Netballers 'baby girrafes' article in Herald

Netballers 'baby girrafes' article in Herald on Sunday

In response to the Netballers 'baby giraffes' article in the Herald on Sunday.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/dylan-cleaver/news/article.cfm?a_id=193&objectid=10586633

Firstly, I couldn't agree more with Matt Kritz of the Academy of Sport in his view that many of New Zealand's top athletes, specifically netballers have poor fundamental movement skills.

We are provided with examples of this every week and in every sport. At the top level athletes with poor movement and coordination are quickly exposed by more versatile and capable athletes.

We are clearly one step behind in our range of movement skills, speed and coordination, and this severely limits our ability to
perform advanced skills and compete.

A couple of points I want to touch on however, is the lack of solutions being provided for this problem and the attention being directed in the wrong places.

We start developing our fundamental movement skills as toddlers, with some critical periods of development happening between 2 and 5, and also the pre-adolescent years. By the mid to late teens our movement patterns are largely set and have become habitual. So trying to change or correct these in the years of early adult-hood is an extremely difficult task. The majority of time with older athletes is spent on undoing bad habits, and the reality is the opportunity for optimising coordination and movement skill has been missed.

Our top level athletes are regularly exposed as being ill-prepared for elite competition, and this is because of a couple of reasons.
One, the focus of sport in New Zealand is on competition and playing rather than physical preparation and general athletic development. Virtually 80% of the time in youth sports teens are either playing or involved in sport specific training, with only 20% of the time spent developing athletic skills.

This needs to be flipped, with the majority spent on physical preparation and teaching and 20% of the time on competing. This would significantly increase the level of playing ability, and drastically reduce the injury rate and burnout rate of teenage athletes.

Secondly, there are currently no tertiary qualifications for the fitness and athletic development of young athletes. How do we intend to develop elite level performers when no one is qualified to teach this stuff? Every paper in university or tech is geared towards working with adults, not kids and teens. The most important population group in this whole equation is also the most miss-managed, under catered for and forgotten.

It's ok to identify our top level athletes are poor movers and uncoordinated, but we're shooting ourselves in the foot if the focus doesn't shift toward creating qualifications, increased funding and more attention to developing young athletes.

My wife and I have recently opened New Zealand's first and only dedicated youth fitness and training centre on Auckland's North Shore for the very reason that too many young kiwi's are competing in sport without a strong foundation of fitness and conditioning.

We are both university educated with degree's in sport, and have received specialist qualifications for youth athletic development from overseas. My wife Leigh was on the Fitness NZ Expert Panel for writing the recently released Children in Exercise Facilities Guidelines, and also served on the Advisory Committee to the International youth Conditioning Association.

We are extremely passionate about youth sports and fitness, and even more so about taking action to highlight the many issues in youth athlete development.

I appreciate your time in reading this email and invite any questions or comments.

Best Regards,

Gareth Ashton
Director
Calypso Sports & Fitness

p 9 414 1182
m 021 02066975
w www.gocalypso.co.nz

ENDS

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