“There are only two options regarding commitment. You’re either IN or you’re OUT. There is no such thing as life in-between.”

Pat Riley

What's Ahead
Parents:
Choosing Sports Camps
Coaches:
Are You Winning By Too Much? Coaching
Players:
Stamina, Strength, Quickness and Agility

Maine Youth Sports
www.maineyouthsports.com
P.O. Box 442
Cumberland, ME 04021
inquiry@maineyouthsports.com
(207) 415-6321

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Heroes

It is easy for kids to admire professional athletes who stand out in their sport. This admiration often takes the form of “hero worship” and gives kids someone to mimic in their path to adulthood. Most parents encourage this behavior through buying jerseys and seeking autographs.

However, as recent news accounts only reconfirm, there is more to professional athletes than just their performance. A professional player’s conduct away from the game is often unknown. Most fans don’t know a player’s morals, ethics, work habits and respect for teammates or for fans. Thus, most parents don’t really know if they want their child to grow up mimicking the life choices of a specific professional athlete.

For kids who want heroes and parents who want role models there can be conflict. One way around this conflict is for parents to begin distinguishing between admiration for a player’s abilities and admiration for a player. For example, saying that a professional player is a great athlete is different than saying a professional player is a great person. Parents can help focus their children on players whose community actions are admirable even if the player’s game actions are not at the superstar level. Helping kids understand the difference between a player as a person and a player as an athlete is the key to providing the right role models to children.

10 Ways to Improve Your Coaching

Just like players, coaches are developed through education that is tested and refined in actual situations. Unfortunately, there are no practices for coaches where they can master their skills before actually applying them. This lack of practice forces coaches to take responsibility for their own education and improvement. Here are 10 suggestions.

1. Search the bookstore and the Internet.
2. Talk with other coaches.
3. Get feedback from parents.
4. Get feedback from players.
5. Attend training sessions.
6. Watch other youth games.
7. Videotape practices.
8. Ask a parent to help with non-coaching tasks.
9. Organize and plan ahead.
10. Have fun.

While coaches often start with sports knowledge, transferring this knowledge into the heads of young players may pose a new set of challenges. Coaches may sometimes feel that their problems are unique. However, with over 2.5 million volunteer youth coaches and over 30 million kids in youth sports, every coaching frustration is repeated many times over. This experience base is available to any coach who actively seeks it out

When Teammates Let You Down

Both in professional and youth games, some players are simply not playing their best. Not every player gives his/her best performance in every game or in every moment of a game. For those players trying their hardest, watching other players not making the same effort can be extremely frustrating. When this occurs, these players can respond by:

• Slowing down to match lessor efforts
• Playing at the same intensity
• Playing at a higher level to try to compensate

Players can always find an excuse to work less hard. However, players who can continue to play their best or raise their level of play, even when others are not, are learning how to become champions.

Interval Training - How it can Boost Your Performance

Interval training has been the basis for athletic training routines for years. The first forms of interval training, called 'fartlek' involved alternating short, fast bursts of intensive exercise with slow, easy activity. Fartlek was casual, unstructured training that perfectly fit it's english translation: "speed play." The interval programs of today have become highly sophisticated methods of structured training for athletic performance enhancement. These sessions include precisely measured intervals that match the athlete's sport, event and level of conditioning.

Interval training works both the aerobic and the anaerobic system.

The repetitive form of this training leads to the adaptation response. The body begins to build new capillaries, and is better able to take in and deliver oxygen to the working muscles. Muscles develop a higher tolerance to the build-up of lactate, and the heart muscle is strengthened. Interval training also allows you to increase your training intensity without overtraining or burn-out.

Precautions for Safe Interval Training

• Warm Up before starting intervals
• Assess current conditiong and set training goals that are within your ability
• Start slowly. (for example: walk 2 minutes/ run 2 minutes) In general, longer intervals provide better results
• Keep a steady, but challenging pace throughout the interval
• Build the number of repetitions over time
• Bring your heart rate down to 100-110 bpm during the rest interval
• To improve, increase intensity or duration, but not both at the same time
• Make any changes slowly over a period of time
• Train on a smooth, flat surface to ensure even effort
• You can also use circuit training as a form of interval training

Advanced Interval Training

You can take a more scientific approach to interval training by varying your work and recovery intervals based on your pre-determined goals. Here are the four variables you can manipulate when designing your interval training program:

• Intensity (speed) of work interval
• Duration (distance or time) of work interval
• Duration of rest or recovery interval
• Number of repetitions of each interval

Here are examples of Interval Training:

1. Run for five minutes, then add a sprint for one minute and repeat.
2. Run or walk around the track once, then run up and down stadium stairs and repeat.

Overall, Interval Training will help you work out longer and harder, burn more calories, and get in better shape for sports varying speed intensities throughout competition.

Info from Quinn, Sportsmedicine.about.com

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