Habits are automatic. They don’t take much energy to perform.
Developing good habits can make life easier. Therefore, every young athlete should be developing as many good habits as they can. It can help in their sports career and beyond
Two main habits that every young athlete needs to have is 1) Time Management and 2) Cooking.
Time management doesn’t have to be complicated. Every athlete should be able to use a calendar and mark down important dates. As they grow older, they can start managing times of practices, and when schoolwork needs to be completed.
Time management is a very important skill and should be practiced and almost mastered before they go off to college. You don’t want them to “figure it out” when they have a full load of college work, practices, social life, etc.
Cooking is the second habit every athlete should have under their belt. It is what is going to fuel them or help recover from school, sports, and life in general.
Surfers are some of the most relaxed group of people you will ever meet. We can be as relaxed or chill too.
Grounding. Surfers run onto the sand and into the water. This connects them to nature. We can do the same by putting our feet on sand, grass, river rocks, etc. We can also submerge ourselves in water or forest. Listen to the wind blow through the leaves or the waves crash on the rocks. All this is considered grounding and can help you relax.
Meditating. Meditation is simply focusing on one thing. Surfers will focus on the ocean, waiting for signs of the next best wave. You can focus on one thing too. It could be a sound, word, phrase. Or it can be a hobby, like a painting.
Stress. Surfing may not sound stressful, but jumping onto a board and riding a wave is stressful. Stress isn’t always bad. Regulate the amount of stress you have in your life. Too much stress can break us down. Not enough stress can make us weak.
Recovery. After the wave, they hop off the board a
Carbohydrates are sugars. There are different types of sugars that can be found in things like fruits and vegetables. We usually associate carbohydrates with baked goods.
When choosing carbohydrates, look at the amount of processing. The more a food is processed, the more it’s broken down and easier for the body to absorb. Take wheat for example. If you eat it straight from the field, it will take a little longer to absorb than if it was pounded and ground into a fine powder (flour).
Glycemic index is another way to determine which carbohydrate you want. The glycemic index is a ranking of foods that will affect your blood sugar levels. You want to consume low glycemic food. However, it's not always bad to have a high glycemic food. Depending on your goal, timing, or activity, you may want to consume a high glycemic food. If you are about to do a tough workout you may want something like a glass of orange juice.
Have your athlete experiment with carbohydrates and how they
There are many elements to developing an athlete. We are only covering 3
First key is time. It takes about 10,000 hours to master a skill. Let your athlete know that it takes time. The brain needs that time to rewire.
Make sure the time that your athlete puts in is quality time. If your kid is spending the time to work on something, don’t waste it with under par work.
Second is focus. As parents we can help our athlete with focus by practicing it at home. An example is to have dinner undistracted. No TV or devices during dinner. We live in an overwhelming, distracted, and short attention span world. Encourage to focus on one thing at a time.
Third key is to love the process. The process is the system of training, recovering, and continuing to put the time in consistently. Learning to focus on the process will allow your athlete to focus on the big picture and not worry about a single game or tournament.
Full Transcript
Hey, David Sabi here with Kid to Athlete. We're ...
For your kid to go to the next level as an athlete, they need to push their limits. We can help as parents, but the athlete will have to push it on their own.
The first way as a parent to help your athlete push their limits is by providing proper nutrition. This can help them to train harder, recover faster, and have better mental focus.
Another simple way to push limits is to set goals above their limits. Help your athlete create big goals that are impossible when looking at where they are currently. Then set more realistic goals that are just above their limit. This will help them focus on the next level.
Celebrate all wins. Big, small, and everything in between. Remind your athlete of the times they could not do something. They need to remember that it took time and some work. Plus it will build the confidence to continue to push limits.
Focus on the process. In the process of pushing limits, failure is inevitable. The more comfortable your athlete is with the whole
Pressure is inevitable when you compete in sports. Therefore, we must help equip our kids with the mindset and skills to handle it.
Number one reason that many athletes buckle under pressure is overwhelm. They become overwhelmed when the time counts.
Two categories of overwhelm. 1) Too many thoughts & 2) Overthinking
Too many thoughts can be distracting to an athlete when they need to focus. Those thoughts can be relevant while others are irrelevant.
Overthinking can overwhelm an athlete causing them to force movements and putting to many thoughts (mostly relevant) in their head when unnecessary.
How can we help our athlete handle overwhelm? Visualization work can help by making situations familiar. So, when the pressure is on in a game, they won’t be surprised and overwhelmed. Allowing them to focus on what needs to done.
Another way to handle pressure is by fixing perception. How your athlete perceives a situation can change how they respond to it. They can perceive
Can you send your kid to the store with a list of 10 vegetables, have them go in the store, find those vegetables and put them in the cart quickly?
Every athlete should be able to know the name of a variety of vegetables and what they look like unprepared.
To level up, know the benefits of vegetables. Your athlete doesn’t need to memorize the nutrition facts. One benefit will work. For example, cauliflower is high in vitamin C.
To level up from that, know how to prepare the vegetables to eat. Let’s take carrots for example. Wash it and eat. Simple. Or you can steam, bake, or grill them. There are plenty of ways to prepare vegetables. The more your athlete knows the better. Especially when they are off to college or on their own.
The goal is to prepare your athlete with the knowledge of a variety of vegetables, the benefits, and how to prepare them.
Full Transcript
Can you send your kid to the store with a list of 10 vegetables, have them go in the store, find those v...
Visualization practices can help your athlete with the mental game. It doesn’t take long and it can be the difference that takes your athlete to the next level.
First, find a quiet place with no distraction for your athlete.
You can do this anytime during the day. I have read it is best in the morning, before the conscious mind fully wakes. Other research say nighttime. What ever time of day you decide, will work. Just make sure you make the time to do it.
Secondly, do what I call “Check-In”. Starting with breathing. I find most people will fix their posture naturally when focusing on breathing. Then check-in with your vision, hearing, and what the body is feeling. Take time as you check-in with each of these senses. Last item to check-in is the mind.
When checking-in with the mind, I really want to focus on that little voice in there. That voice can be positive or negative. Helpful or destructive. Remind your athlete that they need to be aware of the differences. They a
There are many ways you can help your athlete recover from practices, games, and tournaments. Some ways are simple needing no equipment to complex using expensive tools and machinery.
We will be focused on 3 ways to recover: 1. Sleep, 2. Nutrition, and 3. Relax
Sleep is an underrated way to recover. A lack of sleep can reduce coordination, accuracy, energy level, and more. Make sure your athlete avoids or reduces this by getting quality sleep consistently.
Nutrition is a way to fuel up for practices, games, and tournaments. It’s also the best way to recover. Eating high quality, nutrient dense foods is the best way to go. Real foods likes fruits and vegetables. Keep simple. That goes for drinks too. Hydrate with water. No need to complicate things.
Last way to recover is to take a break from the activities that the athlete has been in. Depending on the duration and intensity of the sport will determine how long a break an athlete will need.
Finding a great coach for your kid depends on a couple of factors: 1. Your kid’s age and skill plus 2. Coach’s education and attention to the athlete
Using a quadrant can help determine the right coach for your kid.
Lets start with education range. Educated to non-educated. Education can be from courses, certifications, or formal education. An example of the range, someone that knows nothing about the sport to someone with a PhD in exercise physiology and every certification in a sport.
Understand, a non-educated coach is not always a bad coach. An under 5 year old soccer team may have a coach that doesn’t know anything about soccer. This may benefit the kids by allowing them to play with less structure. However, as the kids get older and their level increases, a coach’s education must increase.
A coach’s attention to the athlete is the other range to consider. I call this “Athlete vs. Sport”. A coach focused on the athlete is best simply because they are building a kid