Wow as a non-American this is all so eye opening. I didn’t realize how $$$ people spend on sports.

Have a kid that played travel sport. We never paid for private lessons and did travel as cheap as possible. Part of that is bc we’re cheap. Kid was interested in sport and made friends and kept him out of trouble. No scholarship but it was a tip in for a HA were he’s thriving and playing his sport.

Anonymous wrote:We are between $25-30K yearly for figure skating, so it sounds like a bargain to me! The majority goes to coaching as it’s all individually coached. She does around four half hour lessons a week and coaches are $100/hr. Ice time and travel make up the majority of the rest.

What is your annual household income? Lobbyist?

Yes but it’s tennis which is a lifelong sport.

So worth it IMO for hours m to have that.

Anonymous wrote:DS plays chess and squash. We spend ~45k a yr. entrance fees, traveling to tournaments, hotels, food, private coaching, camps, etc.

The costs pale in comparison to my niece who is an equestrian.

Yay

Are these country club fees?

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Anonymous wrote:Swim can easily be with the private groups. We are at a cheaper group but considering a more expensive one. Plus, $80 a week private swim lesson and 1-2 weeks of swim camp)

I was never a swimmer, so I don't get what these lessons could involve. Once you've learned the stroke, you move your arms and legs faster than everyone else, and what else is there to know?

That's like saying once you learn to hit a ball with a bat you just need to do it harder and faster than the other baseball players.

No it isn't. In swimming, there is no opponent trying to trick you, like there is in baseball, and no moving object coming at you fast, like there is in baseball, and no decisions to make based on what the rest of your team is doing, like there is in baseball.

Just like in baseball, skill and technique are equally important as speed. Why comment about something you know nothing about. Its a very different sport and kids do swim in teams/relays.

This. My kids are competitive swimmers and have so year round swimming for 7+ Years. They still do private lessons. It could be on things like finger position when entering the water during a stroke, how to get off the wall faster during IM, how to tuck in better during a flip turn, how to streamline longer, how to work on your tempo, etc. each lesson is $60. If you think that because you have no opponent facing you directly you don’t need to polish your sport, you’re wrong -

Oldest son’s AAA hockey was easily $25k this year—team fees; two spring/summer teams; private lessons; equipment; hockey academy; and travel. Youngest starting AAA hockey next year—we are probably at $12k or so for him right now though. We are not in DC.

We can easily afford all this and aren’t looking for scholarships or pro hockey to be the end result. But, we don’t live in a high income area and I’m not sure how most of the other parents afford all this—many/most also have very unrealistic expectations about their son’s future (especially the dads who are 5’6 and shorter).

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Anonymous wrote:Swim can easily be with the private groups. We are at a cheaper group but considering a more expensive one. Plus, $80 a week private swim lesson and 1-2 weeks of swim camp)

I was never a swimmer, so I don't get what these lessons could involve. Once you've learned the stroke, you move your arms and legs faster than everyone else, and what else is there to know?

That's like saying once you learn to hit a ball with a bat you just need to do it harder and faster than the other baseball players.

No it isn't. In swimming, there is no opponent trying to trick you, like there is in baseball, and no moving object coming at you fast, like there is in baseball, and no decisions to make based on what the rest of your team is doing, like there is in baseball.

Just like in baseball, skill and technique are equally important as speed. Why comment about something you know nothing about. Its a very different sport and kids do swim in teams/relays.

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Anonymous wrote:Swim can easily be with the private groups. We are at a cheaper group but considering a more expensive one. Plus, $80 a week private swim lesson and 1-2 weeks of swim camp)

I was never a swimmer, so I don't get what these lessons could involve. Once you've learned the stroke, you move your arms and legs faster than everyone else, and what else is there to know?

That's like saying once you learn to hit a ball with a bat you just need to do it harder and faster than the other baseball players.

No it isn't. In swimming, there is no opponent trying to trick you, like there is in baseball, and no moving object coming at you fast, like there is in baseball, and no decisions to make based on what the rest of your team is doing, like there is in baseball.

Obviously swimming fast involves proper technique that can always be improved.

No, it's not obvious.

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Anonymous wrote:Swim can easily be with the private groups. We are at a cheaper group but considering a more expensive one. Plus, $80 a week private swim lesson and 1-2 weeks of swim camp)

I was never a swimmer, so I don't get what these lessons could involve. Once you've learned the stroke, you move your arms and legs faster than everyone else, and what else is there to know?

That's like saying once you learn to hit a ball with a bat you just need to do it harder and faster than the other baseball players.

No it isn't. In swimming, there is no opponent trying to trick you, like there is in baseball, and no moving object coming at you fast, like there is in baseball, and no decisions to make based on what the rest of your team is doing, like there is in baseball.

Obviously swimming fast involves proper technique that can always be improved.

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Anonymous wrote:My DD does agility with her dog and it's 10k. Some of it, like vet bills and food, we would have paid anyway since the dog is a family pet. But there are also additional expenses like the dog gets acupuncture to be competition ready, and DD gets private coaching as well as dance classes that focus on footwork used in agility. Sometimes she pays she will win a steeplechase with a big purse and pay us back but I just want her to have fun and hopefully this all will help with her leadership skills or something.

Who even knew dog agility was that expensive?!?! How interesting.

+2. What a neat activity for your DD to do.

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Anonymous wrote:Swim can easily be with the private groups. We are at a cheaper group but considering a more expensive one. Plus, $80 a week private swim lesson and 1-2 weeks of swim camp)

I was never a swimmer, so I don't get what these lessons could involve. Once you've learned the stroke, you move your arms and legs faster than everyone else, and what else is there to know?

That's like saying once you learn to hit a ball with a bat you just need to do it harder and faster than the other baseball players.

No it isn't. In swimming, there is no opponent trying to trick you, like there is in baseball, and no moving object coming at you fast, like there is in baseball, and no decisions to make based on what the rest of your team is doing, like there is in baseball.

Anonymous wrote:My DD does agility with her dog and it's 10k. Some of it, like vet bills and food, we would have paid anyway since the dog is a family pet. But there are also additional expenses like the dog gets acupuncture to be competition ready, and DD gets private coaching as well as dance classes that focus on footwork used in agility. Sometimes she pays she will win a steeplechase with a big purse and pay us back but I just want her to have fun and hopefully this all will help with her leadership skills or something.

Who even knew dog agility was that expensive?!?! How interesting.

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Anonymous wrote:swimming is cheap, ice skating is not. I think you can go slowly and just do the group classes for awhile.

My niece's volleyball was around 1k/mo between club fees and travel, and you basically had to be on the club team to get the experience to keep up with the high school team.

All of the sports add up, but I think horseback riding and skating are the highest.

Riding puts it all to shame. Tens of thousands without even considering how much it costs to buy a horse, truck, trailer.

I was talking to my old coach recently and asking casually for a friend about buying a Children’s Hunter for their 12 yo. He said you need to spend in the six figures to get something competitive now. It is insane.

You can spend an infinite amount of money on riding. I saw an article a few years back about the top riders in the U.S., and I think Bruce Springsteen's daughter was the poorest person on the list. The rest were mostly the children of billionaires. It's difficult to compete if you're just a plain old 1%er.

Yeah, I've seen that the teenage daughters of Bill Gates and Steve Jobs are really into riding. Unless you really have money to burn, it seems best to avoid that sport in favor of so many other sports.

Add Georgina Bloomberg, Abigail Lufkin, Paige Johnson, Athina Onassis to the list. Need to have big money

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Anonymous wrote:Swim can easily be with the private groups. We are at a cheaper group but considering a more expensive one. Plus, $80 a week private swim lesson and 1-2 weeks of swim camp)

I was never a swimmer, so I don't get what these lessons could involve. Once you've learned the stroke, you move your arms and legs faster than everyone else, and what else is there to know?

That's like saying once you learn to hit a ball with a bat you just need to do it harder and faster than the other baseball players.

We spend about $5k on club fees and then maybe another 2k on travel for swim meets.