by John Cortese | Sep 12, 2023 | Uncategorized | 0 comments
This is a bad idea… Don’t be that guy!
For those that practice “sport-specific” training routines, or who ONLY play one sport year-around (excluding college athletes) you are severely limiting your athletic potential, and I’ll tell you why.
First off, we need to differentiate a couple of terms that I’ll be using during this post.
GPP = General Physical Prepardeness. Think strength training, sprint/speed training NOT specific to your sport, etc. Basically getting the athlete physically ready for sport via means that are not typically practiced by the athlete during their sport practice. This is what we do in the weight room when we train our athletes. We physically prepare their bodies and their minds for their sport via rigourous training methods that will produce optimal results in speed, strength, and power output.
SPP = Specific Physical Preparedness. Think practicing your sport, game-time scenarios, skill training i.e. practicing route running, hitting, fielding balls, sprints out of starting blocks, etc. This should be done during the early competitive season (pre-season), and obviously done during the season to keep the skill set you want to enhance as high and as efficient as possible.
Now, I hope you see where I’m going with this. WAY too many athletes (especially at a young age) are only playing ONE sport, year-around. It’s VERY common to see baseball and softball players playing their sport (competitively) 9-10 months out of the year. Yes, they might play another sport during that time, but not as serious. I see this a lot with other sports: volleyball and soccer come to mind here as well.
The intentions are GREAT, I understand that these kids want to be great at their sport. But when athletes in the age range of 8-14 year old are (for example) playing fall baseball, regular baseball, all-star baseball, & then travel ball EVERY year until they reach high school, it’s no wonder their arms are SHOT and they don’t see the game as fun any longer.
Even young high school athletes are really shooting themselves in the foot when they only play one sport, then play the same sport for a club team in the off-season
