If your kid was competitive in a HS sport, when did they start playing?

[Anonymous]

My daughter loves sports and playing generally, but she’s yet to find her sport. She’s only 8 so it seems like there are lots of sports that she is still too young for. If your kid was competitive at the HS or college level, what age did they find and settle into their sport?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My daughter loves sports and playing generally, but she’s yet to find her sport. She’s only 8 so it seems like there are lots of sports that she is still too young for. If your kid was competitive at the HS or college level, what age did they find and settle into their sport?

Way too young unless you want to do gymnastics or something highly specialized.

[Anonymous]

Middle school through early high school is when a lot of kids specialize. 8 is way too young unless they are a gymnast

[Anonymous]

Lots of sports little kids can’t really play at all. That is why soccer is such a big sport for little kids. The big thing is to be active and to encourage participation.

Years back I followed a thread on a soccer coaches website about how old could a kid be to start playing soccer and still end up a competitive player. Obviously no specifics were possible, but the consensus was that an athletic kid with good quickness, speed and coordination could start at 12 if they were diligent after starting.

Do stuff that is fun and try things out. The one mandatory kid sport for us was summer swim team. We joined one of those summer swim clubs so the kids could be on the swim team. None of our kids were particularly good at swimming, but 2-3 years of being on one of those low key teams for a couple of months made all of them very good swimmers. We did not worry about them headed off to a friends pool to swim.

[Anonymous]

Depends if individual or team sport of course

[Anonymous]

Lots of competitive high school athletes start in one or more sports and switch to a different sport in grades 5-9.

[Anonymous]

My kid played 3 sports all through high school earned 12 varsity letters. At one point did year round swimming, club volleyball and club soccer. dropped year round swimming freshmen year, volleyball by 8th grade and played club soccer throughout but in high school played soccer, swam and ran track and coed vb one year. The only people who say you have to pick a sport is a selfish coach that wants them on their tam and only on their team.

Multisport athletes are healthier both physically and mentally.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My kid played 3 sports all through high school earned 12 varsity letters. At one point did year round swimming, club volleyball and club soccer. dropped year round swimming freshmen year, volleyball by 8th grade and played club soccer throughout but in high school played soccer, swam and ran track and coed vb one year. The only people who say you have to pick a sport is a selfish coach that wants them on their tam and only on their team.

Multisport athletes are healthier both physically and mentally.

One thing your kid had going for them is that one of their sports was swimming, which is an individual sport (so easier to resolve conflicts) and uses completely different muscles with no impact. My kid tried to do three sports that all require a lot of running, jumping and lateral movement, so even though they got the mental breaks of sticking with one sport, they still got the same overuse knee injury they would have gotten if they just played one of the three sports full time.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My kid played 3 sports all through high school earned 12 varsity letters. At one point did year round swimming, club volleyball and club soccer. dropped year round swimming freshmen year, volleyball by 8th grade and played club soccer throughout but in high school played soccer, swam and ran track and coed vb one year. The only people who say you have to pick a sport is a selfish coach that wants them on their tam and only on their team.

Multisport athletes are healthier both physically and mentally.

One of the reasons why single all consuming sports are pushed is because the machine behind each sport, from the top to the bottom, can’t make money if it was seasonal. I live in a ski town, and even the winter sports have summer training, travel to s America for training, travel to a Canadian glacier for training. Too bad you can’t sign up for a club that is multisport and you just switch sports every season.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My kid played 3 sports all through high school earned 12 varsity letters. At one point did year round swimming, club volleyball and club soccer. dropped year round swimming freshmen year, volleyball by 8th grade and played club soccer throughout but in high school played soccer, swam and ran track and coed vb one year. The only people who say you have to pick a sport is a selfish coach that wants them on their tam and only on their team.

Multisport athletes are healthier both physically and mentally.

One thing your kid had going for them is that one of their sports was swimming, which is an individual sport (so easier to resolve conflicts) and uses completely different muscles with no impact. My kid tried to do three sports that all require a lot of running, jumping and lateral movement, so even though they got the mental breaks of sticking with one sport, they still got the same overuse knee injury they would have gotten if they just played one of the three sports full time.

Their kids also did sports where the primary seasons don't conflict. There would be some spring conflict with volleyball, but soccer is going to go much later into spring

[Anonymous]

It depends on which sport, and if the HS which your child attends has a competitive team (JV, V, or just V only)

For DS, he wishes he started on his sport earlier than 12.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It depends on which sport, and if the HS which your child attends has a competitive team (JV, V, or just V only)

For DS, he wishes he started on his sport earlier than 12.

Totally agree. My DS goes to a high school with a very high ESOL population, high FARMs. He joined the golf team his freshman year. He had NEVER played a round of golf before in his life. By his senior year, he was the #1 golfer on the team and was one of the top golfers in the school's conference. The other schools were also schools with high numbers of ESOL and FARMS kids.

We never once paid for a lesson - he learned golf while playing on the team. Although during his sophomore year, he did play quite a bit on his own at the local public course, since it was one of the few activities he could do during Covid.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Middle school through early high school is when a lot of kids specialize. 8 is way too young unless they are a gymnast

or swimmer

[Anonymous]

8th grade.

[Anonymous]

My kid is 10 and trying multiple sports. She hadn’t focused on any one sport and that’s ok. I want her to enjoy it, be physical and healthy and try new things. Not planning her HS sport career yet.