Saturday, June 8, 2024

Some Athletes Should (At Some Point) Play 2 Sports

Yeah, I believe this. 

Training multiple sports at the same time really does not get enough credit, especially in adolescent/teen/youth sport. I'll have you know that I love specificity, but it is hard to deny the multitude of benefits an athlete gets from training different stuff than their main sport. 

 What are some of these benefits?

1. Early Skill Acquisition
2. Mental Preparation
3. Physical peaking: This is the main benefit I see from training multiple sports. Some athletes do not peak for their sport until post puberty, and some into their late 20s. This is more common in sports where physical development is very important, like weightlifting or rugby. This is less applicable to higher skill sports like cricket or soccer. By training multiple sports before you peak as an athlete, you keep more eggs in your basket and also build a bigger base.

Notice I said you should 'train' multiple sports. Not compete in multiple sports at the same time. That would be hard (though not impossible, but hard).

So what are my recommendations? I think training 2 sports at once is possible. To some extent, all my athletes train 2 sports at once. My rugby players train both rugby and S&C, same with soccer and cricket players. As a weightlifter, I also train for BJJ. 

~ Prem

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