The big picture is most “great young athletes” will break down by their senior year of college due to poor fitness training in their early teen years. Even worse, this training will cause them pain throughout their lives if they don’t learn how to fix it. The majority of these problems in training and rehab can be solved by making them simpler and looking at building a great athlete, not a great “One Sport Star”. Why are kids sprinting when they can’t stand on one foot? Why are they squatting when their core is too weak to hold a plank.
I thank god every day for Brian Grasso and the others who are starting this fitness revolution to stop the crazy sports training. However, as long as parents continue to push and pay and dream that their kids are superstars, we will continue to break down our children one by one.
Basic is not simplistic. Basic is not slow, in fact it is brilliant. Remember the body has an inherent wisdom in regard to movement, our job as coaches, trainers and parents is to tap into that wisdom and bring it out. We do that by giving the body movement problems to solve. Start with simple problems and move to more complex movements as mastery occurs. Movement should not be cognitive, it should be instinctive. We can move and think about individual muscles and how they must fire.
Jon Hinds, former trainer of the LA Lakers, recently opened up the Monkey Bar Gym because he realized the best way to build superior athletes in to make them perform Natural Movements. Push, Pull, Jump, Crawl, Climb are all natural movements that force you to engage the core and build a stable, brick house body.
The athlete must learn how his or her body works and moves to become “a machine”. Each athlete is different and must train at their own pace. The best way to do this is to allow them the joy of discovery. Never lose sight of the big picture. You want to build an elite athlete? Save your money and make your child climb trees, run through the woods and play as many sports as possible.
So, make sure you can stand before you run. Make sure you can squat before you jump. make sure you can crawl before you bench press.
K2 Athletic Performance Training 