Strategies for Developing Olympians – “The Early Years”
Jason Tremblay, PFT Certificate
Long Term Athlete Development (LTAD) plays an integral role in the development of high-level athletes. It is a process that can be neatly modeled on paper, however it is a process that is also highly organic and individualized. Essentially, a plan for long-term athlete development serves as the basis of a more individualized periodization model for the athlete. The goal of any LTAD plan is similar to that of periodization, create transferability and move towards specificity.
Active Start
The logic behind phase 1 of LTAD is to develop physical literacy before kids hit puberty. During this stage children should be exposed to unstructured play to develop movement skills. By starting children off early with unstructured athletics it allows the kids to develop:
- Confidence
- Social skills
- Emotional control
- Fundamental movement skills
- Fundamental sport skills
By the time the active start phase is done, the children should have developed the “ABCs” of movement, agility, balance, coordination and speed.
FUNdamentals
During phase 2 of LTAD children should be introduced to varieties of sport and to continue the enhancement of the ABCs of movement. The development of agility, balance, coordination and speed will ultimately dictate the child’s physical literacy.
Learning to Train
Phase 3 of the LTAD model is considered the most important phase. During this phase children will learn to convert fundamental movement skills into fundamental sport skills. This stage is referred to as the “Golden Age of Learning”. It is important to avoid premature specialization during phase 3. Premature specialization leads to a very one-sided development of the athlete with a greater potential for psychological burnout or injury.
*There are sports where early specialization is necessary. Sports such as gymnastics, figure skating and diving require early specialization and a more focused training regimen at a younger age.
As you can see, during the first three phases of the LTAD model. The child’s exposure to sport should be very multi-faceted and generalized. Developing physical literacy requires practice, and the best way to get a kid to practice is to get outside and play.
During part 2 of our series on long term athlete development, we will be reviewing “Training to Train”, “Training to Compete” and “Training to Win”.
To contact Jason: https://www.kylehuntfitness.com/articles/the-strength-guy/
References
Canadian Sport for Life. (2012). Improving Quality of Sport in Canada. Retrieved July 31st, 2012 from http://www.canadiansportforlife.ca/
Donna Crabtree says
People can learn a lot from the Olympians. You will find that a lot of the approaches and strategies that professional athletes do in the game can be applied in real life situations. In business, the technique and art can be very formidable when used correctly and at the right time. If you want to become successful in Twitter.com, you can rely on some of the tried and proven approaches that the Olympians themselves used for longevity and glory.