Behind every sports success is a pushy parent. Aibu to agree?

@WeAreManyUArefew, depending on how much your young relative likes doing social media, maybe a Patreon or similar would work, with subscribers being given exclusive behind the scenes access to his journey to get to LA or the like. But that's not an approach for everyone.

I know a young cricketer playing at county level, multiple age groups above his actual age, on track for England etc. His younger sister has tagged along behind him since she was a toddler and has sacrificed so much.

Of course! The key thing for him has been wanting to help the homeless, so he has done fundraising to create summer care packages for them and then we took them to our local soup kitchen where they gave them to their clients. He’s now working on fundraising to do the same for winter care packages. He’s also really keen on being eco-friendly so has done a lot of litter picking. So all self-initiated really! Although he attends a special school and they have really celebrated his efforts and are now looking at making him their “fundraising lead” for charitable pursuits at school 🥰

You’d know if you weren’t on the inside.

Like pp said with tennis your child would be left off squads others he’d beaten were invited to. Others would be put forward for the funding when he has better results.

other parents would be called in for meetings about their child’s future, when yours beat them in every comp.

it’s very labile as well. One day you’re filling in the forms and getting your child where they need to be, the next someone else is getting the emails and you’re not.

if you do get invited you find you are asked to foot the bill while others get it free.

thing is if you are on the outside you don’t question why as that just gets your child marked as trouble and the selections completely dry up.

Margaret I'm most definitely not on the inside of anything. I don't have a clue what I'm doing half the time 😂

Ds gets invited to stuff and I just complete the online forms and make sure he's where he's meant to be!

Yes, he's very lucky he does get some funding as nominated by his NGB.

But it has nothing to do with me knowing anyone or what's going on!

True. But I'd much rather have parents who will push me to achieve than those who'd let me be complacent. However, I do appreciate success means different things to different people so people should feel free to parent however works best for their families. Key point is they should also let others parents how they want to. In summary, people should perhaps focus on their own kids

Wow, I'm impressed! May I ask what sort of community projects your son is involved in and how you found out about them? I'd love to get my children involved on helping the local community..
Thanks!

I suspect that means you are on the inside and don't see it most of the time.

I played tennis. At one point I could, and did consistently in tournaments beat about half the county squad. I was never asked to join.

What was the difference between me and, for example Kate, who I'd always beaten easily 6-2, 6-2 or better)? I was several levels up on the rankings too. She played in the same club as the county squad's coach. All the others had similar reasons.

And that was one where there was an absolutely easy way to check.

I'm not, not was I then, that bothered I didn't get to play. I got plenty of other games. There was a certain satisfaction in beating his squad in tournaments matches in front of him though.😁

I was wondering about that. When people talk about the sacrifices made 'as a family', I can't help thinking of the brother or sister who isn't the budding swimmer or whatever, who would rather have the family holiday sacrificed for the sport meets but doesn't get any say in it.
You wonder whether, in families where income is stretched by the expense of the one child's Olympic dreams, what is left for the dreams of any other children in the family.
Awesome though it would be to be the proud sister of an Olympian, it must be hard for parents with more than one child to make sure that any other children who might have talents for other things don't miss out on having their own skills developed because there isn't any money or time left for them.

I have to push just to get my son out the door to school in the morning, does that count he does have football training two nights a week and I do strongly encourage him to go even when he's tired and so on but it's not about wanting him to reach elite level. It's just about getting some exercise in and learning to stick at something, and all the other benefits that come with team sports.

Friend is a single parent. We and others help with lifts, minding, logistics.
A team sport or being part of a squad means lifts can be arranged, duties swapped, coaches take the team.
We have a couple of kids who’s parents struggle to come to stuff so we coaches usually take them or another parent does.

Actually, that’s not a bad thing anyway. We have 2 kids in 2 entirely different sports and do a lot of asking for favours and doing favours for other parents. Honestly though, I can see that the benefits far outweigh the inconvenience.
Having sporty teens means much of their spare time is filled doing something healthy that they enjoy, keeps them occupied, they’re learning to be part of teams, meeting lots of new people, learning to be competitive, learning to lose. And trust me, if they don’t like it we wouldn’t do it!
They can go get another hobby that doesn’t involve most weekends spent getting up at the crack of dawn and week day evenings driving them around to training.

As a coach, I don’t t recognise this. Again Inwiuld say having ££ resources will always help.
It’s the good thing about many sports - unless it’s dressage or something that requires tons of money, equipment- it’s more equal.
You are measures on times, accuracy, skill. Who you ‘know’ is neither here nor there if you are very good and willing to work to get better.

He’s had some money for equipment, gets Team GB clothing and gear for free, had a small grant (. £2k ) towards travel from a local sports fund but young athletes generally don’t get sponsorship as such. His parents make it work. Just. But he’s one of 1000’s of teens in this position in every sport.
He LOVES it though. Loves it. And when he’s in LA in 4 years time, which barring injury or disaster he will be, it’ll be worth it.
Evennif he medals though, he’ll still come back to a ‘normal’ life, working, getting on with life. They all do. Though his plan is to coach once he stops competing at national level.

@Breakdancing Football Dreams: The Academy. Jaw dropping parents and great staff at CP who have to give parents and dc bad news!

Havjng connections can help in some sport. If a parent is a show jumper decent horses come your way. Clearly you need riding talent but you are around good horses from birth. Having rowing at school or uni helps rowers. Most parents give up a lot to help dc but other dc can be left out when a parent is focussed on just one dc.

What sport is this?

Ds sport is all based on speed and rankings. Some is based on the trajectory of improvement.

There's nothing to gain from being "in" with anyone if you simply aren't quick enough.

DC’s sport yes pushy parents helps. As does having a “status” parent- an actor, successful sports person themselves, prestigious job or otherwise loaded. Anything that gets the kid noticed so they’re given extra opportunities.

not so much with the children themselves, but stuff like getting “in” with the GB officials, getting phone numbers, sending videos, pushing for their child to be on national squads. Meetings and discussions.

pushing for their child to train with certain coaches. I’ve seen a parent ask for other children to be removed from their child’s squad.

money. Money helps a lot.

I know a family who are v proud of their two children who represented their country internationally

The other child lives overseas. I have sometimes wondered if they resented the focus on their siblings

It would be interesting to see how many are only children, or have siblings much older.

DD performed in Annie when she was 10, which was quite intense with rehearsals etc.

All the other children were either only children or by far and away the youngest except two girls-who were sisters.
I suspect you find similar, simply because of time to do such things

And it must be hell if you are a non sporty child being dragged to sport meet ups and training sessions for your rising star sibling.

I guess that's the decision each family unit makes for itself.
We made it work, it wasn't always easy but we did the best that we could to give our dc opportunities. Dd was lucky to find her thing, all we had to do was give her the chance to play.

And how would that work if you are a single parent or other parent works away

My Mum was a pushy parent when it came to my sister who was v talented at tennis. It wasn’t so much the amount of training she was taking her to, it was more her extreme emotional reaction to losses and how invested she was in the results. The pressure was crazy and she almost had a breakdown when my sister decided to give up. It was a very difficult time for our whole family. She wasn’t that interested in our achievements at school though really, even though we did really well academically. It just was tennis, tennis, tennis!

Having watched the programme about Crystal Palace and their juniors and youth team I’ve never seen pushy parents like it. They even banned a parent. Money is the big problem - parents see ££££ signs flashing. Most parents support but it’s often parents who know the sport have dc who do well. Not always of course but riders have riding dc, rowers have rowing dc etc. It’s a way of life for some and they’ve started young. Others have to navigate a path.

You can have children doing different sports if you're in a club(s) that have a really supportive vibe.

We quite often have others host ds for big meets or we host others. Other families do the same.

Same with training. We lift share around what people are working and when.

I do all the local kids in school holidays (we are a town and they train in the city) because I'm free and it means other parents don't have to juggle work and lifts for that time. My choice.

It's also means when I had major surgery I didn't have to worry because lifts were paid back quite happily.

I know know even within other clubs it can be quite cut throat but we are very lucky that ours is very friendly and us parents genuinely want the best for all of them.