Sports ability - do they change?

[KHFC2018]

DS is 7 and summer born. He is great academically, but unfortunately as far as I can tell, not athletic/agile/strong, and is weak in a variety of sports.

It is not exactly a problem, everyone has their own talents and weaknesses, and DS is, bless him, enthusiastic about sports now. I am, however, slightly worried that as time goes on, he will start to feel that he is "behind" and lose interest.

Do you have any positive stories for me? Does not sporty at 7 means not sporty ever?

Maybe he hasn’t found a physical activity he likes? Not everybody loves rugby, football or other typical sports taught in school.

DD has a couple of boys in her class who dance, dive, do gymnastics, swim, cycle but won’t touch a ball unless it is school PE and even then only because it is mandatory.

Thanks reluctantbrit. DS can cycle well but still can't swim properly after lessons from 4 years old!

I myself am rather weak in sports, and used to actively avoid it in my school days. So I am hoping that with encouragement and wider opportunities DS will enjoy it and be more positive about it than I did.

My ds had very rough start of life and his gross motor skills and muscle strength suffered a lot. Start of the reception, he couldn't do a lot of things other children can.
He started martial arts in reception, and carried on training. He is great at it now after years. Also his stamina increased massively with regular muscle strengthening training. He is not good at some of the sports, but loves to join in for everything.

To be honest as long as he enjoys it then I think that is the main thing.

You could work on skills with him in the weekend. It is a good thing I think for children to see their parents being physically active even if they aren’t particularly skilled.

Can he throw and catch small and large balls? Kick a soccer ball (even if it isn’t far). Can he float and propel himself through the water? Ride a bike or scooter. Swing across monkey bars? If he can do all these then I think that he’s fairly typical.

Most 7 year olds don’t particularly “get” team sports I think. My daughter is reasonably well co-ordinated and has been playing summer soccer for 2 seasons but her team has only just started to work out that they can get the ball down the field by working together.

Apparently choirs are really good for teaching “team work” skills.

Thanks Irvine, I think muscle strengthing training sounds really sensible. I will see if I can encourage DS to do some. Actually I should do it with him myself!

Oh also, what’s your definition of “swimming properly”?

DD has also had lessons since 4. It’s only in the last few weeks that she has really “got it” and moved to the 25 metre pool. She can swim about 2 - 3 cycles of bi-lateral breathing. We are in New Zealand though so I don’t know how teaching works in the UK.

Yes, because practice hones skills. I would not have said my dc was naturally able or athletic, however she did love being active and outdoors, joined every club going and learned to stick at things. Now her PE teachers say she has exceptional skill at ‘reading the game’, she has great hand eye ball coordination, daring,bravery, she is strong, she has presence in her position at football, is perhaps the best in that position in her league, and picks up new sports easily.

I like the move in some rugby teams to group/train according to size, so they don’t miss out on summer born talent.

Hi fantail, when I said "swimming properly", I just mean swimming on front and on back for 10m in a vaguely identifiable stroke . DS is truly behind in sports compared to his peers hence my concern that he might start noticing at some point and get frustrated.

Maybe starting getting the basic right is the way to go, fitness, ball skills etc.

I was reading about one of the rowers in the boat race over the weekend. Nobody could ever look at him and think anything other than the fact he's a superb athlete. I was therefore surprised to read that at school he was in the D team for football and rugby. The point is, it's about finding the sport that's right for you.

Thanks everyone for your advice and encouragement!
DS likes some team sports but there is probably already a noticable gap between the skill level of DS and others in his class. Team sports are quite the focus in school, and I guess I just want to help him to have a better time doing them.

The vast majority of children who are good at sport at a young age won't make it as sportspeople in the future. It will come as a huge shock to their parents when they discover that actually their dc are pretty average compared to others. Just find a sport your ds likes and let him enjoy it.

Just find a sport your ds likes and let him enjoy it

The problem is that few people will continue in something that they are considerably worse than their peers, so it's not really as simple as that.

I wouldn't actually want my child to be a sports professional - I'd hope they were too ethical to dope.

KHFC2018 Early sports are mostly anaerobic sports, so those with a bias to aerobic metabolism will tend to do worse, as you get older and aerobic contributions matter more, this can balance the playing field. Even a mile which is the longest you tend to have any kids run is under 10 minutes for most, but most kid sports are really short.

For many sports it's also very much developmental and simple size matters, so being 10-20% older still matters, this also tends to drop as the benefit gets less (although in boys especially happens again depending on age of puberty, with the early testosterone helping others.)

As has been said, focusing on fitness, strength and movement will be enough to make him feel a part of any school team even if his actual skills in the sport are weak. Being able to run more or tackle harder etc. will make up for skill deficiencies.

I'd also look at more supportive personal challenge sports and activities where the process not the result are pushed (e.g. freerunning / climbing / parkrun) that way the differing abilities are not focused on but personal achievement and they tend to be done by ability not by age - although being the biggest in a group can be harmful too.

sirfred your point about anaerobic vs aerobic sports is very interesting! And I agree that developing fitness, strength and movement is the way to go for now.

Will think more about into how to incorporate that into our daily lives.

It's interesting for me too, sir.
I was recently learning about Anaerobic/Aerobic respiration. I assumed all the exercise are somewhat aerobic? Otherwise the muscle accumulate too much lactic acid and all the children who participate in those early sports will be pain? How does that work?

Ultimately all human activity is aerobic, sometimes you just borrow the oxygen from the future.

A lot of kids "sports" actually use solely the ATP-PC pathway and don't even get close to the the lactic acid one. Throwing something hard, kicking something hard, sprinting very short distances etc. Almost all only use ATP-PC which doesn't produce any lactic acid, or anything else you just run out of creatine within ~10seconds. It's why young kids often manage one fast go and not much more.

Lactic Acid itself being the limiter btw is not decided and is probably not, LA is just an intermediate fuel and because LA buffering things work on the H+ protons it's probably those that actually stop activity, and just pumping LA into a muscle doesn't cause pain. However a rise in LA is certainly seen when people use anaerobic glycolysis.

Aerobic doesn't really come to dominate for awhile after starting exercise because it's slow to get going - although it's probably faster in children than in adults - if you use an HR monitor on yourself you'll see your HR go up only slowly even after starting an activity, this delay is likely a few minutes in an adult.

My dd is dyspraxic and for a long time has struggled with sports despite being a physically strong and active child. She has persevered with dance and is now quite good - she has to work harder than the others but is happy to do so because she loves it. She is nearly 9 and it's only in the last year it's started to come together.

Meant to add she's remains positively dangerous anywhere near a racket or ball and does sports day in the knowledge she WILL come last !!

I think it is that simple to be honest sirfred. You have given a good example with climbing. It's not competitive in the way that most sports are.

Thanks, sir, though I wouldn't understand half of what you are saying, I do understand that I was just learning superficial info about Anaerobic/Aerobic respiration.Thanks anyway. I may ask you some question later(or maybe years later, if you are still here) when I get to that stage of understanding!

Yes my eldest was not sporty in yr 3 but by yr 6 was competing in a niche sport at national level and her fitness was amazing which had a knock on effect on her other sports so she was definitely sporty at school by the end of primary and this has continued into secondary. She was doing 16 hours per week training at one point (just in the one sport, there was other training in other sports on top of that plus whatever they do at school).

My second dc is pretty fit but he is one of the smaller boys and struggles a bit to keep up with the top sports players in his year group. However his hand eye coordination is fab and he practices hard and does a lot of sport.

I honestly do believe a lot of it is exposure and practice / very hard work. My dc are all encouraged to be very active formally and informally. Dh is sporty and therefore they prob ably have some natural ability and definitely help to practice. It is a mindset and way of life though, it doesn't just happen!

You have given a good example with climbing. It's not competitive in the way that most sports are.

I really think Freerunning/Parkour is perfect, non-competitive, supportive, but also a full combination of most forms of fitness.

Gymnastics would be similar, but has premature gender splits, much more focus on competition, and rarely has any explicit aerobic elements.

I agree Sirfred Your posts are really informative. I feel that so much of children's sport is now about making parents happy. Most of them dream about their dc being top sportspeople. It's insane.