prompt
prewriting
rough draft
Final draft
At the preteen age, children are seen with gleaming smiles' on their faces as they kick the ball down the field, score the winning touchdown, or break the elementary school record for the mile. Though once they reach middle school and high school, everything changes. Smiles turn to painful facial gestures and fun turns to waiting in the athletic training room, watching several students preparing twenty pounds of ice for aching body regions. Hard driven attitudes turn to quitting mindsets and the typical energetic athlete turns to a groaning mess sprawled out on its bed. This is not fun; this is a sense of domestic torture. Throughout the period of youth sport's history, coaches and parents have pushed their athletes to overwhelming levels in which recovery time should be increased and training should be limited in terms of intensity and frequency.
Although few people claim youth sports intensity is monitored to a good extent, youth sports intensity must be relaxed in terms of training style. One of the most important organs of the body, the heart, may be damaged during vigorous exercises during the childhood years. Continuous workout can lead to the thinning of the pericardium of the heart, which leads to susceptibility to disease when the child grows older. The heart does not develop to its full maturity till around the age of 18 and vigorous exercise could lead to growth impairment. Also, continuous, intense training sessions may leas to bone deformity and sometimes permanent damage. For example, when you run the tibia acts as a shock absorber. The continuous jolts could lead to microscopic fractures eventually leading to shin splints or the tibia stress syndrome. At Bayside High School, six out of eight track distance athletes were shown to have shin splints. Due to difficult training, growth impairment in children is a definite issue. For example, the epiphyseal plate within the tibia allows the lengthening of the body over time. Injury to this structure may lead to stunted growth when the child ages. This must be changed.
Though many believe recovery time in youth sports is irrelevant, recovery time is necessary to the safety of the child. Recovery time should be increased to at least 20 hours, while most coaches only provide 8-10 hours. Depending on the child, it takes around 24 hours for destroyed protein to be built back properly. Also, the analogy, "no pain, no gain," is false in many ways. If actual pain occurs (not muscle fatigue), then the athlete must double recovery, at least, in order to avoid injury again. According to the NCAA, 75% of athletes who sustain injury return to the sport too early and reinjure themselves. Lastly, a child benefits more from recovery than smashing another workout onto their schedule. For example, New Balance reveals that most all-state athletes focus more on the recovery than the actual workout. This provides proof that recovery exemplifies success in well-conditioned athletes.
While there are many who feel the frequency of youth sports should not be toyed with, youth sports frequency today is too much for children athletes. Most United States' high school coaches do not follow frequency protocol properly. For example, in the state of Virginia it is illegal to hold an organized practice on Sunday, though more than 50% of coaches admit to holding them. On the behalf of bad coaching, most coaches do not even mind injury and simply tells their athletes to take a short rest while contradicting themselves and upping the frequency of training anyway. Most athletes have the incorrect mindset, vowing that if they train more they will get better. This is false, for Ocean Lakes' cross country team trains twice a day which has lead to twice as many injuries as Bayside's cross country team, who only trains once a day. Also, Drew Hunter, a 4x all-American track athlete, does less workouts than the typical track athlete per week. This shows that victory is achieved through a balance in training.
In terms of frequency, intensity, and recovery time, there must be reform in the system of youth athletics. Yearly, too many injuries are occurring due to ridiculous training rituals. It's too much for the children of our society to deal with and we will begin to see a decline of performance level in the next several years. It's simply too much for a student athlete.
Although few people claim youth sports intensity is monitored to a good extent, youth sports intensity must be relaxed in terms of training style. One of the most important organs of the body, the heart, may be damaged during vigorous exercises during the childhood years. Continuous workout can lead to the thinning of the pericardium of the heart, which leads to susceptibility to disease when the child grows older. The heart does not develop to its full maturity till around the age of 18 and vigorous exercise could lead to growth impairment. Also, continuous, intense training sessions may leas to bone deformity and sometimes permanent damage. For example, when you run the tibia acts as a shock absorber. The continuous jolts could lead to microscopic fractures eventually leading to shin splints or the tibia stress syndrome. At Bayside High School, six out of eight track distance athletes were shown to have shin splints. Due to difficult training, growth impairment in children is a definite issue. For example, the epiphyseal plate within the tibia allows the lengthening of the body over time. Injury to this structure may lead to stunted growth when the child ages. This must be changed.
Though many believe recovery time in youth sports is irrelevant, recovery time is necessary to the safety of the child. Recovery time should be increased to at least 20 hours, while most coaches only provide 8-10 hours. Depending on the child, it takes around 24 hours for destroyed protein to be built back properly. Also, the analogy, "no pain, no gain," is false in many ways. If actual pain occurs (not muscle fatigue), then the athlete must double recovery, at least, in order to avoid injury again. According to the NCAA, 75% of athletes who sustain injury return to the sport too early and reinjure themselves. Lastly, a child benefits more from recovery than smashing another workout onto their schedule. For example, New Balance reveals that most all-state athletes focus more on the recovery than the actual workout. This provides proof that recovery exemplifies success in well-conditioned athletes.
While there are many who feel the frequency of youth sports should not be toyed with, youth sports frequency today is too much for children athletes. Most United States' high school coaches do not follow frequency protocol properly. For example, in the state of Virginia it is illegal to hold an organized practice on Sunday, though more than 50% of coaches admit to holding them. On the behalf of bad coaching, most coaches do not even mind injury and simply tells their athletes to take a short rest while contradicting themselves and upping the frequency of training anyway. Most athletes have the incorrect mindset, vowing that if they train more they will get better. This is false, for Ocean Lakes' cross country team trains twice a day which has lead to twice as many injuries as Bayside's cross country team, who only trains once a day. Also, Drew Hunter, a 4x all-American track athlete, does less workouts than the typical track athlete per week. This shows that victory is achieved through a balance in training.
In terms of frequency, intensity, and recovery time, there must be reform in the system of youth athletics. Yearly, too many injuries are occurring due to ridiculous training rituals. It's too much for the children of our society to deal with and we will begin to see a decline of performance level in the next several years. It's simply too much for a student athlete.
Reflection
This is likely the most qualified and informal piece that I have written this year. Written on March 6, 2017, the research essay came easy to me, for at the time I was studying sports medicine for the purpose of HOSA. Therefore, this piece was important to me in English as well as sports medicine class because it provided further acceleration of my studies in the field. The evidence in the essay is more factual-based and statistics than personal experiences which allows a scientific/statistical mood to the reader. This essay took the longest preparation period out of all of my writing throughout the year, which is why it contains nearly three pieces of evidence per paragraph, exceeding the requirements of a typical essay.