Reply to Competitive (Club) Swimming -- At what point is it fine for a child to leave a longtime sport?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I have read the entire thread with interest, and thought some about why swim families invest so many years and so much money to this activity as opposed to others.

Competitive swimming is a sport that gears up in intensity fairly quickly (perhaps too quickly).  It is not uncommon for 9- and 10-year olds in area year-round swim clubs to practice at least 11.5 hours/week.

Think about that and ask yourself what other activity, outside of school, your child or any child practices for 11.5 hours a week by age 9.  Moreover, that practice time is spent with experienced and trained coaches, as opposed to parent volunteers in many other area sports.

That much practice early on, with good coaches, leads to many gains and accomplishments early in a swimmer's career.  Everyone appreciates these time drops because everyone wants to see demonstrable progress in their sport, especially one which they practice 11.5 hours/week.

But this much swimming can also skew your perceived advantage in swimming versus other activities, thus making a child decide to "specialize" in swimming to the exclusion of other activities earlier than they should.

Let's say that you are a gifted baseball player, participating in an area league, coached by volunteer parents, and practicing for only 4 hours a week.  Your baseball is perhaps not going to progress as fast as your swimming; not because you may not ultimately be a better ball player, but rather because you are investing more time in swimming with a better level of coaching.

I grew up in southern California in the 70s/80s, a swimming hot bed at that time.  Even back when Mission Viejo was king, my club swim friends and I participated in multiple sports until we reached high school perhaps.  We played baseball, surfed, soccer, football, or gymnastics with the same intensity that we swam.  In fact, swimmers would drop in and out of the sport depending on the season.  If it was baseball season, you might miss 3 months of consistent swim practice.

Do you know that NBA player Kris Humphries (of Kim Kardashian fame) held National Age Group records in swimming until recently?  He was apparently one of the nation's best 9-11 year old swimmers -- up there with Michael Phelps -- until he left to specialize in basketball at around age 12/13.  What if his parents had him specialize only in swimming by age 9, he certainly merited it?  What of his future NBA career?

So why do so many of the younger, 9-10-year old club swimmers in this area spend 11.5 hours a week in the pool, but at most 4-5 hours/week on any other activity?

First there is the matter of time for swimmers and their parents.  There are only so many hours in a day, especially during the school year, so how can you swim both 2 hours a day, and engage in any other activity to the same extent.  It is a perhaps a detriment to young swimmers in the long run that the area clubs have them practice so intensely so young, if only because it shifts the athlete's focus almost exclusively to swimming.

Second, we like progress, and swimming shows us lots of that progress and accomplishment early on, as discussed above.  Add to this the advantage that swimming does not differentiate too much between young swimmers.  The big goal at the youngest age groups is JOs, and that is not too much of a stretch for most young swimmers, especially at 12 hours/week of practice.  (Note that many young swimmers, who go on to great success, may not make their first JOs until age 10.  So do not have your child leave
swimming just because they do not make JOs at age 8 or 9).

Club soccer or club basketball, on the other hand, are forced at earlier stages of player development to choose and differentiate between A-, B-, C- and D- team players because there is simply no room on their rosters or on their fields to carry 2,000-3,000 athletes, as the swim clubs can do.

When we talk about teaching our children to stick with a sport even when they are not the best at it, I think of club soccer.  So many children and their families leave club soccer very early on just because their athlete did not make the premiere squad in the first few years.  Some of the best soccer players develop as they age, rising from C-team players to nationally-ranked ones.  Families in this area do not like being labeled B- or C-team players though, and are often unwilling to stick it out for that reason.

That is why swimming has another advantage, because the coaches do not have to label their swimmers as high-potential or average-potential anywhere early in the process.  (And in fact they should not label swimmers until perhaps high school as so many factors can come into play as a swimmer develops and ages.)

With so many area club teams using many large pools, staggered practice times, and big coaching staff, swim clubs do not have to make the difficult assessments or cuts to their athlete base that the other sports are forced to make due to limited rosters and practice space.

It is not until a swimmer reaches perhaps the 15-16 age group that it becomes apparent to many families that their swimmer is not going to have what it takes to make sectionals cuts, jr. nationals cuts, or nationals cuts.  These good swimmers may top out at senior JOs and that is it.  It is also at this age that the clubs finally have to decide who to invite into their nationals groups -- and for the first time ever perhaps, not every swimmer of the same age, who has progressed along together for so many years, will make the cut.

At this point (15-16 years of age), you as a swimmer may have invested 11-21 hours practice a week for the last 6 years.  You and your family have invested a substantial amount of time and money by the point that you realize that you will not reach some of your goals, and that can ultimately be a discouraging if valuable ($$) life lesson.[/quote]

My 15yo son has been in competitive swimming since he was 8yo. He has two sect cuts as a 15yo and is close to several others. He enjoys swimming, and our efforts to get him to even *think* about letting it go and moving on have resulted in him being very, very torn.

But, when I think about all he is giving up and has given up (youth group trips, Math Team -- the one crucial competition date always falls on a championship swim meet date --, Speech and Debate, all things music -- he still gets marching band in, as it is in the fall and actually a class, so he only misses swim for one practice a week, etc.) it makes my stomach hurt. This isn't about money. It's about having four years of high school to do what a kid really wants to do. He mentioned to me a year ago that he wished he could take a year off of swimming to do all the other things he wanted and then come back and pick up at the swimming level he was at when he left. But, as he admitted, that is a dream.

He's also very intelligent, and academics are important to us. He's enrolled in an AP course for his upcoming sophomore year.

We were sucked in, as this is the only sport he enjoyed at a young age, so it's the only one he's done. He STILL enjoys it; never complains about early a.m. practices, or doubles, etc. He has had NO regrets with not doing other sports. It's the non-sport activities that he misses. It is a hard, hard choice. Right now, he's making the decision as to whether to swim with his high school team this year or go on a marching band trip to Disney World. The trip overlaps with the high school team's championship season. He's tortured with this decision. Twenty-five years ago, I NEVER had to make a decision like this. What do I do with this? How do I help him?[/quote]

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