Transcript

[MUSIC PLAYING]

MICHAEL JOHNSON

David, I want to get your opinion on early specialisation in sport because I see it as a big problem in this country, where parents feel that the earlier I get my kid involved in a particular sport, the more time they’re going to have to develop this incredible amount of skill.

DAVID EPSTEIN

Yeah. So I think the burgeoning body of science in this area is suggesting that that early hyperspecialisation is not good in a number of ways. Now, it might get you the best 10-year-old, but it’s not the strategy to get you the best 20-year-old for a number of reasons. One, the earlier you pick, especially pre-puberty, you’re more likely to put the wrong person in the wrong sport.

You’re also more likely to put them psychologically in the wrong sport, right? No matter how gifted you are now, for the most part, it takes a heck of a lot of commitment to get to the very top level because there are other really talented people who are committed. And if you have someone in the wrong psychological fit, I think it’s not very likely they’re going to make it that far.

PETER HESPEL

We have been very involved in elite cycling for many years in the track and field and you definitely see that if young kids, you start to specialise them at a very young age, in the end, they lose the enjoyment of sports. And if at the age of 16, 17, kids don’t have fun anymore in a sport, they will never become an athlete.

LAWRENCE OKOYE

I had great experiences playing rugby. I had great experiences playing soccer, football. I had great experiences doing track. I had great experiences with my friends playing all kinds of sport. And all those things will never go away and that’s contributed to the athlete that I am today. Maybe I wouldn’t be as athletic or as physically capable as I am now if I hadn’t have done all the other stuff in the past.

LIZZY YARNOLD

Growing up, I learned a lot from taking part in loads of different sport, not only in athletics doing lots of different events. But the fact that you were doing different sports meant I wasn’t getting bad tennis elbow. It means that my back wasn’t sore from the javelin. It meant that I could always have a rest and recovery from all the different injuries.

And also, by the time I got to skeleton, my body was kind of fresh into that movement pattern. So it wasn’t something that I’d overpracticed and something that I’d got into bad habits with.

PETER HESPEL

The danger is that you would always use the body in exactly the same way, using the same muscle with the same metabolic profile. And the chance to create an overload in a kid is much greater when you specialise than when you present a variety of exercise moves that make him develop as an athlete. And most of the overuse injuries occur because of very specific training at a young age.

DAVID EPSTEIN

Study after study’s coming out now that while elite athletes do train more than sub-elite athletes, they actually train less early on and then in the mid-teen years usually cross over. And before that, they have what’s called a sampling period.

So I think Roger Federer is a great example of this. His parents I think could be described as ‘pully’, not pushy. They said, you can’t focus on tennis yet. You have to play soccer, basketball, badminton before you can focus on tennis.

And it looks like the kids who have become athletes first, learned a range of skills – both the complex neurological skills, like anticipating objects, as well as just developing body awareness – ultimately then pick up any subsequent sport skill more rapidly and are a lot less injury prone and have the chance to find a sport that they might actually be motivated to do for a decade.

I think there are multiple pathways to success and some athletes, whether they’re diversified or specialised, are going to make it for a variety of reasons, physiological and mental. Golf, I think the jury’s out. Hyperspecialisation early may in fact be better. Most sports, I think the evidence is pushing toward it’s not as good.

The earlier you push selection, the more likely you are to put the wrong person in the wrong sport. So I think there are advantages but that we’ve overdone it in early selection.