Hey Youth Athletes, Don’t Specialize In One Sport But If You Must Follow These Tips
By Ken Reed
We have long written about the negatives associated with young athletes playing only one sport year round, namely a high risk for overuse injuries as well as psychological burnout.
Moreover, single sport athletes tend to quit playing competitive sports sooner than multi-sport athletes.
On the other hand, in addition to both fewer overuse injuries and cases of burnout, multi-sport athletes gain from exposure to different movement patterns, and benefit by enhanced all-around athletic ability and the development of more muscles, ligaments, etc., relative to single-sport athletes.
However, there doesn’t appear to be a slow down when it comes to youth athletes specializing in a single sport year-round. As such, Neeru Jayanthi, co-director of Emory Healthcare’s Youth Sports Medicine program believes we should try to work with these specializing youth athletes and their parents in an effort to lessen the negative effects of sport specialization.
“While sport specialization has its well-documented negatives, young athletes continue to pursue the pathway,” says Jayanthi. “I think it’s probably naive to just say, all right, we’ll take this adolescent, high-level, single-sport player and say, now go play another sport. I think you just must embrace and work with them.”
To that end, here are some tips from Jayanthi and other youth sports experts for young one-sport athletes:
1) Youth athletes should train fewer hours per week than their age. E.g., if an athlete is 12 years-old that would be a maximum of 12 hours per week of practicing in his/her sport.
2) Encourage free play, e.g., swimming in the summer and playing various games at recess. The ratio of organized training in sport versus recreational free play shouldn’t exceed two to one. The risk of overuse injury increases when that ratio is exceeded.
3) Kids shouldn’t play up a level or age group. They also shouldn’t play on several teams at the same time.
4) Be especially conservative during times of fast growth. During the adolescent growth spurt, typically ages 9 to 11 for girls and 11 or 12 in boys, young athletes are at greater risk for injuries at vulnerable spots, such as growth plates at the ends of bones and where tendons attach.
“Young athletes should train based on their stage of development, where the most intense competitive training is when they are past their peak height velocity or growth spurt,” Jayanthi says.
— Ken Reed, Sports Policy Director, League of Fans

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Episode #29 – League of Fans’ Sports Forum podcast: The Honorable Tom McMillen Visits League of Fans’ Sports Forum – McMillen is a former All-American basketball player, Olympian, Rhodes Scholar and U.S. Congressman. We discuss the state of college athletics today.
Episode #28 – League of Fans’ Sports Forum podcast: A Chat With Mano Watsa, a Leading Basketball and Life Educator – Watsa is President of PGC Basketball, the largest education basketball camp in the world. We discuss problems in youth sports today.
Episode #27 – League of Fans’ Sports Forum podcast: Kids’ Sports: How We Can Take Back the Game and Restore Quality Family Time In the Process – Linda Flanagan is author of “Take Back the Game: How Money and Mania Are Ruining Kids’ Sports and Why It Matters.” We discuss how commercialized and professionalized youth sports are hurting kids and their families.
Episode #26 – League of Fans’ Sports Forum podcast: How Can We Fix Youth Sports? – John O’Sullivan is Founder and CEO of Changing the Game Project and author of “Changing the Game: The Parents Guide to Raising Happy, High Performing Athletes and Giving Youth Sports Back to Our Kids.”
Episode #25 – League of Fans’ Sports Forum podcast: Physical Education Should Be a Critical Component of K-12 School Design – Michael Horn is co-founder of the Clayton Christensen Institute for Disruptive Innovation.
Media
"How We Can Save Sports" author Ken Reed appears on Fox & Friends to explain how there's "too much adult in youth sports."
Ken Reed appears on Mornings with Gail from KFKA Radio in Colorado to discuss bad parenting in youth athletics.
“Should College Athletes Be Paid?” Ken Reed on The Morning Show from Wisconsin Public Radio
Ken Reed appears on KGNU Community Radio in Colorado (at 02:30) to discuss equality in sports and Title IX.
Ken Reed appears on the Ralph Nader Radio Hour (at 38:35) to discuss his book The Sports Reformers: Working to Make the World of Sports a Better Place, and to talk about some current sports issues.
- Reed Appears on Ralph Nader Radio Hour League of Fans’ sports policy director, Ken Reed, Ralph Nader and the New York Times’ Tyler Kepner discussed a variety of sports issues on Nader’s radio show as well as Reed’s updated book, How We Can Save Sports: A Game Plan. Reed's book was released in paperback in February, and has a new introduction and several updated sections.
League of Fans is a sports reform project founded by Ralph Nader to fight for the higher principles of justice, fair play, equal opportunity and civil rights in sports; and to encourage safety and civic responsibility in sports industry and culture.
Vanderbilt Sport & Society - On The Ball with Andrew Maraniss with guest Ken Reed, Sports Policy Director for League of Fans and author of How We Can Save Sports: A Game Plan
Sports & Torts – Ken Reed, Sports Policy Director, League of Fans – at the American Museum of Tort Law
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