competitive
cross country skiing. I believe a
healthy ski community where there are 20+ strong, involved and active clubs
across a region is a much better thing than a reality where there are one or
two clubs dominating races. The outcome
of this work is increased numbers of adolescent skiers transitioning to
becoming athletes. What do we need in
place to achieve this outcome? This is
an important conversation and one I’d love to advance.
Roy
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